I am nineteen, and just returned home from a year-long volunteering and traveling stint in various parts of the U.S. I was in a volunteering program with hundreds of other young adults, and I had an unofficial boyfriend who was also in the program. We were basically making no money. We were also originally from different states, and I never planned on seeing him after the program ended. When I found out I was pregnant, I was very calm and rational and never cried, but quickly became very depressed. I never told anyone, being a very private person, and decided that I would get an abortion when I went home.
The program ended a month later, but a week before we were to part ways, I told the man I was seeing. He turned out to be extremely unstable, an emotional wreck, and completely lost it. He started getting drunk and high every night, telling our friends, crying, even one night screaming and cutting himself in his room. So I totally avoided him, because he scared me. I talked to him once more, to ask him if he would help me out financially, and he said he would. He told me he was pro-choice, but that he’d never kill his own child, and didn’t support me. He begged me to have the child and give it to him. And I started to really hate him…I had so much anger at him for telling people about my secret, when I had told no one, and for acting so immature when I was the one going through the actual changes in my body and I had stayed rational. I felt so alone and scared, and now rejected and repulsed by my peers, and there he was crying out for attention and sympathy from everyone around. After I returned home he refused the help he had previously promised, and told me he wanted nothing to do with killing his child. So I was completely alone again.
The weeks before my abortion were nerve-wracking and horrible. I was worried that I wouldn’t get paid from my new job in time to have the abortion in the first trimester. I did, however, and the entire check went to the abortion. I had to leave at my usual hour of 6:30 am to keep my anti-abortion parents from suspecting anything, and sat in my car for three hours reading a book. The whole time I just felt so lonely. I went to the appointment alone and there were protesters standing outside with signs. I went through the whole pre-procedure process. When the nice nurse started explaining the procedure to me, I couldn’t handle it and for the first time broke down in sobs. I was really just terrified. When I had the ultrasound, I heard one nurse say to the other that “it” was curled up. That made me feel sick. They told me that most women didn’t feel much pain and that most didn’t remember the procedure. Well, it was quite a traumatic experience for me. When I was laying on the table, they started to tell me once again what would happen in the procedure. And once again, I started crying. They were concerned, and I told them I was just really scared. Then the drugs in the IV hit me, and everything started happening very quickly. I remember it all, in a bit of a haze, and I remember that it was extremely painful and I was crying and telling them that it hurt over and over. A nice lady offered her hand for me to hold and I remember looking at it but I’m not sure if I took it or not. I think someone said something about giving me more medication for the pain, and someone else replying no. I was shaking but no longer crying when the nurse put my clothes back on me, and I kept losing my balance and falling over, and she kept catching me. In the recovery room I watched as girls came in and sat down in recliners after me. It surprised me that so many women were getting abortions. I didn’t know much about it, or how common it was. I didn’t realize how lucky I was to have a Planned Parenthood in my city and so easily accessible.
I’m extremely glad I had the abortion. I couldn’t live with a man like that fathering my child, nor could I live with myself having a child that I could offer nothing, while I have a sister who has a family and is able to give her child everything. I never seriously considered other options…I felt so alone and cornered, with no support and no money, and all I wanted the whole time was just to get out of this situation and move on. And now I can do that.
