I got pregnant with my first boyfriend the first time. I went to a church school and never had sex education. My parents never talked to me about sex, either. For years, I thought babies came out of your belly button! My boyfriend was Catholic and he told me that the best time to have sex was in the middle of my cycle. I believed him because I was ignorant and because Catholics were supposed to know a lot about birth control through the rhythm method. Unfortunately, he was wrong and I got pregnant immediately. I already had an appointment with Planned Parenthood, but by that time, it was too late; I just didn’t know it yet. I got my birth control pills and was waiting for my period. Then I got the “flu.” I was sick every morning for a week. I had been staying with my boyfriend at his mother’s house, and she was the one who pointed out to me that I didn’t have the flu, but was pregnant.
I did not want a child. I had never wanted children. So, when my boyfriend’s mother asked me what I wanted to do, I told her I didn’t want a child. Since this was 1970, abortion was still illegal. She hooked me up with a sympathetic doctor who sent me to a shrink. I didn’t know what I was supposed to say, but I finally figured out that I had to tell him that I would kill myself if I stayed pregnant. Then I was admitted to the hospital for a D & C.
I have never regretted my decision. Ever. I did not experience any emotional trauma. Actually, I experienced relief that I wouldn’t have to give birth to a child I didn’t want. No one tried to make me feel bad about my decision, either. I realize that I was very lucky for that.
I personally believe that much of the “emotional trauma” that women experience following abortion comes from two sources: hormonal fluctuation and societal teaching. Women are taught that having an abortion is horrible, traumatic, etc. When you hear things like that for years, decades, you come to believe them. In other words, the emotional trauma not attributable to hormonal fluctuation is inflicted on us by a society run by anti-female elements. Luckily, I was so naive about anything related to sex that I had not been indoctrinated.
I’m tired of women being treated like children. We are fully capable of making decisions about our bodies. And we don’t need false “guilt” foisted on us by supposedly “well-meaning” outsiders. Do men who have vasectomies feel guilty because of all the children that they could be producing, but aren’t? NO! Though technically dissimilar to abortion, vasectomy is the closest we can come to a comparison. But the potentiality for life is there in that vas deferens. Yet no one tries to make men feel bad for being sterilized. Why? Because they’re men. Women have been controlled by men and society for centuries. It seems “normal” to many people. I say, it’s my body and I will do with it as I will. I would make the same decision again today. I’m not sorry!
