SITTING in the loo in a Toby Carvery at the edge of the estate where she grew up, 16-year-old Eden Tonner stared transfixed at the tenth positive pregnancy test she had taken.
It wasn’t unplanned – she’d been actively trying for eight months – but suddenly the prospect of breaking the news to her mum, Debbie, who was also a new mother herself, was daunting.
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Without realising it, Eden, now 25 and a mum of three, had become another statistic confirming her home town, Middlesbrough, as the country’s teen mum capital.
The local council is at pains to point out that teenage pregnancy is actually at a 13-year low in the town.
However it still maintains its customary position at the top of the teen mums league table for England and Wales, according to data published by the Office for National Statistics [ONS].
The ONS monitored the rolling annual conception rate to women aged under 18 between 2015 and March 2022, and in the North East town, for every 1,000 births, 34.3 babies were born to teen mums.
Hull was the next closest with 30.4, then neighbouring Redcar and Cleveland, also part of the sprawling Tees Valley conurbation, with a rate of 30.3 per 1,000.
Coincidentally, a recent report revealed Middlesbrough is also the worst hit area in the North East for child poverty, where the child poverty rate is 41 per cent.
Speaking to The Sun, one desperate teen mum – who we’ve kept anonymous – reported she was unable to work or claim benefits so with a newborn to clothe and feed at the age of 16, was forced to buy baby formula from shoplifters going door-to-door flogging goods.
This bleak picture in these northern towns and cities, all of which have seen spiralling industrial decline for decades, is in stark contrast to affluent areas in the south.
In Windsor, the teen pregnancy rate is just 5.5 per 1,000 births.
For the borough of Buckinghamshire it’s as low as 6.5.
Meanwhile, for a whole generation now, Middlesbrough has been used to the sight of school-age teens pushing their youngsters through the Cleveland shopping centre in prams and buggies.
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‘I loved being around babies’
Eden gave birth to Parker, the eldest of her three sons, at just 17, after a planned pregnancy.
Speaking exclusively to Fabulous, she says: “Looking back on it now I’d say I support teenage mums, but not teenage pregnancy.
“If I could go back and give my 16-year-old self some advice it would be ‘don’t be in such a hurry, there’s no time limit on being a mum.’
“I felt such a strong maternal instinct and I thought having a baby was everything I could want.
“I’d babysat for family and friends since I was 14 and I loved being around babies.”
We’d been having a meal in the Toby Carvery and I took a pregnancy test in the toilet. I ended up doing ten of them, reality kicked in pretty quickly at that point.
Eden Tonner
She and her teenage boyfriend at the time had been actively trying to conceive for eight months – it had seemed the obvious way to consolidate their relationship, the “next step”.
She recalls: “Even though we had planned the pregnancy it was still a shock when I found out it had actually happened.
“We’d been having a meal in the Toby Carvery and I took a pregnancy test in the toilet.
“I ended up doing ten of them, reality kicked in pretty quickly at that point.
“My first thought was, ‘What is my Mam going to think of this?’
“My little sister was only eight weeks old and she was about to find out she was going to be a nana as well.”
The conversation with her boyfriend went well as she emerged from the toilets – he was thrilled.
The conversation with mum Debbie, now 46, not so much.
“At first she was not happy at all,” Eden recalls.
“She was just in shock that I had done such a thing and planted the seed that I should consider an abortion, but that was just never going to happen.
“She said to me “I’m not disappointed in you Eden, I’m disappointed FOR you.”
“She thought I had thrown away my best years on becoming a mam so young and that I’d be left behind while my friends were having fun.
“To be fair, my mam was brilliant the next day and she has been ever since, I couldn’t have got through it without her.”
I hate the idea that young mothers get judged and blamed for all sorts of problems when they’re just doing their best.
Eden Tonner
Life as a young mum was far from easy so Debbie stepped in, buying 80 per cent of the essentials which Eden needed for her newborn.
Eden’s relationship ended shortly after Parker was born and she found herself living in a flat with her baby son making her £500 benefits stretch out across the month.
Eden, 25, says: “Mam did so much for us and I’m thankful that she was there.
“She was keen that I should still be able to enjoy some of my teenage years and she encouraged me to go out with my friends while she looked after Parker.
“I’d go out maybe twice a month and spend £20 or £30 maximum on a trip to the pub or a meal with my friends.
“Every spare penny I had went on Parker and next to nothing on me, but that’s what being a mother is.”
‘Judged and blamed’
Meanwhile, Eden had to deal with harsh judgement from those who didn’t agree with her situation.
“I’d hear people – usually older women – tutting and saying ‘kids having kids’ as we’d walk past them,” she says.
