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SPEAKER: Boy, Minnesota, that's just an hour's drive from Fargo and about four hours from the Twin Cities. But it's that close to the Twin Cities, and it's that much of a getaway. That's a working maple sugar and tree farm with 25 miles of cross-country ski trails. That's if you call in now at the $500 level.

SPEAKER: Last call here for Sound Money listeners, if you're interested in this Sound Money Guide cassette, give us a call here in the next few moments, and we will be able to send it out to you when you take out your membership at the $60 level. Do give us a call. We're at 298-1330 in the Twin Cities.

BOB POTTER: OK. Now the time, 11:15. This is Midday. I'm Bob Potter in the Twin Cities. Our Midday broadcast on Saturday made possible by Ecolab Incorporated and its ChemLawn subsidiary providing institutional and residential services worldwide. We usually begin Midday with a news summary. I can tell you I looked over the newswire, and I didn't find anything on there that was worth your time listening to. So I'm going to skip that. Mark Heistad usually finds 10 minutes worth of news on Saturday mornings. I do not know where he gets it.

I can tell you about the weather though. Skies are cloudy. There is a little precipitation around the area generally. Although, Saint Cloud has sunny weather this morning, and it's 30 degrees. At Fargo-Moorhead, mostly sunny and just 7 above. At Sioux Falls, mostly sunny 28. Elsewhere, some cloudy skies with flurries here and there. International Falls, flurries in 26. Rochester, cloudy 32. Duluth, superior, and the Twin Cities both reporting 33 with some snow in the Twin ports area.

Forecast is calling for cloudy skies. This is an updated forecast now from the National Weather Service. Light snow diminishing to flurries in the Northeast, variable cloudiness in the Western parts of the state today with mostly cloudy skies lingering in the Southeast, highs ranging from 27 to 37. Then, for tonight and tomorrow, it'll be partly cloudy with lows from about 10 in the Northwest to the mid-20s in the Southeast, highs tomorrow from the upper 20s to the mid-30s. In the Twin Cities, mostly cloudy the rest of the day. The high should be right around 36 degrees with a northwesterly breeze up to 20 miles an hour. Partly cloudy tonight. Colder, the low around 20 and then tomorrow partly sunny with a high in the low to mid 30s.

Teenage pregnancy is our topic today. And in just a little while about a half an hour or so, we'll introduce Dr. Betty Jerome, who runs the Teenage Medical Center at Minneapolis Children's Medical Center in Minneapolis. She's been working on this issue for many, many years, and we'll have an opportunity for you to visit with her about teenage pregnancy. But before we get to her, a special documentary produced by member station KLCS in Rochester. It's called When Children have Children, and let us begin by listening to that.

[AUDIO PLAYBACK]

- Hold his head right here.

- All right, next contraction is the baby. Can you have a deep breath?

- Wasn't [INAUDIBLE]

- Hold it.

- [INAUDIBLE]

- Push, 2, 3, 4--

- Coming, keep it coming.

- --5, 6, 7--

- Keep it coming.

- --8, 9, 10.

- Good. All right. Deep breath in, and push down.

- Nice.

- That's a big--

- Nice job. All right. Let's take--

[INTERPOSING VOICES]

- There you go. That was a long one.

BOB POTTER: They say that once a healthy baby is born, the pain is forgotten. But when 17-year-old Heidi recalls the birth of her first child, the joy and relief of the occasion are muted. Apprehension, confusion, these were her overriding feelings. After all, she was hardly more than a child herself.

[MUSIC PLAYING] There was a time when ignorance made our innocence strong,

There was a time when we all thought the could do no wrong.

BOB POTTER: This is a program about what it's like to be a teenage parent. It's told by teen parents themselves. We call it When Children Have Children.

(SINGING) But here we are in the calm before the storm

HEIDI: There are times when I just want to crack right down the middle, you know. There are many times where I just can't even-- I get so angry. I just want to just leave and never come back, really.

BOB POTTER: Heidi is angry because she's pregnant again. It happened within four months of baby Justin's birth. At first, she was embarrassed, ashamed. Neither abortion nor adoption were solutions for her. She would have this baby and raise it too. And, like lots of young fathers, her boyfriend, John, stuck around for the birth of the first baby and is here with her getting ready for the second. How does he feel?

JOHN: I'm a pretty scared person right now. I'm really on edge a lot just because of everything that's going on. I can't see how we're going to get by with having two kids. We're faced with all the things that we have to think about of car payments, insurance payments, rent, heat, electricity, TV payments, diapers, clothes, baby food, groceries, everything that most kids our age do not have one worry in the world.

BOB POTTER: John worries a lot. He grinds a cigarette out into an ashtray and immediately lights another.

JOHN: I mean, I could never see working this many hours for the rest of my life. I've already been in the hospital once from exhaustion because I got mono over it. And, you know, that put us another $2,000 in the hole, but $2,000 now doesn't mean really anything.

BOB POTTER: Two part-time jobs both split shifts and paying minimum wage don't offer much promise for the future of the baby who's now clinging to John's leg and gurgling for attention.

JOHN: I'm 19, and she's 18. And everybody that's our age is out doing everything they used to do, and nobody wants anything to do with an 18 and 19-year-old parents right now. I mean, what fun are they? All they do is sit and talk about their kids, talk about money. And most of them are in college or just graduating or living at home. They have nothing to worry about except for what they're going to wear to school tomorrow. That's just my opinion.

