When Penny Marshall was only a teenager, she and her partner Michael Henry welcomed a child. Things took a turn for the worst when he started chatting to his ex-girlfriend after marrying Penny.
In September 2012, the late Penny Marshall wrote an article for Newsweek claiming that she had begun dating Michael Henry in 1963, during her second year of college. She referred to him as Mickey and he was there on a football scholarship, but he was down since he didn’t make the trip team.
They had intercourse, which was her second attempt at the act, because she felt so bad for him. However, Penny missed her period a month later, went to the doctor, and found out she was pregnant!
The celebrity at the time was only 19 years old, and her lover was one year younger. The couple hadn’t even talked about birth control before getting into bed together, and at the time, abortion was prohibited in the US.
Penny made the decision to raise the child alone, but Michael shocked her by suggesting they get married! John F. Kennedy was shot over the same weekend that the couple got married.
While on their honeymoon, they slept in a motel, and Penny thought that this set the tone for their marriage because all that was reported on the news was Kennedy’s funeral. In addition to being young, the couple had no money.
Michael’s scholarship only provided him with about $100 each month, and his wife was still enrolled in school. However, Penny eventually dropped out of college and started working as a secretary to make ends meet.
The actress acknowledged that she and her husband had no idea what they were doing when they decided to become babies in July of that year. Like Michael’s mother, Penny had no experience with labor, and the actress’ mother was unable to recall any of her own deliveries.
She looked in a book to figure out what to do after her water broke, and it said to contact an ambulance. She didn’t need to head straight to the hospital, the doctor advised her.
As Penny’s contractions grew harder and more regular, Penny’s mother pulled out a couch, placed newspaper on it, and they watched television together. When the celebrity chose to go to the hospital, the mother-daughter team started timing the contractions.
Michael, who was employed in construction, was told, and Penny was given a bed in the hospital. As the actress went through a 20-hour labor without the baby, her spouse came and went.
As she waited for the baby to arrive, nurses advised her to take a shower or go for a walk. The actress, who hadn’t eaten since the previous day, got hungry and struggled with her spouse for food.
But because she had gas, the nurse could only give her Jell-O. Penny struggled through more contractions over the course of the next six hours, and nurses kept checking her until she finally hit one because she’d had enough.
On July 7, 1964, their daughter, weighing seven pounds, fourteen ounces, and measuring twenty-two inches, was finally welcomed. The young child had Michael’s eyes and a full head of dark hair.
After looking at his daughter, the star’s spouse, who had initially desired a baby boy, had fallen in love. Penny remembered a girl from camp with the name Tracy Saturn that she liked, and Michael was certain he didn’t want to give her a bird name like Robin, so they decided to call their child Tracy Lee Henry.
When Penny and her husband finally got to bring Tracy Lee home after spending nearly a week in the hospital, their studio apartment seemed even more small. The “Laverne & Shirley” star made the child’s room out of an empty dresser drawer.
Michael did a terrific job as a father and contributed to the upbringing of little Tracy Lee. He would get up in the middle of the night to tend to their daughter, and they would get up together in the morning before he left for college, Penny recounted.
At the conclusion of the summer, Penny and her husband relocated to a larger, less expensive two-bedroom apartment that was nearer Michael’s school. The actress went back to work after spending seven weeks taking care of the newborn.
The young couple was fortunate that Michael’s grandmother was willing to watch her granddaughter while her parents went to work. Additionally, Penny’s mom desired to spend time with her 1-year-old granddaughter.
She didn’t enjoy Tracy Lee’s ability to speak as much and in perfect words when the child was only one, though! In order to keep the residents of the building from learning that Penny’s daughter became pregnant before getting married, Penny’s mother said the child was six months younger.
Since he was originally from Albuquerque, Michael had had enough of his wife’s family and New York by the time Christmas rolled around. In addition, he didn’t observe the holiday because he was a Jehovah’s Witness.
Penny played Ado Annie again the following summer in a stage version of “Oklahoma!” The couple was ultimately persuaded to file for divorce after being away from home for more than a month since they were leading different lives and didn’t want to wind up hating one another.
Michael and his ex-wife split amicably, and he had no desire to contact her. The couple’s decision to divorce turned out to be the finest one, and Penny’s life was successful as a result!
The actress married actor and producer Rob Reiner, who also adopted their daughter after she moved in with them. Penny was now working on “Laverne & Shirley” as well.
Penny Marshall, an actress, admitted that she adored and delighted in her three grandkids.
When the star’s marriage to Reiner came to an end in divorce, she discovered she was pregnant once more. The author of “My Mother is Nuts” decided to abort the child because she is single.
Even though Penny decided on an abortion the second time around, she was relieved that it was prohibited when she was carrying Tracy Lee. In an article with Newsweek, she stated:
“What I believed to be a significant, life-altering error that could have earned me a scarlet A actually resulted in the creation of a great family.”
Her daughter gave her a grandchild, Spencer, and then got remarried and had Bella and Viva. The actress admitted how much she cherished and delighted in her three grandchildren.
Penny said that her family’s well-being was what mattered to her. She explained that she believed that life was more significant than the entertainment industry.
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