RAISING a child that is the result of a rape is hard to do, but not impossible. It's the story of Yanique Henry, 20, formerly a resident of Tavares Gardens.

Four years ago, Henry was raped in Falmouth, Trelawny. The result was a daughter.

HENRY... I keep her because she is mine

"I went home and took the pill," she told the Observer, recalling that she had taken the so-called 'morning-after pill' following her rape. "It (the pill) didn't work out. I don't know why it didn't work, but it didn't."

A few months later, with her body beginning to display the tell-tale signs of pregnancy, her condition was confirmed.
By this time, the man who had raped her had been taken before the court, following her having pointed him out at a dance only days after the rape.

The ensuing months of her pregnancy would see people encouraging her to abort the child and later, to abandon her, or give her up for adoption. But the then teenage mother would choose none of those options. Instead, she decided to keep the baby.

"Dem (people) tell me fi give her weh. Dem tell mi fi leave her a rubbish heap, but I keep her because she is mine," Henry said from the balcony of a friend's house in Tavares Gardens, where she grew up.

But as much as she loves her young child, there are days, the mother admits, when she is tempted to hate her.

"The feeling of the man mek mi feel like hate her, so sometimes I rough her. My mother tell me not to do it so I don't and I try to make her happy by taking her to Hope Gardens and so," said Henry, who currently works as an exotic dancer.

She notes that she has little choice but to do her dancing. It's the way she earns an income to provide for herself and her child, while helping her mother who is currently out of work.

"My father is dead and my mother not working. So I mostly work and focus on the child," she told the Observer matter-of-factly.

Henry was quick to add that she has plans to go back to school and made it clear that the sale of sex did not form part of her work.

"I don't do the sex thing. I just do my stage thing and collect my money on Sunday nights," she said.

Henry shares her story at a time when the island is locked in a heated debate over whether or not abortion should be legalised. The church and other interest groups are morally opposed to abortion, while there are others advocating a woman's right to choose, while at the same time noting that there ought to be exceptional cases where a woman should be able to abort a foetus. Among those 'exceptional cases' is when a woman is raped and is impregnated as a result of the assault.

For her part, Henry does not regret having brought her child to term.

"All my friends are proud of me. I just try to keep up myself and stay strong," said the young mother smiling. "I am happy (about her). She is very bright. She asks me a lot of questions. Anything she wants to know, she asks mi."