BOB POTTER: John and Heidi have both dropped out of school. They're getting an education of a different sort learning firsthand what welfare is and how food stamps work. And, these days, Heidi seldom leaves home. Her connection to the outside world is a television set, always on in the background. The apartment is clean and neat. As she goes across the small living room to turn the TV down, Heidi stoops to pick up the one toy on the floor.

Keeping up with Justin is harder than ever. She bends with difficulty. Heidi's big with child, just eight weeks from her due date. Her breakfast today, a can of diet pop and a cigarette shared with John. There are lots of times where I've just had to bite my tongue and just say, OK, we'll get through this, especially when Justin's being really fussy and John and I aren't getting along. And then on top of that, I've got all these aches and pains from being pregnant anyway.

[GINO VANNELLI, "YOUNG LOVER"] One life to live

No time to pretend

No wins no loss

No heroes in the end

No dreams no plans

No promises

HEIDI: Some days I just think, wow. And some days, I go cry a lot too, you know. I cry and cry and cry. And other days, I'm happy.

(SINGING) No dreams no plans no promises

HEIDI: But I am a strong person for putting up with this and so is John.

JOHN: Yeah. We have to be strong. We have no choice. If we weren't strong, we'd go crazy. We wouldn't even-- it's really hard to keep my sanity. It really is. I feel like I'm crazy sometimes just because of the things that I think. I feel like I should be admitted to a psych ward just because of the way I feel sometimes. Just because I get so worried and so upset about things that I just lose It, And I can't. I can't help it.

BOB POTTER: Their voices seem flat and lifeless as if they are talking about someone else. They've lived many lives already. In their early teens, both Heidi and John abused drugs and alcohol, bouncing in and out of juvenile court.

HEIDI: I'm not really afraid of anything out in the world because it's like I've already lived three lives, you know. I feel like that. I've been in treatment like five times. I've seen tons of counselors. I mean, I have been through it all I feel like. I've been in jail. And now, it's just a total turnaround from what I was.

BOB POTTER: Looking back, John and Heidi say the first pregnancy should have been no surprise.

JOHN: For years, it didn't happen, you know. I mean, I should have expected it to happen. I mean, birth control isn't always used. It isn't always available at the time that you want to do it. And I should have known it was going to happen. But I was so out of my mind at that time and so into everything else that I didn't really even care, and so was Heidi.

We never really-- I don't even think we ever discussed having kids. We never discussed having kids. We never discussed marriage. I thought it was just going to be just another girlfriend, you know. But it didn't work out that way.

HEIDI: It's really true. I mean, you think everybody else gets pregnant but you. That's what we thought. Not us, of course not.

CONNIE: We call that the adolescent myth. And what that means is that, developmentally, a teenager or an adolescent is kind of at a stage where they see themselves as a person that's able to conquer and manage and do anything they set themselves up to accomplish. It's sort of a superhero type mentality. And, of course, that's a myth.

BOB POTTER: Connie is a public health nurse who has worked with teen parents.

CONNIE: I think, as people become more mature and older and are able to look at where they're at, they have a lot more questions and more doubts and more fears. And that's probably healthy. When you're young and think you can do everything, you don't realize that you need help, and perhaps you're not doing it the best way. So that's kind of where kids can be at when they're having children at this stage. They just aren't looking for the help that is out there and would be good for them to receive.

BOB POTTER: That's the situation that Carol found herself in 16 years ago, when she was alone and pregnant. Now, in her mid 30s, she's a Library Systems Manager, and her son is a junior in high school.

CAROL: From about 16 to 20 probably, there's a lot of things you don't know, a lot. And I think I kind of had that ego that goes along, so much with that age that, well, other people really don't know that much about it. And this is my life, and I can handle it. And it's not going to make that big a difference. And I remember thinking, even while I was pregnant, even up until the ninth month that I was pregnant, that, well, after the first couple of months, after I got used to it, then I'd just go back to life exactly like it was before I had my baby. I think I really believed that.

BOB POTTER: A lot of teen mothers believe that, Heidi included. Their ideas of what raising children would be like came from a lot of places, their own parents, friends, and they say especially television and music. 20-year-old Tammy is mother to a two-year-old daughter.

TAMMY: You watch TV and these people with their babies, and they have no problems. So these girls want to have this perfect little family. And half of them, when they find out they're pregnant, their boyfriends leave them. And it's just they see all this stuff and they say, well, I want that. And then that's not what they end up getting.

BRENDA: My name is Brenda. I'm 14. I'm five and a half months pregnant. It's a big shock, I mean, especially at my age. I mean, I'm only a eighth grader. People that play the parts on the TV screen, when they're having intercourse, it's like the kids watch and they think, well, that's OK for us to do it. I mean, if they can do it, we can do it too. Even radio, I mean, half the songs they got playing just like the one George Michael has out got it or-- I'm not sure what it's called.

[GEORGE MICHAEL, "I WANT YOUR SEX'] I want your sex

BRENDA: Yeah, I want to have sex, and it's just stupid. I mean, god, that's, going to tell half the teenagers, well, it's OK. I mean, go out there and do it. And I just don't think it's right.

(SINGING) your sex, huh!

C-- c-- c-- Come on!

SPEAKER: The contraction is beginning. Let's get our focal point. And let's take a deep cleansing breath.

