Today would have been my due date. I had my abortion on August 17th, I was exactly 6 weeks. I chose the medical abortion and went through it at home while my husband took our 2 and 5 year old out for pizza and swimming. From the moment I took that test and we decided to have an abortion I knew I was making the right choice. Yet, I doubted myself over and over again worried that I was being selfish. We are middle class people, with two perfect boys. We have been married 8 years. We could have had a third child logistically, but I didn’t want to. I didn’t want another. I didn’t want to freeze my career again, I didn’t want to lose sleep, or change more diapers, or live on a newborn schedule. It wasn’t that we couldn’t, it was that we didn’t want to and that made me feel so guilty. I felt like I didn’t deserve an abortion because I didn’t necessarily need one. I have always been an advocate, but never imagined needing an abortion myself.
Healing isn’t linear and I still struggle but time has definitely helped. Here I am on my due date and I can tell you this was the absolute best decision we could have made. While I still wonder who that child would have been, I don’t dwell on it. While my heart does ache, it doesn’t regret. Mothers have abortions. People who simply don’t want to have another child, have abortions. We could have survived a third child, but I didn’t want to just survive. I want my family to thrive and I’m not sorry for that.
