Many parents would despair at the thought of their 15-year-old daughter becoming pregnant.
But Soya Keaveney’s mother Janis takes a more positive view.
The unemployed 48-year-old says Soya, whose baby with boyfriend Jake Gray, 17, is due in January, will make a ‘wonderful mother’.
Too much, too young? Seen posing in revealing clothes at just 12, Soya is now 16-weeks pregnant at just 15
Not to mention that the new arrival means the family will be handed a bigger council house.
Mrs Keaveney has already attracted accusations of encouraging the premature sexualisation of her daughter.
Aged just 12, Soya was posing provocatively in a bikini for pictures her mother later posted on the internet in the belief it would launch the youngster’s modelling career.
Model aged 12: Soya in a provocative adult pose
Despite the images bringing a deluge of twisted emails from ‘strange men’, they were not the last.
With her mother’s full approval, the pre-teen Soya donned false nails and a belly button piercing and struck glamour-girl poses for a magazine spread.
In it she said she dieted and worked out daily in an effort to be like her idol, Cheryl Cole.
Last night – with her modelling dreams now on hold – Soya proudly posted a scan of her unborn baby on her Facebook page, writing: ‘Don’t see what the big fuss is. Being pregnant doesn’t mean your (sic) a slut especially to someone who you have been in a long term relationship with!’
Her mother, meanwhile, said: ‘I’m just totally blown away by this. I don’t understand what the big fuss is about.’
She declined to say anything more, directing the Mail to PR adviser Katy Brent and adding that the family would entertain bids for media interviews when Soya returns from a holiday with her boyfriend and his family in the Spanish resort of Majorca.
In an earlier interview, however, she insisted her daughter – who said she was taking the contraceptive pill and had refused to consider an abortion – would teach her unborn child the same discipline she had been shown while growing up.
As a mother, Mrs Keaveney said she had been strict but understanding. Her daughter’s boyfriend was allowed to stay overnight in the family home in Thornaby, Cleveland, but only in separate bedrooms and that is how it would remain until she is 16.
Heavily coated in make up, Soya's mother Janis says she trusts her daughter completely and will be a wonderful mother
‘I know people may think that I’m laying down the law after the horse has bolted,’ she told The Sun. ‘But Soya won’t be sharing a bed with Jake under my roof until she’s turned 16 in January.
‘I’m very strict about that. I know they’re very much in love but the law is the law.’
Proud: Mother Janis Keaveney says she 'dosnt understand what the big fuss is about'
In the meantime the family – which includes Soya’s sisters, 20-year-old Coco and Ritzy, 18, and twin brother Tarot – are preparing to move to a bigger council house.
‘Our three-bedroomed place was already over-crowded with her sisters, her brother Tarot, Jake and one of her sister’s babies,’ Mrs Keaveney said.
‘Once the new baby comes the council will have to find us a place with four or five bedrooms. We’ve already started packing.’
The mother, a former school secretary, caused uproar when she allowed photographs of Soya posing in lacy underwear and a bikini to be published in Closer magazine in 2008 under the headline ‘My girl’s only 12 but she’s already dieting’.
The article revealed that, unlike other children her age, Soya had been going to discos at the age of seven and wearing make-up, mini dresses and revealing tops. By eight she was desperate for fame.
Aged 12, the youngster was exercising every day and never left the house without putting on eyeliner and mascara.
She had also started wearing padded bras, short skirts, cropped tops, high heels and fishnet tights.
There were nights out at under-18 discos and hours spent in front of the mirror getting herself ready in clothes regularly picked out by her mother.
Soya Keaveney's Facebook picture shows the scan of her unborn child. The youngster has attacked critics who have questioned her age
‘Soya is still only a girl and very immature in some ways, but I’ve always 100 per cent trusted her when she goes out with her friends,’ said Mrs Keaveney.
‘When she was 12 or 13 she went with some friends to an under-18 disco and told me about a contest they had to see who could kiss the most boys. I didn’t see any harm in it. After all, it was only kissing.’ The magazine article told how Soya had posed for the provocative pictures – the bikini shot taken while on holiday in Egypt – and her mother had posted them on a website dedicated to her daughter in the hope it would help her modelling career.
‘Some people might think the pictures are raunchy, but I think she looks lovely,’ Mrs Keaveney said.
‘Hopefully, they’ll help raise her modelling profile. It’s all good practice, and she’s not showing anything you wouldn’t see on a beach.’
Soya’s exercise regime included 200 sit-ups. ‘I’m terrified of getting fat,’ she admitted. ‘I want to be a model, a singer or an actress, and they’re hardly ever fat.’
Last night, Miss Brent said Mrs Keaveney was fielding requests for further interviews. ‘I can go to her with a figure,’ she said. ‘But at the end of the day it’s her call.’
