How do you deal? How do you cope? How do you try to understand everything that is happening while you desperately try to get a grip of your reality that you thought would never be shaken up again?

For years, I have seen and heard situations like this from people I just know of and yet it has been embedded in my brain that it wouldn’t happen to someone I know---or rather to someone whom I shared my most crucial moments with.

Today, I just found out that one of my close friends---whom I wished I were she when I was in college, is seventeen weeks pregnant by a guy whom she doesn’t have any relationship with.   

Funny, when you are 16, it seems hard to fathom the idea that this can happen to someone you know because you are still trying to prepare for the onslaught of adult choices that God is giving you while trying to salvage your sanity. In addition, you still try to keep everything the way that it used to be---no matter how difficult it seems.

Normally, people say that it happens because it is considered a usual thing in our society already. However, I tell you, it is very different when it happens to someone you care about deeply no matter how the two of you are already poles apart at this point in your life. You just can’t seem to accept that someone of this person’s caliber will experience a dilemma like this. And no matter who you are, no matter what you are, it is easy to say that you have to face reality but in fact, it is hard---very hard. 

Some of my friends were egging her on and saying that she should just give up the child just because she was not ready. And for a moment, for that one vital moment, I shudder at the thought of these people being my friends. Are we that selfish already? I know that our society is somewhere at its all time low -- dwelling in the level of pond scum but to hear from someone you know is quite hard to follow.

Do we really think that wasting an unborn child’s life is really a necessity just because the mother is not quite capable of handling her situation?

Let me tell you a story of a boy I knew. His father had syphilis, his mother had tuberculosis, and his four other siblings were not doing well either; one died; the other three had what you call a terminal illness. They were never well off and the mother just found out that she was pregnant with the said boy.

What do you think the family did? Aborted the child or kept it?

Abortion is so tempting in situations like this, right? And it’s going to be hard for the child to grow up in a family that can’t even take care of themselves. But wouldn’t it be too bad for the world if that family chose abortion and killed Beethoven?

It is sometimes amusing to know that practicality has overtaken our everyday lives and yet we still do things that we regret in the end.

My friend’s life is her own and I will support her in any way possible. Still, I couldn’t help but thank God that He gave me a life that is full of blessings---a family that supports me, a career that challenges me and a faith that never ceases to remind me that I am not in control of my life.

Knowing my friend, she will sweat this through and I am proud of her. There will be good times and there will be bad, but no matter what I am sure, she will take it head on.

Nice Malijan, is a 23-year-old filmmaker who just finished work as Art Director for a telemovie for Channel 2. She is now currently working on her first feature while helping out other filmmakers in their own projects.

You can reach her at oraclecaptain@yahoo.com.

Media source:http://metrosphere.mscd.edu .