So that brings me to this. A dear little buddy of mine in Concepcion Huista, Reina (who is Doña Rosa's daughter, the sister of 2 of my ex-students back in the Peace Corps days, and Andres' cousin). Reina is a short, stocky little gal of about 17 years old who dropped out of 8th grade last year. That whole family is pretty unique - 7 girls (incl. Reina) and 1 boy (Rafa who was one of my students and pretty much the worst student I ever had although we're friends now :) Dad is in the US and has been for several years. Doña Rosa gave birth to her 1st daughter in the mountains of northwestern Guatemala while fleeing from the army during the war in the 80s - she is hardcore. Her 2nd oldest daughter, Juana, is in the US, too, and left behind 2 young daughters in Doña Rosa's care.



Aaaanyway, I saw Reina in December and she looked as usual. The girls had sort of spread out recently from Doña Rosa's house with Reina and Gabi living at Maria's house, Doña Rosa's eldest daughter, and the other girls somewhere between the two. Well I guess Reina was, like, 8 months pregnant because a few weeks ago it was reported via Andres' sister who lives in Concepcion that Reina had just had a kid. I was like, What!? Apparently Doña Rosa didn't even know her daughter was pregnant and Maria, Reina's older sister, was also only let in the know once she had to go to the hospital. Yikes.

I guess Doña Rosa was then found crying inconsolably, for good reason, about the state of her family. Everyone in their family is precious, of course, and at the same time so much pain is caused by having too many kids and not having access to family planning education or resources.

Reina's other older sister, Guadalupe (who was in my Peace Corps-era classes, too) became pregnant and forced to marry the baby's father, even though - according to the family, she totally didn't want to. In fact, I heard the guy she was "getting back at" by being with her future baby's father was so heartbroken he wrote a song, in traditional Popti' language and instruments, about her which plays on local radio. This is lore passed to the gringa, so grain of salt here. Point is, I wish these kids got some information about developing healthy relationships, family planning, self-esteem.

And Juana, leaving behind 2 daughters, now with 2 more in the US... And the dad apparently has kids in the states, too... plus the 8 in Concepcion who don't have all their needs met.

I don't mean to criticize this family, just to illustrate the web that is woven by denying education and resources to people. Sure, as the PBS article linked above says, many indigenous people in Guatemala believe that they should have as many children as God gives them, but I know that many don't. I know of rural and indigenous women who have to plead with their husbands to keep their family size around 3-4 kids. Women who are conscious of the link between healthy children, number of children and their income.

And what I know comes from working with the kids in the junior high over a couple of years, most recently last fall. The 9th grade students knew literally nothing about sexual health, anatomy, family planning. I'm talking about 18 year olds. They were so misinformed it was scary. They all told me no one tells them about this stuff, and for that reason they were physically on the edge of their seats during the sex ed day of my health program.

I feel extremely privileged to have been given information at a young age about relationships and family planning in public school. I realize information and education doesn't help every unplanned or teenage pregnancy, but there's got to be something better for these girls in Guatemala who are actually denied information and where misinformation and machismo rule.