Abortion as a mum with ppd

Our child had just turned 1 when we found out we were pregnant again. We both knew we wanted to terminate, it felt like we were making a positive choice for us & our daughter. I had a medical abortion at home & everything was fine, it wasn’t as bad as I had anticipated. I reached out to friends beforehand because I felt clueless & alone, and whilst people didn’t have a lot of experience I was overwhelmed with support. I had friends that had kept their choice a secret & they seemed to be suffering with it, so I decided very early on that being open was the way to cope. I told everyone, friends, family, my bosses. I figured if I needed help, I wanted people to know why. But I was fine, I felt empowered & certain that I had done the right thing. That was until about 5 weeks later when I had to go to A&E because I was losing A LOT of blood. I ended up having to have another medical abortion because the first wasn’t 100% successful, apparently this happens to about 4 in 100 people… I remember lying there, my feet in the stirrups and crying, feeling like I was being punished for trying to get rid of this baby. And then I was angry at myself for having such a regressive reaction. I felt like my mind and my heart were at odds. I have always been pro choice so why all of a sudden was I getting hung up on heartbeats & eyelids & fingernails. The whole experience set me into an anxiety spiral. I had really bad insomnia, I lost a tonne of weight & I took a leave of absence from work. My post partum depression which had faded, came back full force. I was a wreck & I never expected it. It took me a long time to come to terms with the reality that you can believe in your choice to terminate so wholly but still feel grief. I don’t think that grief will ever go away completely, but I would still make the same choice over & over if I had the opportunity to go back & live it again.