Where it all began...

11 months ago, I sat with my now ex partner and cried. I’d just found out I was pregnant. I was over the moon. It was a moment I’d always dreamt of happening. The timing wasn’t perfect, I’ll hold my hands up to that. I’d just started my second go at college, two weeks into a dance course that I now knew I’d inevitably have to leave.

I was scared, I was only 17 at the time. Which sounds crazy young I’ll admit, but to me I didn’t feel young at all. My partner was several years older than me and I had been working in the months before starting college again. Growing up it was just me and my mum, so I’ve always been around adults and had considered myself one for some time.

For the majority of my pregnancy it never even crossed my mind that someone might consider me a young or teen mum. It was only when I became single at seven months pregnant that the idea even occurred to me. For me it felt very natural to be having a baby.

Three months into motherhood and I can admit that, although being a mother is almost a second nature to me, maybe it wasn’t the right time at all.

I remember so vividly sobbing into my exes arms, listening to David Attenborough’s calming voice whispering from the tv in front of us. You almost expect that finding out something so life changing would be some kind of movie-like moment, or at least I did. It was simply a mundane, real moment. But nevertheless it was beautiful to me.

However, it wasn’t quite as calming as it could of been. In the back of my mind grew panic. Mainly because now I had to tell my mum. Who did throw a tea towel at me when she found out... but that’s another story.

I was a little sad that she wasn’t here to experience this. She’s more than just a mother to me. She’s a best friend and a role model all mixed into one wonderful concoction. I’d always imaged experiencing this moment with her somewhere near by.

She was in Scotland at the time. My partner and I, who had been living with her back then, finally had the house to ourselves for a few days and -Oh god I am an awful daughter, aren’t I. She didn’t know what was waiting for when she returned home.

It’s insane how ignorant I was at the time. I loved my partner so much, we’d talked about having a family one day, many times and I figured were just getting things started a few years early. I had always wanted kids young... maybe not just yet. But I thought that we’d be like any other couple having a baby.

Looking back I might have been living in a fantasy, as things with my partner were never that simple. Maybe being with another man might have made things more generic and easy. But having children unexpectedly is never that easy.

When I first became a single mum-to-be, I felt almost ashamed, that I’d failed somehow. Being so young, I already heavily feared people would perceive me as a bad mum, I couldn’t bare to think that people might judge me even more now.

Only upon becoming a mum myself did I realise that nothing can prepare you for motherhood. Planned pregnancy or partner, neither actually define you as a good mother. And really without all the difficulties I’ve faced since that moment, 11 months ago, I wouldn’t even be a fraction of the mum I am able to be today.