SPEAKER: Blow it out slow, and let's start with our ha.

JOHN: I wasn't excited at all at the beginning. I thought, oh no.

BOB POTTER: That's right nice and slow.

JOHN: I just had to come to realize that, wow, we are going to have a kid. I'm going to have to get off my butt and start doing something about it, you know. I've got to get a job. We've got to have a decent car. We've got to have decent everything. And I couldn't just sit around and not do anything anymore. It made me really come to realize that my life is going to totally change within a matter of months, and it did. And it still is. Every month it changes, and I'm sure it still will for the rest of my life.

BOB POTTER: In this small darkened ultrasound room, Heidi and John try to make out the shadowy image of their unborn child on the computer screen. The doctors are concerned. The baby hasn't appeared to be growing at the proper rate.

HEIDI: This is like my 10th ultrasound. So I mean basically-- and just like the instinct, when they tell you, it's just like instinct, oh, yeah, just cause you know where all the parts are.

BOB POTTER: As it turns out, the baby's growth seems improved. Relieved, Heidi and John now wonder if this one will be a boy or a girl. Heidi has her heart set on having a little girl.

SPEAKER: OK. You're wondering what kind, huh?

HEIDI: Yeah.

SPEAKER: Little rascal was lying on his stomach. Oh, you sure you want to know?

HEIDI: Yeah.

SPEAKER: It's a little boy.

HEIDI: Is it?

SPEAKER: Yeah.

HEIDI: OK. That's scrotum.

SPEAKER: See it right there?

HEIDI: Oh, yeah.

BOB POTTER: Now that they know they're going to have another boy, they wonder what he'll look like, if he'll have Heidi's red hair or, if like Justin, he'll look like his father. For the first time in weeks, Heidi and John actually seem happy. Talking easily with each other, making plans not only for the new baby's future but for their own as well.

CAROL: You have to be prepared to give up or at least put on hold the plans, dreams that you personally had. The things that you wanted to do are just not going to be that attainable that quickly. I'm not saying you have to put them away forever, but I'm saying that there's going to be a lot of postponement in your life. That there's going to be a lot of laters rather than nows.

BOB POTTER: Again, Carol speaking from experience.

CAROL: There are times when I completely forget how hard it was, except if I get reminded. And, usually, the people that remind me is when I can be walking down the street and see a very young girl who's pregnant and/or an obviously young woman, maybe high school age, who has a child by herself, and it doesn't take much to spot it. And I can see that and think that I've handled it real well, and that I've gotten over all-- the psychological junk that is still around there about it.

And then I'll see somebody that'll remind me of myself, and it all comes back. It doesn't go away, the feelings of isolation, of how difficult it was. My first urge is to run up and just shake them by the shoulders and say, what are you doing? It isn't like what you thought it was going to be. It isn't easy.

HEIDI: I'm sick of it, you know. I mean, that's the honest to God truth. I'm so sick of it. I just want to have this kid. I'm tired of it. I don't know if it's normal to feel like that, but it's like I don't even want the baby anymore, you know. It's like just forget it. Is that normal or is that weird? Nobody else understands, and that's the hard part about it. It's like, please understand.

BOB POTTER: Justin sitting in his high chair can't understand. All he knows is that he's hungry. And if mom is too tired to feed him, it doesn't matter, he's still hungry. Heidi says that some days she falls asleep with spoon in mid air. Today though, the neighbor's dog keeps her awake.

HEIDI: That's enough.

[BANGING]

Shut up, Shadow. See, now he's quiet.

JOHN: [INAUDIBLE] People next door in that house have two dogs. They're hunting dogs.

HEIDI: But that's ridiculous.

JOHN: I know he snaps and barks there.

HEIDI: He does not need to stay out there and bark like that.

JOHN: Look, now he's on top of his house.

HEIDI: See, he stopped. He knew.

BOB POTTER: Heidi is edgy in the last few weeks of this pregnancy. She complains about the weight she's gained, how she can't sleep. And then there's the constant pain in her back. Although she bickers with John a lot, there has been some talk of marriage, but Heidi says she doesn't want to make another mistake. Marriage aside, they know that raising their children is up to both of them. That's something many teen fathers are unwilling to accept.

WALT FRANZ: John was really an exception. He stuck with us the whole time. He was here in the first pregnancy when the days were the darkest, and we were dealing with all the uncertainty. And he was here again with the second pregnancy when it was just like, gee, here's the same problem again.

BOB POTTER: Walt Franz is Heidi's doctor.

WALT FRANZ: The problem that we have with so many young men is that our society and many of us perpetuate the excuse that the guys are sowing wild oats. And there's some element of machismo to this. But the girls are bad girls and women in trouble.

JULIE: My name is Julie. I'm 17, and I'm seven months pregnant. I'm not really ashamed. I mean, I can go out in public, you know, and it doesn't matter to me. If people want to look, fine, they can look. I mean what they say it doesn't matter to me, you know. I was out at the mall one time, and this lady, she was just staring at me. She was just looking at me, and she looked at my stomach. And I go, "Hey, haven't you ever seen a pregnant teenager before?" She just kind of backed off.

MIKE: My experience from my education, it takes two to have a child.

BOB POTTER: Mike is a school social worker, who works with the pregnant girls program.

