I have never sat down to write this out, but I think it’s time. Before I share about the abortion, it’s important to know where I come from, and how I ended up making the choice to have an abortion.
My mother was sixteen when she got pregnant with me. She resented me from the moment I was born.
Not only that, but she grew up in an abusive home and had no idea how to raise an emotionally healthy child. I remember my mom talking about how she wanted to break the cycle. She didn’t want to continue the abuse. Her saying that makes it even more heartbreaking that she did continue the cycle. She was a mean spirited, selfish woman who made sure I knew how much she hated me for ruining her life. In her worst moments she’d scream that she had never wanted me, and it would be better if I hadn’t been born. I don’t know how to explain how that made me feel. I do remember a quote I read a few years ago. “When you’re unloved, you’re not real”.
I did finally escape my mother, but I left without any skills, including emotional ones. I wandered from place to place until I ended up with a guy. We had been together just a few months when I got pregnant. I knew there was no way I could keep that baby. I wanted to, a little. Mostly because I felt lonely and unloved. And in that moment it hit me. Lonely and unloved, like my mother had been. And how did she fix her broken heart? She filled it with kids. She made people who had no choice but to love her, because they relied on her for everything. I recognized how unhealthy it was to have a child so I wouldn’t be lonely. Other people do not exist solely to serve me, and no child should be forced to bear their parent’s trauma like I was. It wasn’t the right time. Maybe years from then, or maybe never would be the right time, but not. then. The trauma I carried was not dealt with. I would be repeating the cycle my mom had so badly wanted to break.
I made an appointment at a local Planned Parenthood. Everyone was very nice and professional. The lady at the front desk, the nurses, and the doctor. They gave me an ultrasound and I saw the pregnancy on the screen. It was just a smudge, a little dot on a dark screen. I was almost eight weeks pregnant. The doctor sat me down in a quiet room and asked me if this was for sure what I wanted to do. I said yes. I swallowed the first pill, took the painkiller and the misoprostol bottles in a paper bag and went home. I followed all the instructions carefully.
It was mid afternoon when the bleeding started and the pain came. It was terrible. The pain. The painkillers did nothing for me. I was nauseated and couldn’t stand on my own. I asked my boyfriend to run me a shower but I just ended up sitting in the tub, screaming in pain. Blood ran in a steady thin stream down the drain, and a few hours in, the sac came out. I could see the tiny embryo inside the sac. It was just a brief glance before my boyfriend took it away.
The pain subsided after, but I was exhausted for several days. I mostly sat on the couch and watched TV or cried. I did the right thing, but it was still emotionally taxing.
It has been several years now, and I don’t regret my choice. I did what I knew was right. There was no way I was going to bring another person into this world when I could barely take care of myself. If I ever have a child, it will because they were planned, and wanted, and deeply loved. It will be when I’m financially secure, and stable emotionally. I’ll paint the nursery, look at good daycares, and get maternity photos done. I want to be the one who truly breaks the cycle.
