For most people, finding out they are pregnant is a cause for celebration. But what about if you are only 16? How does it feel to give birth when you’re still a child yourself?

Today we are staying closer to home with a post from Jo Middleton. As well as being Cuddledry’s Marketing Manager, Jo is mum to two gorgeous girls and blogs as Slummy Single Mummy. Here Jo shares her birth story…

I was just 17 when my first daughter, Bee, was born. Her dad, Jonathan, was a year younger than me and was still at school until about three weeks before she was born. At the time I didn’t think too much about my circumstances, and obviously felt incredibly grown up and mature, as you do when you’re a teenager. Now Bee is a teen herself and I am beginning to realise just how much of a child I really was!

A little while ago, sorting through some photos, I came across a short birth report I had written at the time, fourteen years ago now. I read it and can imagine myself there, but it sounds like another person. A child. In some ways it makes me sad to think about how much growing up I must have done in such a short space of time, but at the same time it has an enviable casualness to it, a laid back, take-it-in-your-stride attitude that we often lose as adults.

So in the name of self reflection I have reproduced it here. Unedited. Even though parts of it did make me cringe a bit. I started having contractions at about 3am on the Saturday morning but the report starts when I went into hospital at around 7.30pm, when I was having contractions every 4-5 minutes….

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