MIKE: It always ends up the girl gets blamed for any children out of wedlock. Whereas, if they're in wedlock, we had the baby. If it's a woman out of wedlock, she had the baby. And guys, I think, socially still get the old pat on, the back like, yeah you're, cool because you're Joe stud. On the other hand, he gets praised, and the girls are put down, called sluts, trumpets, prostitutes, whatever. And I don't have to go into the language.

SPEAKER: The kids I went to school with, I mean, they're just like-- they don't even talk to me anymore. They don't want nothing to do with me. They make fun of me. And I'm like, I guess, that's just tough luck. I mean, I feel trapped down in a box.

[ERIC CARMEN, "ALL BY MYSELF"] When I was young

I never needed anyone

And making love was just for fun

Those days are gone

SPEAKER: Have you just lie back now there and just come on up in the stirrups for just a second, have you scoot down just as far as you can. Perfect. That's just fine. Just relax. This won't be comfortable anything, but let's just check and make sure that there's no changes there.

BOB POTTER: Heidi says this baby will be her last for a long time. It's a promise she made to herself once before when she had Justin. But the statistics are not in her favor.

SPEAKER: Unfortunately, statistics would bear out that many single mothers become single mothers in the future. And so, hopefully, one can break the cycle by getting a patient in, taking care of them with the pregnancy, and trying to break the cycle for the next pregnancy, helping with all issues from birth control to education to parenting techniques.

SPEAKER: I think we have a tendency when we have kids to keep them sheltered from the big bad world. And this one sign I saw, what your kids don't know can hurt them, I think is great. Kids are maturing faster at a younger age. I think they're going to have to know the real hard facts of life really early.

SPEAKER: A lot of the kids that are having kids don't know how to talk to their parents, and their parents aren't trying to see things from their viewpoint. They're trying to see it in their own head, well, I think this is best for you. And it puts a lot of pressure on teenage kids.

SPEAKER: Who can you get in a room that'll agree that kissing on the first date is OK, and from that all the way up to when they have sex, you know. And I think that's a problem. You get about 40 different ways of looking at it just with adults. So then, when kids see the adults not agreeing, it's like-- when they get 40 different messages on something, they take an average and come up with their own. This is reality.

[GEORGE MICHAEL, "I WANT YOUR SEX'] Sex is natural, sex is good

Not everybody does it

But everybody should

Sex is natural

Sex is good

HEIDI: Me and my boyfriend were having sex, and he didn't have a condom on even though I'm on the pill. I just straight up told him, I go, "You stop right now." I go, "Stop." And he did, you know, and that really-- I was afraid too, but I did anyways. And he did and it was OK, it was no problem, which kind of scared me to say no. But I said I'm not going to put up with this crap from anybody anymore.

SPEAKER: As far as drugs, you just say no. But for sex, you don't want to teach people to just say no because there comes a time in their life when it's real appropriate. And it's a part of intimacy, and it's a wonderful part of life. So just say no, it doesn't work for sex. You want just say no for now.

[MUSIC PLAYING]

BRENDA: I mean, if I could do anything all over again, I mean, I would have tried my hardest not to get pregnant. I mean, you got to miss out like going to parties and going to birthday parties again and going to dances and stuff like that. No, I mean, it's all you're an adult now.

You got to get out there work, finish school, take care of this child of yours. I mean you've got to grow up so fast. It's just bad. It's bad for you because then you miss half your life. That's what really, I mean, scares me the most, missing up on half of my teenage life.

[SCHOOL BELL RINGS]

BOB POTTER: For the time being, Brenda has left this part of her life behind. Instead, she goes part time to a special school for pregnant girls where she learns not only about math and history but also about how to be a parent. She's discovering that caring for a child will leave virtually no time to be a teenager.

WALT FRANZ: Adolescence is such a tremendously important sociologic event in our society that these people miss that. This is a whole segment of our lives in our Western society that we have viewed as perhaps the most important-- one of the most important transitions that we make.

In other societies, it doesn't exist. But in our society, it exists. And it's viewed as growing up, or it's viewed as becoming an adult. It's viewed as developing all kinds of social skills. These individuals haven't been able to do that.

TAMMY: I was really excited with the last three months or so. I couldn't wait to get the crib up, and I couldn't wait to-- I was really excited to become a mom, you know. I didn't have any doubts in my-- I mean, I thought it would just be all fun and games. I didn't know what was to be expected [CHUCKLES] at all. Oh, man.

I mean, I thought seeing all the mothers walking around with their kids. I thought that's easy. I'm sure it's not easy at all. It's no fun. I mean, it's not physically hard at all. I mean, you don't got to do nothing except change their diaper, make a bottle, I mean, quick shake of the hand. But mentally and emotionally, oh, it's just really, really tough, especially when they're screaming. I can't stand that.

JOHN: I would love to just go back for two weeks to the way I used to be and not have to worry about things, but I guess, we're into it now. And hopefully, someday, we'll be out of it after we get through, both get through school and stuff.

[TRACY CHAPMAN, "FAST CAR"] You got a fast car

I want a ticket to anywhere

Maybe we make a deal

Maybe together we can get somewhere

Any place is better

Starting from zero got nothing to lose

Maybe we'll make something

Me, myself, I got nothing to prove

JULIE: I just would really hope that people, young, sexually active people can think in terms more of choice and decision because I didn't. I just let it happen to me.

