Life is amazing with it's twists and turns. Just about the time we think we know who we are...just about the time we think we have it all figured out, something happens to remind us that we know very little at all.
For years I was a pro-life activist. I marched in rallies in Washington, DC. I stood on street corners holding signs of aborted fetuses. I had no doubt that anyone who would have an abortion was a murderer, pure and simple. And abortion was something that I knew in my heart I would never consider for any reason. I saw life as a gift from God...period. And nothing could change my mind.
Until last week. Until I found myself 49 years old, in a troubled marriage, and pregnant. When my monthly cycle was off, I automatically figured it was menopause. Pregnancy never entered my mind. At least, not at first. But the nagging thought would not go away that maybe...just maybe I WAS pregnant.
I was horrified. Too scared to even take a pregnancy test. I didn't want to know. What if I was? Then what? I have been making decisions to move forward in my life. And a pregnancy was going to mess up all of my plans.
The hardest realization came in feeling no joy that I might be carrying a life inside of me. With my other children, there was always so much joy when I found out I was pregnant. Feeling anguish over the possibility also filled me with tremendous guilt. Where was my faith in God? Where was my joy in the miracle of life?
My health is not such that I can safely support a full-term pregnancy. My last pregnancy ended in a still birth at seven months, and it was devastating. To think of going through such a thing again was more than I could bear. Not to mention my age. The child would be graduating high school when I was almost seventy years old.
Abortion became a term of relief to me. Just knowing it was an option made me feel a tremendous burden lifted. But with that, tremendous guilt came and took its place. How could I make such a turn around in my thinking? Here I had judged and pointed fingers and been so self-righteous in my opinions regarding women who had chosen abortions. Now, I was one of "those" women who was considering having it done....IF I was pregnant.
I took an at-home pregnancy test, and the results were negative. I felt somewhat relieved, but not totally convinced.
A few days later, I started spotting blood. At first I thought my monthly cycle had finally arrived. But last weekend while away on a camping trip , I woke up in a pool of blood that left no doubt I had miscarried.
The blood still flows, and with it a tough realization. We really do NOT know what we would do until we are faced with a situation in our lives. Nobody could have told me that I would ever consider an abortion.
But life has a way of waking us up and forcing us to take a good hard look at ourselves. I now know what its like to be faced with an unwanted pregnancy. And I can imagine how horribly scary it would be to have only one option available.
Never again will I consider myself pro-life. I am now pro-choice. This doesn't mean that I love abortion, because I don't. I hate it. But sometimes we have to make choices in life that are hard. And in this instance, it would have been the lesser of two evils.
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Comments: 69
It must have taken great courage to post that.
No one on this planet loves abortion, including the pro-choicers, of which I rank. I once accompanied a girlfriend to a clinic for an abortion. She had been on medication which pretty much guaranteed a mutant birth. She knew she could not handle giving birth to a thing child a brain, 3 arms or some other severe malformation, and chose to terminate. It broke her heart to abort, but she knew the procedure was the most humane thing to do. The protesters outside the clinic were worse than the abortion. I asked a group of them , how many have adopted children, let alone severely handicapped ones. . Not one of them did. Hypocrits.
I think you have had more than your share lately.
Stay strong, Girl.
I can't imagine how difficult things must have been for you. I offer you support as well and I agree with Donna. No one loves abortion but life deals out some pretty raw deals sometimes and the choices you make may not be the ones you thought you would.
I hope things get better for you. I'm sending lots of positive energy your way! :)
I am sorry you had to go through this
I always thought people were so embedded in their position that conversion to other side was not possible. Your article proves me wrong.
In Cheryl's article, she made the comment "And I can imagine how horribly scary it would be to have only one option available. "
And then I made my comment. I think each situation is unique and each choice is unique. However, it's not the only option out there for unplanned or unwanted pregnancies.
Cheryl, I am very sorry that you had this experience.
I'm like Wilhelmine--I'd like to see "pro-lifers", instead of excoriating, start taking loving care of women who would otherwise have no choice but abortion, and adopting their children.
It must have been really tough, but i am happy you are out of it now. Keep smiling. I agree, sometimes, we have to take some decisions which are against our beliefs or it just happens, but at that moment of time, the only option is to accept it. But, thats life, isnt it?
God bless.
I feel very strongly that abortion should be an option available to all women, and that nobody should stand in judgment over anyone else's decision on this. It's simply nobody's business but the person making the decision about their own body. Period.
Mona...thank you for your healing thoughts.
Patrick....I agree. It's important to be able to discuss controversial issues in a respectful manner. And I do welcome anyone who is in disagreement with the change in my way of thinking....for I truly do see where they are coming from. We are all at different places in this journey.
Cheryl - My sympathies pour out to you for this situation. It is very true that one never knows what will happen until they are put in a situation. I have always been pro-choice, whether or not I would get an abortion is a completely different issue but I always felt that each woman should be able to decide what is best for herself and her family. Hats off to you for coming through this with a positive outlook.
Cheryl, I applaud your bravery and the openness of your mind in being able to change it like you describe.
IWT also echo what everyone has said about abortion being a last-choice decision. No one wants to get an abortion. But in some cases it is the only correct decision to make. And that decision is personal one. Government should not be making rules about personal decisions that concern ones own life, body, and health.
