It was April. I was 18 years old working full time and making 9 dollars an hour. I had been seeing this guy for a little over a year. I was set to go to college the following September, and my boyfriend had just gotten his car reposessed, and kicked out of his apartment. Hindsight is always 20/20, but I’m still not sure what I was thinking. I knew I wasn’t in love, and I should have been more careful. Instead, I realized I was late, and the pregnancy test affirmed my suspicions. I was pregnant. I was devastated, but stayed calm, and did some researching on the internet. I scheduled an appointment for an abortion a week later.
On my way into the appointment, there were protesters, pulling my arm and telling me not to walk into the death chamber. They had information that could help me. They played on my guilt, What they told me, almost worked, but that was their plan. I sat in the waiting room for 3 hours, It was an eternity, and it wasn’t easy to go through…painful even. I drove home later that day, feeling relieved. I still felt like a horrible person, I thought I didn’t really have an excuse to have an abortion, I probably could have married my boyfriend and raised a child. However, that same boyfriend left me for his best friend the following September, and he is now in jail for stealing cars and credit cards. I definitely could have married this guy and raised a child, but I doubt it would have been a healthy environment for me or my baby. Until today, although I knew I made the right decision for me, I always felt guilty when I saw a pro-life bumper sticker or when I hear politicians talking about women murdering their unborn babies. I am in college now, and I work full time, I help my mother out with her bills. She’s still trying to get her life figured out from when she had me at that age. I’ve already accomplished more in my life than she was ever able to…she married a man she wasn’t in love with, and dropped out of art school…she’s over $40,000.00 in debt and had virtually no child support from my father, and only makes minimum wage.
I guess I always thought I was alone, but reading the stories on this website tells me I’m not. I know President Bush passed the Partial-Birth Abortion Act…and I’m scared. Although I was only 6 weeks pregnant at the time of my abortion, I can’t help but feel that the passage of that Act will affect women in their first or second trimester of pregnancy. Had abortion not been legal at the time I made my decision, I could have given birth to a baby, and subjected them to a life with a father in and out of prison, and a mother who didn’t know how to help herself let alone her children. Or, if I was that strong willed, I would have seriously hurt myself going to an illegal doctor or using some other method.
