TERRY

Terry
My name is Terry.

JCH
How old is your son?

Terry
He's three. He'll be four in March.

JCH
How old were you when you became a parent?

Terry
I was twenty.

JCH
What was your reaction when you found out you were going to be a dad?

Terry
Happy.

JCH
How did becoming a dad change your life?

Terry
It makes you grow up really fast. You don't have time to be a kid, doing stuff that you like to.

JCH
What was your life like before he came into it?

Terry
I was always out, hanging out with my friends, going to the movies and what not. Having a kid, you have to take responsibility. You can't go out and do all of the stuff you did beforehand.

JCH
Did it change your approach to life?

Terry
It just gave me more responsibilities than I already had.

JCH
Tell me about that.

Terry
You have to be able to provide for your kid. You've got to go out and get a job so you have money to support him.

JCH
Tell me about how it affected your school.

Terry
It was more important for me to provide for my son than go to school so I never finished school.

JCH
And now?

Terry
And now I'm going to Job Corp so I can get my high school diploma.

JCH
Why?

Terry
So I can get a better job to support my son better.

JCH
Is that important?

Terry
Yeah.

JCH
Why?

Terry
With today's society now, a lot of people without high school diplomas or GED's don't have good paying jobs. With a high school diploma the chances are a lot better that you're going to get a better job.

JCH
How did your friends react when they found out you were a dad?

Terry
I basically lost all of my friends as soon as I became a dad.

JCH
Why?

Terry
I wasn't hanging out with them and partying with them. I didn't do the things that they like to do because I had responsibilities and my son came before anybody else.

JCH
How did that make you feel?

Terry
It made me depressed but at the same time I'm not going to just put my son on the back burner and forget about him. My son comes before anybody.

JCH
Tell me a little bit about the depression. What was that experience? What did that come from? What did it do?

Terry
It just made me feel like I was all alone. I didn't have anybody to go out with.

JCH
It was tough.

Terry
Yeah.

JCH
What would you say to other teens, to guys in particular? What kind of message can you send?

Terry
Well, there is no protection that is 100 % safe. There's always that chance that you can get the girl pregnant. If you become a dad you have to take responsibility. You have to go out and get a job so you can support your son or daughter. You have to provide for them for 18 plus years and it's hard.

JCH
Why is it hard?

Terry
Because kids are expensive.

JCH
Talk to me a little bit more about that.

Terry
Well, you have the cost of diapers, day care if need be, food and then medical bills.

JCH
It's a lot.

Terry
Uh-huh.

JCH
Tell me about your day. What is your day like when you have your son?

Terry
Depending on the age of your kid, you get up early, you basically don't have any time to yourself. You always have to, when you're a parent, take your child along with you and keep them entertained and what not and then when they're sick or cranky they keep you up all night so you don't get any sleep.

JCH
Do you think teens today realize what it takes to be a parent?

Terry
No.

JCH
Why?

Terry
I guess because they haven't experienced it. That's why taking a parenting class is good for all kids, then they get a better outlook on what being a parent is like.

JCH
Did you have any idea what it would be like to be a parent?

Terry
Kind of, because my mom had a day care so I was around little kids almost all of my life.

JCH
But was it the same when...?

Terry
No. It was totally different.

JCH
Tell me about that.

Terry
When it's your own it makes you grow up a lot faster because you have to take on so many responsibilities. You can't just like put it off if it was someone else's child.

JCH
Does your child live with you?

Terry
No. He lives with his mom.

JCH
And how does that make you feel?

Terry
It's hard because I miss seeing him. It makes me want to leave and go back and be home with him, but being at Job Corp, I know I'm going in the right direction to be able to support him better.

JCH
Is it tough having him live with somebody else and have another male role model in his life?

Terry
Yeah, to a certain extent. All I look for is to make sure that the guy treats my son's mom with respect and treats my son good and doesn't beat him.

JCH
Send a message to a teenager about teenage pregnancy to help them think about maybe not doing it, or give them some idea what they are in for. What would you tell that teen?

Terry
The best way to deal with it is not to have sex at all because if you do get pregnant you will have a lot of responsibility that you may not be ready for. If you're sixteen, it's going to be hard for you to go to school and work enough hours to make enough to support the child.

JCH
How does having to pay child support affect your life?

Terry
Paying child support takes a lot of money away from you but you know that your child is being provided for.

JCH
And that's important? Why?

Terry
Yeah, that's important so your child can have clothes, be fed, have a roof over his head.

JCH
You can't just get out of it either. Tell me about that.

Terry
It's mandatory by the states to pay child support if you're not together with the mother and if you're working, they automatically take it out of your paychecks so you never see it.

JCH
What's it like getting the pay check at the end of the two week period or one period and it's just a pittance of what you may have been expecting.

Terry
You have to work really hard, work a lot of hours and to make up for the child support taken out of your pay checks, you'll have to work a lot of over time and what not to make up the difference and a lot of employers don't like paying for a whole bunch of over time.

JCH
What has being a teenage dad been for you?

Terry
It's been hard because when I became a dad I was only twenty and all of my friends didn't like the idea because I wasn't out partying and having fun with them, so I lost all of my friends. I had to take my responsibilities and be a dad.

JCH
And what does it mean to you?

Terry
I've always liked being a dad but it's hard taking all of the responsibilities that come with having a child. You can't go out and do all the stuff that you used to and what not. You're tied down to supporting your child or children.

JCH
Talk to me about your feelings about having some one else taking care of your child.

Terry
It's hard accepting the fact that another male will be a father figure because you're not there or you're not together with the mom, so it's hard. It makes you feel like you're not doing a good job. You just want to make sure that the guy that is with your child's mother treats both of them good and doesn't abuse them. I'm going to teach my son to respect girls, to treat them right and to take responsibility for what he does.

JCH
Do you think a lot of teens don't think about that?

Terry
I know a lot of teens think that condoms or birth control are 100 percent safe and they're not.

JCH
No, they aren't.

Terry
I know from personal experience.