That's a 'no brainer' to me...
The pivotal point of it all is when one believes a zygote becomes a person, and THAT is also a function of one's personal set of experiences, beliefs and values, and thus ALSO a matter of choice...
"Pro-life", to me, indicates that someone feels they have the right to choose my (or a woman's) beliefs for me (her). I will never subscribe to that, any more than I would insist on my right to choose anyone else's beliefs for them...
Tough topic, Cheryl. Thank you for bringing it up so poignantly.
Thanks for sharing this.
Each woman's situation is different from the next, so for the government, or the church, or anyone else to tell a woman what she can and cannot do to her own body is to me a complete breakdown of our freedoms afforded from living in the United States. There are too many children in our society and around the world who need good homes; so to bring another life into the world who is unwanted is wrongfully increasing the burden on our communities.
Tough topic, lots of opinions. Thank you, Cheryl, for speaking up and not being afraid to stir the pot.
Hats off to you for "getting" what I've been saying for years. A person cannot venemously say what they will do in a situation until they are IN that situation. The view from the outside looking in is always a skewed one.
Congratulations of finding the part of you that makes you "OK" with who you are, what you think, how you feel, and that refuses to let society dictate how you should be.
I'm sorry that you had to have this experience. It must have required a great deal of soul searching to come to the conclusions that you did, and even more to put them down "on paper", as it were. I'm dreadfully sorry that you have recieved unkind emails, and I'm fairly sure that some of them went far beyond unkind. I'm familiar with the mentality, although there is one thing that I've never quite figured out. How can people who rail at you, scream accusations an epithets, ever believe that they are behaving in a manner that would be even marginally acceptable to Jesus?
How brave you are to post this.
What a cruel thing to say to someone. How dare you say something like that to someone. You and your self-righteous....sanctmonious attitude makes me puke!
Let me ask you...... Have you never EVER done anything....ANYTHING.... wrong/sinful in your entire life? Ever? Even though you thought it was the right reason? One sin is just as bad as the other. A sin is a sin is a sin. Period. YOU......need to look at your own life. Look at what YOU do wrong. Look at YOUR OWN sins. Examine your OWN conscience. STOP JUDGING PEOPLE. Don't forget. YOU will stand before God one day, too. You'll have to answer for your wrong doings, too.
I just want to vomit. People like you give Christians a bad name.
Cheryl makes an extremely valid point. You never know what you would do when you're faced with a situation. One can preach and believe all they want, but when it comes down to it....you NEVER know. Irregardless how commited or devout you are.
However, I don't think my situation should dictate how someone else handles it. Everyone should have the CHOICE to decide on their own what is best for them in this situation.
The Abortion Issue and the Legal Contradictions
Here are some of my other comments from my posts:
"I didn't want (or cannot afford) the child." "I was not being irresponsible; the contraception failed." "The mother's circumstances (or environment) are not conducive right now." "She is incapable of raising a child." "I was raped." "The conception was incestuous."
These and many others are the justifications that I have read or heard. My only answer is that I disagree that these should even be considered as possible valid reasons. There are several other solutions than deliberate abortion to those situations. Surely the child does not deserve a death sentence under those circumstances.
Is there any circumstance where the rights of the unborn are overridden? The usual example given is: where the pregnancy endangers the mother's life. I won't argue either for or against this case. The self-defense justification is logical, and my conscience only permits me to leave that entirely up to the mother and not try to persuade her either way.
"The mother should sacrifice herself for her child." Good, logical point. Yet, I am proposing that the person whose life is in danger should make that choice. Many have in mind their other offspring when making that choice.
If you don’t mind, I’d love to read your opinions.
I was once like you are. Pro-life. I did all the things that a pro-lifer would do, as you did. But I also had to recognize (eventually) that I was a hypocrite unless I was able to do something to REALLY help a woman with a problem pregnancy, such as taking her in, and seeing that she got the care she needed. Donating my maternity clothes and my kids old baby clothes really doesn't cut it! What infuriates me so much about the pro-life movement now is that they, likewise, are not really willing to put their money where their mouth is. They are just like I was 20 years ago: Not willing to inconvenience themselves to help out a woman in distress. Which is equally ironic, when you consider that most of them think that having an abortion is a matter of convenience. They don't seem to realize that abortion is not something a girl or woman does on a whim!
As you said in one of your comments, we shouldn't pass judgment on a person, when we really don't know what that person is going through. Thanks for being brave and sharing your story.
as kokomo suggested; pro-lifer's don't always put their money where their mouth is. last weekend there was a pro-life demonstration in our city. people lined up along a major roadway holding signs. "abortion is murder"; "pray for abortion to be illegal"; "adoption not abortion". i pulled my car into the parking lot of a business on this road. got out of my car & walked up to over 3 dozen people who were holding the signs regarding adoption. i asked each one how many children they had adopted. one woman ignored me & would not answer. one young man said he wasn't able to adopt because of his age. the rest said they had not adopted a child. i asked why....they didn't answer.
i feel your pain. i wish you peace. i hope that you will always have choices in making decisions in your life.