When I realized that I was pregnant the first time, I had just turned 17 and I was about to finish high school. At first I just thought my period was late and that I didn’t have to worry. I was still young and I didn’t know much about pregnancy symptoms and even though I had them, I couldn’t recognize them. My partner of that time was older than me so I trusted him and the only contraception we were using was the pull-out method. Until one day, after my best friend finally convinced me that I should take a pregnancy test.

My period was late for almost two weeks and the test was crystal clear. I was pregnant. I panicked, I didn’t know what to do. Living in a country where abortion is not only considered as murder, but also as a shame, a taboo. I had no idea where I would start, I had no idea about how many weeks I was pregnant, nothing at all.

When I told the person I was dating at that time, he didn’t want anything to do with it, he claimed he was not responsible for the pregnancy and told me to figure it out myself.

I had no choice but to tell the only person who was left that I could trust. My mother. When I told her, she took it better than I expected but I could still see the sorrow in her eyes as she was planning for my abortion.

We are a very religious family and beliefs started to kick in. Will God ever forgive me? Was the question that I kept asking myself.

I had a surgical abortion and I went through a really hard time all by myself. I got sick, cried in silence when I wanted to shout my pain and I had to give up on a scholarship I had been promised because the pregnancy test kept being positive for some weeks after the abortion and I knew in the required papers to get a visa to go to the country where I was supposed to go for the scholarship, we had to do a pregnancy test and I didn’t want to embarrass my parents.

I prayed, again and again, and I healed from it and swore to myself that I would never have an abortion again.

Four years later, I found myself pregnant again but this time, I was an adult, I had knowledge about self-administrated pills and I knew exactly how many weeks it had been, and I knew again that I was about to do what I swore I wouldn’t ever do again.

I took abortion pills and since I was at a very early stage, this time was way easier than the last one, like normal periods only longer.

Even though I was emotionally stronger, this second time really broke my heart. I started spending hours and hours overthinking and more hours on the internet reading articles about people who had abortions more than once, because I was really afraid it would be difficult for me to conceive again.

I went to the ob gyn for a checkup and everything was good but I couldn’t share my story with him or tell him the real reason why I was there because what I had done was illegal so I only acted like I needed a random checkup. Everything I read on the internet said that there are no risks that the two abortions could affect my future fertility. But deep down, I still have doubts. If a doctor ever reads this, please reassure me that what I read everywhere is true.

It’s been six months since the last abortion and I am slowly healing and slowly forgiving myself but I am still concerned about my future fertility for when I am ready for a baby.