I had my abortion because I was 26 and had just signed my first teaching contract with severely emotionally disturbed kids in Chicago suburban schools. I felt that I could not honor this contract and be pregnant due to the fact that my work involved hands-on restraining of children and significant physical risk at the hands of some very disturbed students. As my mother had had three illegal abortions in the late 1940s and early 50s and I had a sister that also had two abortions at that point (has since had another), the attitude towards abortion in my family was very positive. In fact, my mother sent me the money to have my abortion.
During the abortion experience, I would not let myself be anesthetized - general anesthesia was an option available at this abortion clinic - so that I could be "forced" to hear and know what was going on while it happened - a penance of sorts - and I remember feeling emotionally numb before the abortion was completed. I think that, in all honesty, I knew exactly what I was doing even as I was doing it. I was raised by Christian grandparents and I valued human life and children, to whom I had already committed my education and career. But I was totally absorbed in my life, my "rights" and my convenience.
Immediately after my abortion, I felt relief that the problem had been "solved" and became outraged with the pro-life movement almost immediately. My mantra became "they don't know how it feels. They are self righteous and judgmental and they simply don't know how this feels!"
As time went on and I pursued my teaching career, a Master's Degree in Counseling and got married and started a family, I became painfully aware of a deep sense of rage and self hatred that found its way out of me in various areas of my life. My pregnancy with my daughter began my journey to healing, but I had not yet given my life to Christ or realized that the only true healing or forgiveness I could find was in and through him. I shared my abortion experience with my husband shortly after meeting him and also shared my honest feelings about knowing that I had ended a life. I simply did not know where to go from there...what to do with my rage at a world that made choice SO easy, a family that embraced what I had done without any question and myself for being so selfish that all I could think of was getting rid of this "inconvenience"!
I found help and forgiveness in so many places and through so many people once I committed my heart to Jesus and discovered that what I had done, while sinful, was forgivable. I began to realize, God had a way for me to move beyond it and be freed from its power over my life. The process was very long and very painful, but as I began to feel God's forgiveness, my anger and self hatred began to disappear. I wrestled with my own deep fears, some of which I did not really understand. I wrestled with God as I sought answers to the questions about my own heart and how the things that had happened to me in my childhood had caused it to grow so hard. I shed more tears than I can count as I prayed and talked late into many nights with other Christian women who had also had abortions, some even after they committed their hearts to Christ. I found comfort through scripture, books that God led me to, music that spoke of God's unconditional love for me and words that God spoke to me through years of counseling with a wonderful Christian counselor. Although this person had never had an abortion, she understood how it felt to be standing deeply in need of forgiveness and how it felt to finally receive it! Many Emmaus Walks when I would feel God bring up again what I had done and heal my reasons for doing it also helped in my healing. Much of my healing has been between myself and God and I have spent hours of sweet communion with Him alone as I have come closer and closer to allowing Him to take this burden of self condemnation and guilt and redeem it! I have also seen Him do that many times over these 40 some years....redeem this decision that I made, this life that I took, by allowing me the blessing of sharing my experience with someone else who has been carrying this burden of guilt and shame. I am 60 years old now and "Nana" to two precious grandsons and a granddaughter. God continues to show His faithfulness to me every single day by opening doors like this very one...and showing me that He has a purpose in the pain of my healing from my abortion. I think I will most likely be in this process of healing until I am perfected with/in Him....but, for now, the continued journey keeps me close to Him and deeply aware of how much I need Him and how much He loves me!