The testimony of Hannah, who had three abortions. She had children she had given birth to and was raising, and she feared that something terrible would happen to these living children as divine punishment for her killing the other three:
“[N]ow I started to have nightmares and the nightmares were about dying and dead babies and I kept jumping off mountains into darkness and I also started to think that something awful was going to happen to my children. I always thought that someone was going to kill my children… Also I started to cry a lot… I also realized that that [sic] I never could think about the abortion. I would never let myself think about [it]. Every time a thought of anything about abortion or anything in the radio or television or papers I would turn it off and I could not listen or read about it. I remember one day at the office where I worked as a part-time clerk …girls were whispering and talking quietly about another girl who was away for the day and it turned out that she had gone to have an abortion and when I heard this I started to cry and couldn’t stop. The others thought that I was like this because I had a headache (that’s what I said) but the truth was that for the first time I cried about the word abortion. After that time I kept away from the word.…
My life changed slowly but I never once associated my sadness, erratic behavior, uncontrollable crying, depression and unknown fear as being related to the abortion…
For me the triggering memory of the abortion was the birth of my best friend’s baby. I suddenly remembered never having a little girl and having always wanted a little girl and I remember saying that maybe I did have a little girl but that I’d killed her and that’s why God couldn’t trust me with more children or baby girls…
The regret is part of what I have to live with… Christmas is especially difficult because for some reason I seem to remember more strongly. When I look at the set Christmas table I remember that there should be other children there.… Today they are not sitting at their place at the table. For this I am so sorry.”
Anne R Lastman Redeeming Grief: Abortion and Its Pain (Balwyn, Vic: Australia: Gracewing, 2013) 243 – 244, 246
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