HEIDI: You think it's all baby powder and little cute frilly dresses until the first time you get puked on or something. Then it's different. Or that first dirty diaper comes along and it's like, oh, no. When I was thinking about it when I was younger, I was always married and a house, a little white picket fence, all that stuff. Now, it's a apartment, not married.

BRENDA: Half, I mean, half of the people, they think, oh, this is a breeze. I can take care of a kid, no problem. I mean, it's just like babysitting. It's way different than babysitting. I mean, when you're babysitting, you got the kids for like two to three hours. When you have a kid, you have them for the rest of your life.

BOB POTTER: More than half a million children have children each year in this country. Brenda, Tammy, Julie, and Heidi are just a handful. Contrary to popular wisdom, the problem of teen pregnancy crosses all socioeconomic lines. What these kids do have in common is that their lives have been changed. They've become parents, now concerned necessarily more with the future than the present.

[NURSERY MUSIC]

[BABY CRYING]

[ALPHABET SONG]

CHILD 1: (READING) When I leave home to walk to school, dad ali-- always said-- ss- says to me--

CHILD 2: No, you won't leave! You dear lazy. Get in bed. I want to use this one. Where are some shorts?

MOTHER: They're all in the laundry right now.

[BOY SHOUTING]

CHILD 3: Why are we doing this?

CHILD 4: Go! Go! Go!

[CHATTER]

[BOY SCREAMS]

[SCHOOL BELL RINGS]

[RUBÉN BLADES, "THE CALM BEFORE THE STORM"] Here we are again in the calm before the storm

CLAUDIA DALY: When Children Have Children is a production of KLSE in association with KGAC, written and produced by Carol Gunderson and Rebeca Gonzalez-Campoy, associate producer and technical director John Gatto, narrator Noah Adams, executive producer of When Children Have Children, Claudia Daly. When Children Have Children is made possible in part by Norwest Banks Rochester.

BOB POTTER: And that lady at the end was none other than Claudia Daly herself, though I don't think she admitted it. It is 14 minutes before 12 o'clock. We are going to continue here talking about teenage pregnancy and its implications with Dr. Betty Jerome from Teenage Medical Services in Minneapolis.

But before we get to her, I do want to remind you that if you would like to order a cassette tape of the documentary When Children Have Children, you can do so by filling out a check for $10 and sending it to KLSE FM, 735 Marquette Bank Building, Rochester, Minnesota, 55904.

Let me give you all that information again. If you'd like a tape cassette of the documentary When Children Have Children, fill out a $10 check and send it to KLSE FM, 735 Marquette Bank Building, Rochester, Minnesota, 55904. We do not normally make tape cassettes available of our programs, but here's an exception. And if you'd like one of this program, you know what to do, $10 is the price.

Well, Dr. Jerome.

BETTY JEROME: Oh, oh, oh.

BOB POTTER: What did you-- what did you think of that half hour?

BETTY JEROME: Well, I worked with this all the time. It's kind of sad, isn't it?

BOB POTTER: Yeah, it really is.

BETTY JEROME: You know what it is, don't you? It's a very sad commentary on the grown ups.

BOB POTTER: Wait, why is it the grown up's fault?

BETTY JEROME: Well, it's like we don't know really what to do, and so we don't do anything. I think the grown ups are frozen. They cop out. Their biggest excuse is that those kids have no business doing that in the first place. And if they just do what I told them to do, then we wouldn't be faced with this. And that's what's been going on for many, many years. And I've been working at the teen center for 18.

And I think it's about time that everyone who doesn't like what they heard today, who feels that they ought to do something about it, and that shouldn't continue, should make a definite effort to reach the young people and to get them to understand that their whole way of doing things and lifestyle, that sexual intercourse is not the safest thing in the world and that you need to take precautions.

BOB POTTER: Well, people have been saying that to kids for as many years as there have been kids, and--

BETTY JEROME: They don't make things available. They still don't mention these things in school. I mean, parents deliberately write notes so that the young people can't get that type of information or care. I mean, any young woman that has a baby and is pregnant again within four months has either not listened to what the obstetrician has to say or has not listened to those people that are there to help her.

BOB POTTER: That was one of the more startling things about the documentary, I thought, was that within four months, there she was again.

BETTY JEROME: But then the ideal is not to bring another child into a family for three years. The emotional drain of supporting an infant and a toddler is such that it just takes all the effort that you can do. And we try and teach that when I go to Africa, when I'm in Southeast Asia, no matter where we are. And to have one baby in your arms and five months pregnant is kind of tough.

BOB POTTER: We have only about 20 minutes with Betty Jerome here because of our membership week schedule. So I to get the phone lines open and have you on the air with her if you have a question for Betty Jerome. She runs the Teenage Medical Services portion of Minneapolis Children's Medical Center in Minneapolis, obviously.

And the phone number, if you have a question, is 227-6000 in the Twin Cities, 227-6000 for Twin Cities-area callers. Elsewhere within the state of Minnesota, toll free at 1-800-652-9700, 1-800-652-9700. And in the surrounding states, call us directly. It's not very expensive on Saturdays, area code 612-227-6000.

We have a listener standing by already. Go ahead, please. You're on with Betty Jerome.

CALLER 1: My comment is the difference between current attitudes towards children having children and a couple three decades ago. Often, these things were hidden in the closet. And not until one of my cousins died did I find out that he had a half sister that was born out of wedlock to his mother before his father married his mother.

