17-year-old mum-to-be says baby will be ‘my best friend’
A SCOTS teenager who deliberately fell pregnant by her new boyfriend of only two months said she had always longed for a child and wants her baby daughter to be ‘my best friend’.
Rachel Hendry, who is only 17, appeared on TV documentary Baby Faced Mums last night to reveal her hopes that she will have a friend for life when her first child arrives next month.
Despite her family’s concerns, she said she felt having a baby was the right thing to do with her 21-year-old partner, Chris Haynes, whom she met at a caravan park last year.
Miss Hendry, of Motherwell, Lanarkshire, became pregnant late last year and dropped out of school. But yesterday she said she will go back after her daughter is born to prove ‘not all teenage pregnancies are bad’.
On the Channel 5 documentary, which follows her preparations for motherhood, she said she and Mr Haynes will be good parents, adding: ‘We really wanted to have a child. There is nothing stopping us. The baby was planned. We knew we were right for each other, we just knew we were perfect for each other and it’s what we both wanted.
‘I hope that in the future my baby will become my best friend, when she’s older. I’m very, very excited.
‘Chris has worked since he was 15 years old. He works for the holiday camp where we met last year.’
Miss Hendry has also been documenting her pregnancy on social media, posting images of her scans on Instagram.
‘There are plans for the future,’ she said. ‘We’re engaged but haven’t made any wedding plans yet. I know childbirth is going to hurt, it’s not going to be painless. I’m just happy to be having a healthy baby.’
Miss Hendry plans to return to school after the baby is born to continue her education. She said: ‘I’ve completed my Highers. I’m waiting for the results. I took English, biology, geography, physical education and maths and I’m going back to school either this year or next year to do my Advanced Highers.’
She also claimed that looking after her younger brother Ross, now 15, when he was a baby has stood her in good stead.
‘I raised him for the first few years of his life from when he was two and I was four,’ she said. ‘ Now we both have a good mother who can look after us.’
But her adoptive mother Carol said on the programme that she is worried that Miss Hendry is too young to give birth, although she believes the teenager will be a good parent.
Rejecting claims she may not be able to look after her baby properly, Miss Henry said: ‘I can make soup – and curry.’
On the blog where she describes herself as a ‘mummy-to-be’, she also defends premarital sex, sharing an article in which a young virgin recounts saving herself for marriage only to be left disappointed on her wedding night.
Miss Henry believes her erstwhile classmates support her. She said: ‘My best friend (a boy) is extremely supportive, he is going to make a great uncle. I don’t talk to any of the girls in my year.
‘Of the ones I did talk to, they were supportive because they knew I’d make a good mum.’
Mr Haynes said on the programme: ‘We didn’t want to use anything, no condoms or the Pill because the child is what we wanted, so we’d done our best to make the child.’
On social media, Miss Hendry posted an image of her baby’s 20week scan, saying: ‘Can’t wait to meet our baby girl in August! Baby Amelia Ann Haynes.’
She added: ‘I’m in love with a child I haven’t met yet. Just can’t wait to hold her in my arms.’
But not all the family are in favour of her pregnancy. Younger brother Ross even thinks she should have been ‘kicked out’ of the family home. He said on the programme: ‘I just don’t think it’s the right age for her.’
Miss Hendry is one of a handful of young mothers appearing in the documentary series. Others include Lettie Head, a 21-yearold mother-of-three who is trying to convince her partner to have another baby.
‘I’m very, very excited’ ‘I don’t think it’s the right age’