I would like to start this off by saying that my abortion is only a small part of my story. It does not define me, nor will I ever let it be used to measure how “good” a person I am. I have always had so many dreams involving where I’d travel to, what stages I’d perform on, what career I’d have and in none of them am I ever a mother.

I am 23 and only started having sex back in December. I had always used condoms and thought that would be okay until I found a better method that worked for me. On my 23rd birthday (in February) I had sex with a man that I have been seeing for a few months. 2 weeks later I had just finished the run of a show I was in and on that night I had what I thought was the start of my period but the next day… it was gone. I googled it (like I google everything because I’m a basket case when it comes to anything weird going on with my body.) What google came up with was that it was potentially something called “Implantation bleeding”  (when the egg is fertilized and implants itself in the lining of your uterus or something as invasive as that) Well… that was enough information for me. I drove myself to the clinic where the doctor said “I don’t understand why you’re here… your period isn’t even late.” to which I replied “I just know something is wrong… what I would love is for me to be wrong and that you can tell me I’m being crazy… but please just do the test”

It came back positive.

The time I had sex on my birthday got me pregnant. Happy fucking birthday.

I just immediately felt like the world stopped and that this was just a big joke. I never thought that that would happen to me… I always thought this happened to girls who were careless and didn’t use protection. Well I did… and it still happened (95% effective my ass!)  I just broke down and started crying saying “I can’t do this… I can’t” I was a broke actress living pay-cheque to pay-cheque dating a man with no current plans to commit to me.

The doctor kind of awkwardly patted my shoulder, gave me  a pamphlet and left me there.

I walked out of the clinic and sat in my car with my phone ready to call the guy. I was afraid of what (Let’s call him “Jack”) would say. He grew up in Alberta with a veeeery religious family and he is still an active christian to this day. I guess I thought he’d say something like “Well… we can’t live in sin so I guess I’m gonna have to marry you and raise this child!” (Or something silly like that, I have an active imagination)

When I called I was so scared that I couldn’t even get the words out, eventually he had to just guess what was wrong. He said “…are you pregnant?” to which I responded hysterically “…YESSS! *sniffle, sob, sob*”  After a few seconds of silence he said “Ok… it’s gonna be ok! Umm… I’m really not at a place in my life for something like this but I’m willing to do whatever you want to do.”

I sat there in my car for 2 hours in this mall parking lot bawling my eyes out getting a lot of stares from passers-by who probably thought I was crazy. Jack left work to come join my in-car pity party and when he got there we just kind of sat there for a while. Eventually I said “Would you be mad at me if I said that I already made the appointment?”  He hugged me and said “This is your body, you should never have to do anything to it that you don’t want to”

We spent the entire week together leading up to the termination. He cooked for me, he snuggled me, he watched trashy movies with me to keep me distracted. It was really nice not to have to be alone and have such a good… um… friend? fuck-buddy? Boyfriend-adjacent? around to help me get through it.

I felt so guilty that it didn’t even take me a second thought to make the phone call to book that appointment. I have never felt a maternal instinct… I knew that if I had gone through with keeping it, it would just be so that society wouldn’t label me as a bad person. Then, that child would grow up with a resentful mother and thats an awful burden to put on a kid… isn’t it?

It’s been a few months since and I still sometimes feel like a bad person but when I feel this way I just have to stop and read the reminders I wrote myself about why I did it and that it was what was right for me at the time.

“It wasn’t ‘selfish,’ it was ‘self-care’… I didn’t do anything wrong”

Maybe one day I’ll fully believe that.