“I hate the idea that young mothers get judged and blamed for all sorts of problems when they’re just doing their best.”
Eden went on to have a second son, Sailor, four years ago and a third, Sullivan, now two, with her current partner.
The pair are in a stable relationship, he works full time but looks after the children at weekends.
Eden meanwhile is juggling being a busy mother while also on placement as part of the children’s nursing degree she began studying at Teesside University a year ago.
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Determined to succeed
Eden is far from alone in her ambition to succeed in life.
Growing up on Middlesbrough’s Pallister Park estate, Charley Hopper had dreams of joining the forces like her dad and hoped to leave school with a clutch of GCSEs.
But everything changed when she discovered she was pregnant at 15, to her boyfriend of just a few months.
Despite a strong reaction from her worried parents, Charley was determined that she was keeping her baby.
She says: “I knew my own mind and I was certain I would be a good mother. I knew it would mean sacrifices and that the baby’s needs would have to come before mine.
“My family were supportive, although at first it didn’t go down well.”
At 22 weeks, Charley contracted the Streptococcus B virus.
She went into labour and her daughter, Ava-May, was born small enough to fit in the palm of a hand weighing just 1lb 2oz.
Charley, now 21, says: “For a 15-year-old girl it was an enormous thing to deal with. I would never have got through it without the support of my family.
“I was living at home and spent 129 days going back and forth to James Cook hospital to see my little girl as she fought hard every day.
“The idea that I was responsible for that little tiny life was a lot to take in but I knew that’s all I wanted in life, to be there to look after her the best way I could.”
Ava-May is now five and while Charley is no longer with her daughter’s dad, they’ve remained friends.
She says: “He lives close by and is a great dad. Ava has two very loving parents and she’s everything to us.”
Charley is unable to work as Ava requires her full attention so her income is her £1,500 a month carer’s allowance and £700 a month disability living allowance.
Sociologists say it’s no surprise to find deprived and declined towns like Middlesbrough topping the teen pregnancy tables.
Assistant Professor of Sociology at Durham University, Kimberly Jamie, is one of the country’s leading authorities on the subject.
She explains: “Decades of research tells us that teenage pregnancies are much more likely to occur in socio-economically deprived neighbourhoods which are at the sharp end of widening inequalities of wealth, health, education, housing, and opportunities.
“But at the same time women from deprived neighbourhoods who have children young aren’t at significantly increased risk of poor long-term outcomes than women from the same area who have children later in life.
“It’s inequality and deprivation which have the greatest impact on life outcomes, rather than the age at which a person has children.
“Teen pregnancy shouldn’t be a primary concern.”
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A desperate situation
On Middlesbrough’s unemployment-ravaged Grove Hill estate Rev Kath Dean runs a food bank in St Oswald’s Church.
She reveals how the grave situation faced by dozens of families – young mums included – is steadily getting worse.
“Two years ago we were serving 150 families a week and now that figure is around 250 and people are coming here from surrounding towns, such as Darlington,” she says.
“When people are getting two buses to come to a food bank to help them survive, you know we’re in a serious situation.
“We get young mothers coming in here who have been sanctioned by the DWP because they couldn’t make it to their meeting. It means their benefits, the money they live on, just stops completely.
“That’s not just for a week – it can take as long as three months without a penny.
“There are terrible problems here caused by drugs and a lack of any kind of employment opportunities.
“That’s the backdrop people are living against every day when the statistics say there is a high level of teenage pregnancy.
“I notice girls that I used to have at kids’ clubs with children of their own at such a young age. It’s sad because they aren’t getting the help they need.”
‘Drugs are the scourge of this town’
People in the town are used to signs of poverty and crime.
Carol Pedelty, 59, works in a charity shop selling second hand toys and furniture for the South Tees Hospital Trust.
She explains: “Drugs are the scourge of this town, you can stand outside the shop and see deals being done in broad daylight.
“So many problems come along with that – we even see people shoplifting from here.
“You see kids in balaclavas roaring around on illegal motorbikes all the time – even through the shopping centre in town.
“You don’t have to look hard to see this is a town which unfortunately has a lot of problems.”
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‘I’m a good mum’
As far Eden is concerned however, she has high hopes for her children’s futures.
She says: “I think I’m a good mum to my boys and I hope I’m giving them a good childhood to help them be happy and successful in the future.”
A Middlesbrough Council spokesman said: “The South Tees Pregnancy Strategic Partnership works to help young people make informed choices to reduce both unwanted pregnancies and sexually transmitted diseases.
“Teenage parents in Middlesbrough are supported every step of the way to meet their full potential.”
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