DECATUR, Tenn. – For as far back as she can remember, Megan Lewis rarely kept secrets from her mother. The youngest of three girls, growing up in rural Meigs County, Megan said she always felt comfortable talking to her mom about anything.
That included her mother, Missy, talking to her about birth control if she was thinking of becoming sexually active with longtime boyfriend, Hunter Ballew.
But for six months in 2014, just past her 16th birthday, Megan carried the weight of a secret so worrisome she began to break out in hives and suffer spells of anxiety. In March of that year, Megan and Hunter found out she was pregnant. Too afraid and ashamed to tell anyone, the teenagers kept their secret until there was no longer any way to hide the truth.
Megan continued working on the family’s farm and playing summer league basketball. She even went on vacation to the beach with her family in July, all while hiding her pregnancy. So determined to hide her secret for as long as possible, she would open her bedroom window when she felt sick and throw up outside to avoid making her family suspicious.
“We had noticed she gained a little bit of weight, and her dad even teased her about needing to work out more for basketball, but she wasn’t noticeably pregnant,” Missy said. “The day after we got back from the beach, Hunter asked me to come up to Megan’s bedroom so they could tell me a secret.