But now that these things are open and people aren't sent off to Duluth or somebody to have their pregnancy and delivery, does that make a difference in the attitude of the young people that if I obey that impulse and enjoy myself, society somehow will take care of my kids?

BETTY JEROME: Well, thanks, old friend. And I think that today, we don't punish women, young girls, by taking babies away and sending them off or sending them off but trying to live and be a good mother when you're 13, 14, and 15. The longer I stay at the teen center, the younger the teenagers are that are sexually active.

And the young men that they like are frequently either their age or slightly older. And we've got to get both the young men and the young women to understand the importance of contraception.

BOB POTTER: Wasn't it kind of unusual. We heard in the documentary with the girl at the beginning that the fellow was with her, and they were apparently making some sort of a life together, talking even about getting married for crying out loud. Now, isn't that a little unusual?

BETTY JEROME: Yes, it is. I mean, few enough of these young men like to stay around. And for those of you who have sons, would you like to have them tied down like this? I mean, having a baby isn't something that should be punishment. That's your fault, so you're stuck with it. It's a pleasure, and babies are very precious. But it's got to come in sequence and come correctly. And the old saying, if you can't be good, be careful.

I don't think that having intercourse is so bad. It's just that you better jolly well know a great deal more about what goes on and what the consequences are because most of the young women that I see, the minute they tell him, and the girls will say to me, he'll stand by me. I said, tell you, I know you're not pregnant on this visit. But why don't you tell him you are and just see what happens? And they come back, and they'll tell you. Boy, did he panic. Did he panic.

BOB POTTER: Let's move on to this next questioner. Hello, you're on the air with Betty Jerome.

CALLER 2: Yes. Hi, Betty.

BETTY JEROME: Hi.

CALLER 2: You know, contraception and sex has been around for a long time. Planned Parenthood has passed out contraceptives, and it has proved that It has not been successful. The one thing that bothers me that nobody has mentioned, it seems like we don't press the fact that love is the most integral part of a relationship. The fact is these kids think that sex is the most important part.

There is nothing said about respect for each other and the high intellectual things that human beings should think about love and this relationship. And I think that perhaps, if we put it on that positive note and take away the, well, you don't have to be responsible, just use a contraceptive, I think that's a cop out.

There is a movement of-- well, it's contraception, but it's natural family planning. And I know that this can't be done with two people that aren't married. But--

BOB POTTER: OK, let's get Betty's comments on this concept generally. Betty.

BETTY JEROME: Oh, I think natural family planning is certainly a method. But it's not for two kids in the back seat of a car that are just getting acquainted. And so many things happen to young people that that part is out. And you're right, a lot is to be said for getting to know one another and know what it is.

We are getting more classes in schools on personal relationships and the importance of knowing your partner well. I have two worries. I have not only the worry of unwanted pregnancy but the worry of the sexually transmitted diseases. Our nation has more venereal warts, which we now begin to understand lead to changes in the cervix. And we think cancer of the cervix in young women.

When you call a young girl, 16 or 17, on the phone and say, you're going to have to have a biopsy of the cervix, they panic. They don't like that one bit. And the earlier they start sexual activity, the higher the chances of cancer of the cervix. And they need to know these things. And we've got to stop not mentioning it.

I mean, facts in chlamydia and gonorrhea and trichomoniasis, all of those things are still around. You should read Ms. Magazine. The two-page article recently, they have a big Olympic runner, a woman as a rink Olympic runner. They've got a marvelous article in there. And the relationship between young people has got to stop and not include intercourse.

BOB POTTER: It's about 5 minutes before 12:00 as we continue with Betty Jerome who runs Teenage Medical Services in Minneapolis. Our topic is teenage pregnancy and its consequences following the documentary that we heard earlier in the hour. Thanks for waiting. You're on with Betty now. Go ahead, please.

CALLER 3: Thank you, Dr. Jerome. I've heard you many times, and I really do think you have a message. My question now seems a little different in the light of your last comment. I was thinking that, where has the counseling been perhaps, about encouraging children to have their babies up for adoption? At one time and in my generation, there were babies that were adopted.

And it takes a very strong and probably more mature person to come to that conclusion so that she would be able to continue with the rest of her life in a rather productive way. However, in the light of what you just said about the transmitted diseases and AIDS and all these other very serious complications, I'm sure that many of these children would not even be adoptable, so.

BOB POTTER: All right.

BETTY JEROME: All right. I think you're right, and you gave the key when you said it takes a mature and an adult person. And these are not mature and adult people. These are people that see infants as play toys. And they dream about what it's going to be like, and it's entirely different. It takes a lot of guts and vision into the future.

And teenagers are, for right now, they like happenings. They don't worry about Friday night until Friday morning. And then the whole weekend is there. And then all of a sudden, on Sunday night, they don't have the paper ready for Monday. So when you're dealing with people that really are just not capable of doing that, it's very difficult.

And indeed, adoption would be a delight. There are just hundreds and hundreds of couples out there waiting. But to give up something, when you think you were madly in love with a young man, I mean, to destroy the love part of that union, they see it entirely different than the adults do. And it would be tough. It would be very tough to do.

BOB POTTER: Well, we heard in the documentary one young girl saying that after she'd had her baby that it was so much different than she thought it was going to be. It wasn't like she imagined it all. It wasn't like the song suggested and so on, not like the movies and television programs suggested.

