My daughter came home and asked if I can go buy a home pregnancy test for her. What?! And before I could utter the next word, she said that it wasn’t for her. My reaction hasn’t uncoiled, and I was still in full DEFCON mode. Who? Why? Apparently one of her friends is late and it is stressing her out. She can’t go to her parents? So why not go to the drug store on her own? She doesn’t know which ones and she doesn’t want to do the research on her phone or computer in case her parents check her history.
So, my daughter and I went to the drug store and I took the opportunity to explain to her what these tests are for and that they are still not 100% accurate. The best thing to do is to go to a doctor and they have ways to assess the situation, including a blood test. “Dad, she knows. These are the very things she can’t do at the risk of being found out.” So that’s a different problem altogether. “Dad, let’s just get it and then go home. I’ll give it to her at school tomorrow.” So, who’s paying me back? “Dad!”
The test turned out to be negative. After a collective sigh of relief by everyone, my daughter asked me what would happen if it were she who needed the test. With the benefit of hindsight, I was much calmer. I paused, thought for a moment and then said that I would probably do the same thing and ask the same questions. Probably more questions. Probably way more questions.
Dad, why are you asking me these questions?” Because it’s a good fire drill for us, too.
But I also inquired why she (or any girl in that situation) would suspect the worst if they are late. In fact, period frequency in adolescents is prone to be irregular anyway. It has nothing to do with the similarly timed lunar cycles otherwise all women would have the same timing. An average cycle can be fewer or more than 28 days. Pinning it on a specific day of each month would also be inaccurate with some months having 31 days.
“I don’t know how late my friend was. We didn’t talk about it. My friend just needed to know.” Well, I’m sure she was happy that life went back to normal. But circumstances that create those events need to be reviewed. I imagine that she wouldn’t want to test again next month. I don’t need to mention that contraception is just a pregnancy safeguard and may not be 100%. And it doesn’t protect from other things. “We didn’t talk about any of that, dad. I would assume she knows that I know.” You know a lot and I made sure of that. So don’t assume she’s armed with the same knowledge. If the results were positive, what would she do? “Dad, I really don’t know. We didn’t talk about that either. Why are you asking me these questions?” Because it’s a good fire drill for us, too. She paused for a moment and realized how justified I was in interrogating her.
“If it were me, and I was positive, what would you do?” I would tell your mother together and then book you into a clinic to have the fetus aborted. “Really?” she said with immediacy. I think she was surprised that I had thought about this and was so objective about it. Absolutely you will have an abortion! At 14, you can barely take care of yourself. Many doors would be closed to you and your education and non-career would be on hold as you embark on a new life. Your education will be slowed and you won’t be able to swim anymore, much less join varsity. Your career may never take off. It would actually be a disadvantage if this happened to you now given all the things you tell me you want to do. She thought about it for a fraction of a second and didn’t disagree with me.
Vicarious living is good as it serves as reminders for things that can easily happen to us!
