Written by
Corinne Platt

Photographs by
Joanna B. Pinneo

"When I first found I was pregnant I was scared like to tell my mom but I knew that she would understand.

"I mean the worst would be telling that you have aids.

"But pregnant and 13 that’s not a very good thing to tell your mom so it just brings me something closer that I could talk to my mom about cause telling your mom that your pregnant is really hard. I wanted an abortion but it’s against my religion – I’m catholic. If I was ever to give it up for adoption the first person I would want to take her is my mom or family members. I knew that she would like take it badly but she kind of hit the ceiling. She was disappointed more than mad. She was just sad because of my age but when she first felt the baby kick she started getting used to it. And now she just can’t believe how big I am and that I’m really going to have a baby. "

"When I wasn’t pregnant I was running away and getting into drugs, me and my mom weren’t as close as we are now. Me and my mom were fighting all the time and we’d always get into fights – verbal fights, sometimes physical fights and now me and my mom are learning how to communicate with each other. We don’t fight. There’s little verbal fights but they’re not as bad as they used to be. Me and my mom have really calmed down over the past months since I’ve been pregnant and we’re just really learning how to communicate with each other, now. I feel comfortable telling her anything. I always like to go out with my mom. We’re just getting real close. But once the baby’s born I know all the attention will go toward the baby. But we’ll still be close I’m sure."

"My mom divorced my dad when I was born. I was raised by Sergio, mom’s boyfriend. When I found out that the guy who I thought was my dad wasn’t my dad I was really sad. I got to know him when I was 9. Then he went back into prison where he was most of my life. It took a while to get to know my dad. When I was 12 he never showed up for my birthday party. He wanted to take me fishing when I was older and wanted to hang out with my friends. We’re not as close as we thought he would be. I need a dad that can sit there and talk to me and be sober when he’s with me."

"I don't know how to act like a mom. I don't know how to raise my own kid and I don't really know how to really take care of a kid by myself because I am the one that's going to be the mom, not my mom's gonna be the mom, its me."

"I would rather be in a school that has pregnant girls that are going through what I’m going through or that have gone through what I’m going through. I heard about Florence Crittenton through court. I went and enrolled me and the first day of school started and I was in. It’s real nice there, the teachers are understanding. You get to eat in class cause you know you’re pregnant you’re hungry, you get the munchies all the time, so they understand. You go to the bathroom whenever cause pregnant girls usually go every five minutes. At the nursery it’s real nice, you have all kinds of swings. There’s always helpers there and right now I’m one of those helpers since I’m getting close to my due date. They’re also throwing a parenting class and I’m in that class. I’m really getting used to school. There’s girls that are pregnant, there’s girls that already have babies that are a year or two and are pregnant again, but over there you could get your education, you could graduate there. You learn everything that you do in a regular Denver public school but the only different thing about it is that they have babies. What’s good about it is that you don’t have to find a baby sitter. School is the babysitter for your baby. The school lets you stay there and recover and get the baby on a feeding schedule. When the baby’s hungry they’ll just go across to my class and they tell me that my baby’s hungry and I’ll go breastfeed it."