Isn't there a way of getting the kids who are in that experience, together with those who have not yet gotten to that point, and letting them share their ideas? Maybe the ones who haven't had the experience will think twice about it.

BETTY JEROME: I think it's-- I think it's excellent. And I think every high school has the opportunity to do that. When you're not included in the high school, games, basketball, and the football, and the clubs, and the fun after. And you have to go home and take care of a baby, and you're still trying to get to classes and do things. I mean, even if you have to drop out, you should really keep in touch.

And I think those people should be brought in to talk to the other students and say, this is what it's like. They never knew what it costs to pay for diapers. They didn't know what it costs to pay for food. They didn't know what happens to how much food babies really mess up and don't eat and has to be thrown out.

I mean, the expenses and the financial part of this is something that is a surprise, and it's a surprise far too late. And I can assure you that these young women all want to be good mothers, but they can't. They crack, and they break. And they don't have the-- they don't have either the stamina or the understanding and the backup.

If they have real good backup, then it means that another older adult is taking a big hunk on the shoulders. And that's tough too. That's hard on the grandparents.

BOB POTTER: Oh, sure. Back to the telephones and more questions for Dr. Betty Jerome. Thanks for waiting. You're on with her now. Go ahead.

CALLER 4: Hi, Betty. I have a comment. I was struck by the young man's comment that we have to have a decent car, and we have car payments and TV payments and that kind of thing. And I wondered if these young people, after they've had a baby, first or second, are they given any kind of counseling to help them learn how to manage?

I mean, we never started out with car payments and TV payments and all of that. We ended up buying that stuff at estate sales and garage sales. And the expectations maybe were lower, but we paid for what we had. And I'd like to have your comment as to why the richest nation in the world of the industrialized nations continues to have this horrendous teenage and younger pregnancy problem?

BETTY JEROME: I think it's because the young people turn us off. We really don't sound sincere that our nation under the capitalist system can permit people to be homeless and be out there. And we can put them on the dole, and that assuage their conscience. And that's not good enough.

One of these days, all this is going to catch up. I mean, you're going to have to make up your mind. We're aggressive, war-like nation any way you look at it. And we've got money in that, and we've got-- look at them talk about the stealth bomber. I mean, it's just got to make sense. Where are we going to put it? And then you always say, well, the other guy is going to jump on us.

But we have to get very sensible about that. We have actually a number of people that can be contributing members of our society, and we've got to do better. If we can get to the moon, we ought to have something better than the dole that we hand out. I don't know. I don't see them afterwards.

I see the mothers and try to get them on contraception and get the youngsters into good nursery schools and care. But that's expensive. Nursery care and care for infants outside the home for many professional women is tremendous. I mean, you're almost somewhere between $8 and $10,000 a year just for that.

And of course, you can't have television. If you can't pay for it, you shouldn't get it. I know, I'm a child of the Depression, so I've had holes in my shoes. And I know what-- I mean, Easter was the time at our house when you could get new clothes.

[CHUCKLES]

I remember I shocked the teacher one day when she asked what we were going to do for Easter, and that's what I told her. She thought I was a godless person. But those clothes were important, and I hadn't had any for a year.

BOB POTTER: And as far as counseling the kids on the financial aspects of not being able to have it all right now, I suppose that's--

BETTY JEROME: You're going to have to start in junior high, dear. I mean, we have young women that are sexually active at 13 years of age. I've got to talk to a young man yesterday at 13. He didn't know his sperm was real wiggle ball. And I had to point out that it was just as dangerous. The secret weapon is the secret weapon.

[LAUGHS]

BOB POTTER: Let's move on to some more listeners. Thank you for calling. You're on the air with Betty Jerome.

CALLER 5: Thank you, Betty. I'd like to get some comments on two things from you. Number one, on how to get boys-- what your ideas on getting boys more involved in this sort of responsibility. And number two, do you think that parents-- it would help for parents to be more involved in PTAs and in the schooling and how that would be possible, how the community can begin to reach children by involving the family more in the schools.

BOB POTTER: All right.

BETTY JEROME: Well, you go to PTA meetings. My mother was a school teacher, and I used to go to meetings with her. And the people that showed up at the PTA were the people that were good and cooperative in the first place. And there are a lot of people that are just too busy out there.

What to do about paternity? First of all, you're going to have to convince the young women to state who the partner is, and then he's going to have to pay. I don't know any boys that really are taken right out of society the same way young women are.

And if their college education got nipped in the bud and all the money that daddy and mom are going to put into that college education was put into care for his family and he was stuck with it until the youngster was 18, it's a harsh lesson to learn. Makes you bitter. But the young men, as always, have frequently gotten off.

And I have two boys, and the biggest thing was to tell them, don't do these things. Just don't get involved if you can't pay for the cost.

BOB POTTER: Well, it may have worked for your kids. It doesn't work for all of them, obviously.

BETTY JEROME: No, I know it doesn't work, and we can't save them all. But we can say, look, young man. I don't let people argue with me about how I feel about freedom of choice and the right to life group, particularly men, and this goes for male physicians and staff rooms, unless they all know where all their sperm went. If they can't account for it all, don't talk to me at all. Don't say one word.

BOB POTTER: Dr. Betty Jerome is with us. She runs the Teenage Medical Services in Minneapolis, part of Minneapolis Children's Medical Center. Our topic, teenage pregnancy and its consequences. Your next, go ahead. Thanks for waiting.

