The speaker loves someone and believes that love is real, but she is afraid to have a child with him. She explains that she grew up poor, without a married father at home, and felt ashamed and rejected. Her painful memories lead her to ask her partner to wait: she wants love, but does not want a child to suffer as she did. By the end, her repeated promise of love sits alongside that caution, so the feeling is tender but not carefree.
The โold, cold, rundown tenementโ and the worn dress someone threw away make poverty concrete: the speaker remembers not having even โthe simple things.โ โNo nameโ suggests more than lacking a formal family name; it can also express feeling socially unrecognized or judged. The phrase โname of shameโ shows how strongly she has absorbed other peopleโs stigma, even though the child would not be at fault.
The song can be heard as both a plea for patience and a decision to protect a possible child from hardship and rejection. โNever meant to beโ may refer to a child born outside the accepted family structure, rather than implying that the child is unloved: the speaker repeatedly insists that she will always love them. Her shame is real, but the lyrics also suggest that societyโs judgment, not the childโs worth, creates much of that pain.