Teen Mom
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Teen Mom
Stress from school, work, and home are enough to drive any high school student insane; however, imagine adding the stress of a baby. Teen pregnancy is now becoming more common in today society. The struggles that these young moms are faced with are not often seen by other teens. However, MTV paired up with four teen moms to show others what life is really like when you have a baby at the age of sixteen. Over the last two seasons Maci, Farrah, Amber, and Caitlin have shared their stories with millions across the states. Throughout this paper I will be discussing how transitioning, honesty and truthfulness, self-esteem, interpersonal validation, stereotypes, and self-presentation tied in with this weeks season finally of Teen Mom.
The first concept transitioning was demonstrated by all four of the teen moms. As read in chapter one transitioning is defined as “passage from one form, style, or place to another.” In the final episode of the season, as well as episodes throughout, we see how the girls went from being carefree teen living each day with support from their parents to a parent themselves.
Found in chapter two is the second concept honesty and truthfulness. This term is defined as “telling the truth and not withholding the truth.” Early in the first season we find one of the young couples, Maci and Ryan, having relationship differences. As a result, as seen in the finally the couple decides to go their separate ways. However, in the end both Ryan and Maci decide to be honest and truthful with one another to do what is best for their son Bentley. Doing so, we see that the battle for custody is not as difficult as the young parents were making it to be.
The concept self-esteem is found in the third chapter. Self-esteem is defined as “the value or worth a person places on him-or herself.” Caitlin and Tyler decided to place their daughter up for adoption in the beginning of the first season. Throughout the show we see Caitlin having self-esteem issues with herself about their adoption plan. She tries finding inspiration in knowing that their daughter Carly is now with a loving family who can financially support her and tend to her everyday needs. In the final episode when Caitlin and Tyler get to see Carly a year after her birth. This visitation lifted the couples self-esteem when they realize they done the right thing by giving their daughter the life they could not.
Interpersonal validation is defined as “the times when someone else offers to help us expresses interest in us, or supports us.” I felt that this concept coming from chapter four also tied in with the last episode. Farrah, whose boyfriend and father of her daughter Sophie died in a car accident, was in much need of support. Although Farrah and her mom did not see eye-to-eye a majority of the time we see the two put their differences to the side