Abortion is hard even for women who feel they made the right decision. This testimony from a book by a pro-choice author illustrates the feelings some women have:
“I had an abortion when I was 17. It was illegal then, so my parents took me to Mexico. The memories were painful. But I never talked about them.
When I was 22 I had an abortion, part of the ending of a marriage. It was still illegal in Arizona, so I went to California…
At 26, a second marriage ended with my third abortion. It was now legal in Arizona, so I didn’t have to run away. It was neat, clean, and fast. I woke from the anesthetic sobbing. The nurse, trying to comfort me, repeated, “It’s all right, dear. It’s over. It’s over.” I knew – that’s why I cried. But I didn’t talk about it.
The American psychological Association announced recently that “most women who have abortions experience a sense of relief,” rather than “any lasting psychological trauma.” I felt that relief – every time.
I got on with my life, as everyone around me advised…
For so many years – I resisted – thinking about the abortions. It always hurt too much. After the first one, I would count years by their ages. I’d imagine how old each child would’ve been that year. After the second, after the third, it became too difficult to carry their ages. I knew it was hurting thing to do. I accepted the abortions as done, as choices, awful choices, between fire and ice, between rocks and hard places… No one told me that a woman, a girl, who chooses to enter pregnancy has the right to mourn. I thought that since I have chosen abortion, I had given up that right.”
Ruth Colker Abortion and Dialogue: Pro-Choice, Pro-Life, and American Law (Bloomington: Indiana University press, 1992) X IV
Women deserve better than abortion.
Share on Facebook