CALLER 6: Yes, I just like to comment that I think that one of the problems in our country that we still can't seem to get over is the kind of shamefulness that's attached to women, especially, going in and actually getting contraceptives. I just remember when I went into Planned Parenthood for a diaphragm, I felt like I was doing something wrong.

And it was really hard for me to actually go and do that. And you know how the gels are kept behind the counter, and you kind of have to ask the pharmacist for it. And they're $8. And it kind of gives us a message that. well, you really shouldn't have this. But if you really want it, well, OK.

And I think that we should encourage that more and kind take away the shameful kind of secret act of being responsible about contraception in this country, I think.

BETTY JEROME: Well, that's fine. I think it would be fine if they'd put some of these contraceptives in the girls' locker room. We sell more condoms to women than we do to men. They come in and get them because the boys don't like to come in and pay for them. Actually, they don't want to pay a quarter. I've always felt that a sexual encounter was worth at least $0.25.

BOB POTTER: You're on with Betty Jerome now. Go ahead, please. What's your question?

CALLER 7: Oh, it's more of a comment than a question but to compliment the adoption agencies on their handling of teenage pregnancies. 17 years ago, my 17-year-old daughter became pregnant. And though our teenage years had been rocky for both of us, this pregnancy brought us together as we had never been before as we explored the various options.

She chose the adoption option. And the result was identical twin boys. We were totally surprised, as was the doctor, I guess. Anyway, that doubled the emotional overload, and I was really concerned, would she be able to carry through? And did I want her to carry through this adoption? But she said, well, if I wasn't able to-- if I'm not old enough and strong enough and mature enough to care for one baby, I surely couldn't take on two.

BOB POTTER: All right.

BETTY JEROME: I think your daughter is wise.

BOB POTTER: One of the things that the documentary did not get at, and I'd like you to comment on this before we take our final listener question, is what is the outlook for these babies themselves? What happens to them typically?

BETTY JEROME: Well, training for motherhood is not something that people like to do when they're not a mother. And once you're involved, then you need that training. In the high schools, where we have young mothers with their infants, they're getting a great deal. But if you are a young adolescent and you're a mother, it's mighty hard to make you mature. It's like you've got one week to learn to ride that two-wheeled bicycle.

And it takes a little bit more wisdom and maturation and so that there has to be excellent backup for every one of these mothers. And I spent some time in China this summer. And I have to say that they have much more support for their mothers than we do. The communists are way ahead of us. They're behind us in a lot of things, but on this, they are ahead.

BOB POTTER: We've got about a minute left. A brief question and response, go ahead, please.

CALLER 8: Yes, I wanted to make one comment. I heard some people talking about, oh, finding sex with the love relationship. And what I question is, why should teenagers be expected to act like adults don't? Our whole society is revolved around selling both men and women as sex objects, and then children are expected to be far more mature than the adults in our society.

And one quick question.

BOB POTTER: No, I'm afraid we don't have time for that but just a brief reaction to that.

BETTY JEROME: Oh, I could stand up and cheer. I think you're absolutely right. LA Law discussed using contraception in a relationship of their lawyers the other day. And I think it was the most marvelous thing I had heard.

BOB POTTER: Well, at that point, Betty, I'm afraid we've run out of time. But we obviously could continue for a good deal longer. Many people have questions, and you certainly have an interesting perspective on all of it. Dr. Betty Jerome is director of Teenage Medical Services at Minneapolis Children's Medical Center.

Midday is made possible by Ecolab and its Chemlawn subsidiary. I'm Bob Potter at 10 minutes past 12:00.

CATHERINE WINTER: KNSR FM 88.9 Collegeville, Saint Cloud and WNSD FM, 100.9 Cloquet, Duluth, Superior. I'm Catherine Winter in the Saint Paul studios of Minnesota Public Radio. And with me right now is Tom Davis, who has just told me that he describes himself as a professional volunteer during Minnesota Public Radio's membership week. And that's what we're here to talk to you about today is membership and becoming a member of Minnesota Public Radio.

We're here for just a few minutes, and then coming up at about 20 minutes past the hour will be Mark Hystad with the Week in Review. On the Week in Review today, Mark's going to be talking about the significance of the Bush appointments. And there will be an extended piece as well on health care in prisons in America, including some talk about AIDS in the prisons.

And then on the lighter side, Mark plans on bringing up a piece about the first hang glider flight across the continent. But for now, what we'd like to talk with you about just for a few minutes is membership and how important it is to become a member of Minnesota Public Radio. You can call in right now. We've got dozens of volunteers downstairs. And you can call in at 298-1330 in the Twin Cities or 1-800-228-7123 from anywhere around the state.

And as I said just a minute ago, with me is Tom Davis. Tom has been sort of coordinating all the people who are handling the phones downstairs and has been here all morning on a Saturday. And Tom, the question that I have for you is what in the world is it about Minnesota Public Radio that makes you come in and devote so much of your time to it?

TOM DAVIS: Well, I think the first thing is that several years ago, I made that first initial commitment to come down to Minnesota Public Radio and to answer phones. They're just all normal people like you and I down there on those phones. And I was very, very impressed that first time by the level of commitment of everybody at the station, everybody from on-air people to the engineering staff to some of the artistic staff. Even the administrative people downstairs have a level of commitment.