Stepping out of childhood, jumping into motherhood

Kenya: “The myth that ‘beauty is power’ is actually super destructive because it tricks young women into thinking that if men want them, they will be empowered, which is, alas, not true. Because the kind of ‘power’ that comes from having men lust after you is fleeting and holds no real weight in the grand scheme of things.”

— Meghan Murphy

Many teenage girls have come to learn the truth of these words the hard way. This is particularly true in areas like Nyando in Kisumu County, where numerous adolescent girls have been tripped up by the illusion of their own ‘power’.

While those who have ‘fallen’ are left to nurse babies or infection-riddled bodies, or both, another lot takes their place, reveling in newfound womanhood. It is a vicious, and unfortunate, cycle. School dropout rates are increasing.

In this mostly rural area, budding cleavage is a sign that a girl is no longer a child. Attention from men is interpreted as an appreciation of her developing beauty. All this is not strange. The tragedy lies in the teenagers using sex to prove they are ‘real women’.

Their lovers believe the girls are young and pure, and the naive adolescents do not demand condoms. The result is an unusually high number of teenage pregnancies.

Kisumu County Director of Population Oduor Onyango says most men are afraid of contracting HIV, not impregnating the girls. “They believe teenage girls are HIV-free so they do not see the need for condoms.”

This is worrying in a constituency where the HIV rate is estimated at 28 per cent, four times the national average of seven per cent. The situation is not helped by the local myths about abstinence, pregnancy and family planning.

For instance, it is said the more sex you have, the bigger your hips grow. And big hips are a treasured feminine asset. Family planning is said to cause barrenness, and reduce an area’s weight at the ballot box. “The men lie to the teenage girls that at such an age, they cannot get pregnant by having sex once,” Onyango says.

He is worried that the trend might get worse because religious groups demonise inclusion of sex education in schools, while politicians are encouraging people to avoid family planning and have more children. Ignorance is a major concern.

“A lot of advocacy is going on, but it will take time to reduce the adolescent pregnancy statistics because the right audience is never reached. A chief’s baraza (gathering) might tackle some issues, but girls avoid such forums,” the county administrator says.

 

It is not hard to understand Onyango’s concerns. On a visit to Rabuor Health Centre, one is greeted by the sight of girls barely 18, either pregnant or carrying babies.

The facility has a youth-friendly facility, built by Centre for the Study of Adolescence, that is a year old. It provides medical care for teenagers from Kochieng’, Masogo, Nyamware North and Okana, which represent three locations in Nyando Constituency.

The posters on the wall of this clinic lay bare the alarming numbers. For instance, new teenage antenatal clinic visits were 415 in 2012 and 459 in 2013. Those tested for HIV were 335 and 458 respectively, of which 13 were found to be positive in 2012 and 16 last year.

Boda boda operators are said to be responsible for most of the pregnancies.

Rabuor Health Centre Community Health Worker Fridah Kwaloi says parents are partly to blame for the unfortunate trend.

“Parents don’t sit their children down to talk about reproductive health. While we were growing up, we used to visit our grandparents’ houses, where we would be educated on matters of sexuality. Today’s parents don’t bother,” Fridah says.

The situation is a mere representation of other counties across Nyanza.

Weavine Otieno from Homa Bay County was impregnated by a family friend who her mother trusted and would call to teach her Mathematics.

It is these Maths lessons that set the foundation for a relationship that left the girl, then a Form Three student at Odienya Mixed Secondary School, pregnant in 2007: “My mother trusted him because they were in the same chama (revolving fund group). Parents should not entrust their daughters to just anyone.”

Weavine, however, was one of the lucky, and few, girls who return to school after having their babies. She sat the Kenya Certificate of Secondary Education (KCSE) examinations and scored an aggregate D. In 2010, determined to get a better grade, she went back to school and scored a D+.

Later, she studied Supplies and Management, and is now a secretary at the Central Kasipul Ward offices. If only all such cases had such a happy ending.

Most teenage mothers drop out of school. Without academic qualifications, the most they can hope for are menial jobs and a hand-to-mouth existence.

There is a link between education attainment and early childbearing. While 40 per cent of women aged 15-19 with primary level education were found to have began giving birth, compared to 25 per cent among those with secondary or higher levels of education.

With the social, health and economic risks associated with teenage pregnancy, this problem needs to be treated with the seriousness it deserves. These girls need the power to make something better of their lives.