Teen Parents Warn Others of Realities of Sex

There was a time when Adan Chamul would do anything to get a girl to fall for a line. His friends told him it was the thing to do and they liked to go to junior high schools where their luck was the best.

Adan was at Pacoima Junior High School on Monday, but with a very different motive.

“I wanted to tell girls not to fall for the guys’ lines,” said Adan, 18, and now the father of a baby girl.

Through a program run by El Nido Family Services, which has an office in Pacoima, eight teen-age parents--seven girls and Adan--have been visiting junior high schools in the northeast San Fernando Valley to give the younger students the benefit of their experience.

Since February, they have been trying to shatter the fantasy of having sex by talking to 1,700 students in health classes and assemblies about the realities of family conflicts, the pain of labor and the constant nights of broken sleep.

After a brief introduction by Alexandra Tobeck of El Nido, Adan and 17-year-old mother Karen Johnson of Panorama City sat side by side in front of a health class of about 20 students. They spoke plainly about how their lives have been forever changed since they became parents.

“I lost all my friends when I got pregnant,” said Karen, who had a baby boy last October.

“I don’t regret not having an abortion,” she said. “I regret having sex at an early age. I sometimes regret not thinking about adoption, and giving him a better life than I had.”

But Karen has kept the baby, perhaps out of stubbornness. Participating in the panel with other teen parents has helped her to look at her life more closely.

“It taught me to really think about what I’m doing,” Karen said.

What Adan and Karen had to say had a big impact on the class, said teacher Cornelia Romey. The quiet that fell over the room as the two told their story was unusual. The students were paying attention, shyly raising their hands to ask questions throughout the program.

“Can you imagine having to go home today and tell your parents, ‘Oh, by the way, I’m pregnant,’ ” Tobeck asked. The entire class gasped. One student made a clicking noise with his mouth, like a shotgun being loaded.

“I think having a baby is worse than dying,” Karen Rivas, 17, of Panorama City, told another of Romey’s classes.

She said she was in labor five days before giving birth to a daughter, now 1 year and 10 months old. “It hurts so much you can’t even breathe,” Karen Rivas said.

Tobeck cautions that not just one talk can change someone’s opinion about sex. But she said surveys and letters written to the teen-age parents have shown that the frank discussions have an impact.

“I learned that at this age you don’t have to have sex to have fun,” one student wrote.

“Now, I really don’t want to have sex until I’m married,” wrote another.

“Many see only the ‘romance’ of a doll-like baby, not the hardships which will take over their lives,” a Pacoima Junior High School teacher wrote.