EXPECTING CARE
When Arianna walked into a church basement in Austin to take a free pregnancy test, she thought of it as a lark, a way to kill time during the long, dull days of life as a street kid. About a month before, she had run away from the Austin Oaks mental health facility and was now living with her boyfriend in an alley near the Texas Capitol. The idea of being pregnant was laughable.
“It was just laughs and giggles while we were waiting in line,” she said.
Afterward, she remembers one of the volunteers, an older woman, pulling her aside and telling her she was pregnant.
Arianna, who asked that her last name not be used, said her first reaction was to “freak out.” Caught between denial and panic, she was saddened by the realization that she was no longer a kid. At the same time, she was exhilarated.
“The moment you find out you’re pregnant, you don’t feel lonely, you don’t feel sad, you don’t feel angry,” she said. “You feel loved already.”
“People are scared because of the state we live in and the messages we have. And we have people who will literally go after you. I think it’s a legitimate fear.”
Arianna was 16. Three years earlier, Child Protective Services had removed her from her great-grandmother’s home and put her into Texas’ deeply troubled foster-care system. As unstable as living with her relatives had been, foster care was also chaotic and traumatic. Feeling as if no one was on her side, she ran away and spent about a month on the street before CPS learned where she was. Her caseworker drove across the state to pick her up and return her to the
