25 June 2008…
I remember every single second as if it happened 5 minutes ago… It was a Monday morning, the day I received my first ever full paycheck as I started working in May… My boyfriend walked me to the atm to draw out R2000… My appointment was at 09:30…I hadn’t slept since the previous Friday…because I indulged in drugs to make me forget about what I was about to do… I told my boyfriend to go… I was gonna do this on my own… But honestly, I was scared out of my mind…
Holding onto the teddy bear he bought me, I sat alone in a room, three tablets dissolving under my tongue…and I felt a connection so strong to the baby growing inside of me…I couldn’t go through with it…this was my baby…but the nurses wouldn’t let me leave… They told me it was normal to feel that way…and I believed them…I hate each and every nurse that was there that day…2 hours later, the anesthetists arrived… He asked me I’d done any sort of substance within the last six hours, because it would be dangerous if i did…and that was my last chance to save my baby’s life because I had taken a hit of meth just 3 hours earlier…but I sat there and shook my head…numb with fear and emotions… He injected my arm and lead me to the same room i had my scan done just three weeks earlier…
I remember the nurses asking me to remove my underwear from underneath the piece of cloth wrapped around me hips…and the last thing I remember was crying and saying I don’t wanna do it anymore… But still I laid myself down on the bed…allowing them to spread my legs…
The next moment, I woke up in another room…The anesthetists explaining about the medication I’d have to take…and when he walked away, I reached down, feeling for the lump on my stomach…but there was only a hot water bottle… I lied still for a few minutes, tears running down my cheeks… It was over…and I hated myself ever since that few moments…
I have a printout of the scan I did at that same hospital before the procedure… I stared at the black and white photo everyday, studying every detail… And a day or two after the abortion, I noticed the age of my baby… On the 25 June, my baby was exactly twelve weeks…which explained the urgency of the nurses, because after twelve weeks, the procedure could not be done there…
But what hit the hardest…the reason I can’t stand looking at myself in the mirror anymore…is that exactly 6 months after that day my baby was due to be born…on the 25 December…
CHRISTMAS DAY… I will never forgive myself… I’m so sorry…
Growing up, I was one of those hardcore feminist girls…believed that a woman had the right to do whatever she pleased… My life and the circumstances, I grew up in made me tough… What I called a strong, independent woman…
In high school, my girlfriends had started having sex and the conversation of pregnancy often came up… I remember we as a group, we would all agree on this line, “If I fall pregnant before I’m married, I’d have an abortion”.
Those were our exact words… spoken with so much confidence… We could handle anything…and abortion would be the least of our worries…
Sitting here now, I can’t believe how naive and ignorant I was…
The day I ‘felt’ I was pregnant was the happiest day of my life!
I knew I was pregnant way before I took a test or before I missed my period. I felt my body changing and I loved it, even the morning sickness! And it was bad, for the short time I was pregnant. I felt a growing closeness to my baby. And then I told my boyfriend I was pregnant…he started smiling, a big bright smile and I was so relieved because I thought, everything’s going to be ok, we both want this baby. And then reality kicked in. He wasn’t ready for the responsibility. Neither was I. I’m still not but I felt that I could learn to be. My baby needed me. He told me that he was not ready but if I wanted to keep the baby, I should. He would support me either way. I started having doubts, I had just started a job and he was unemployed. How were we going to give a baby the life it deserves? We both come from broken families and we had promised that one day we wouldn’t let our children be raised like that. My heart was breaking. He was going about life as though this wasn’t happening. I was the one feeling everything. I never thought things through I just made a booking to have an abortion and told him about it and he just said ok! OK??? I wanted more than that, I wanted him to stop me.
The day of the abortion, March 8, I was a nervous wreck! I was shaking all the time. We got to the clinic and there were other girls as well. We all had to go through a process first. My boyfriend sat there and all he could do was complain about how long it was taking…As if he couldn’t wait for the baby to be gone. It was then that I realized that I was alone in this and he would never understand what I was feeling. I was told to get undressed. They gave me pill to put in my mouth that would dissolve. It was a pill to make me start bleeding and to soften/widen the opening of the vagina. I started getting cold shivers and felt extremely drowsy. After a hour, it was my turn. I started panicking and wanted to run away. They had closed all the doors and I felt trapped. I was told to get on the bed and to put my legs in the straps to spread them apart. I was terrified. I started crying. Someone held my legs and the other lady put something cold in me. It was some sort of a clamp, we were shown the device before we went it. She turned it and it opened up my vagina. That I never felt.
What happened next was the most painful and traumatic experience of my life and I will never forget it. My baby was sucked out of my womb! I felt my baby being sucked out of me and I screamed, I wanted them to stop, I didn’t want to do it anymore! They continued to suck until I was numb and couldn’t feel anything anymore. While my baby and I were being taken away from each other, the nurses were talking about what they were going to make for supper that night! I lied there in disbelief! My whole world was torn apart and they were talking about food??? I had to get off the bed and go into another room where all the other girls went afterwards. I just wanted to be alone. I was bleeding and the pain that came back was excruciating. I didn’t want to be there with all of them. Feeling their pain, hearing them cry.
Later that day, I was at my boyfriend’s house, lying bed. Instead of him being there for me, holding my hand, crying with me, he went to go drink with his cousin! I have never felt so alone in my entire life! I had blocked out everything about that day until recently, I began having sleeping problems. I get flashbacks and panic attacks. I see that room, I smell it, I hear everything and I want to run away because they want to take my baby from me. I have started thinking about killing myself. I have disappointed my child. I never had the guts to stand up for my unborn child, who needed me!
Everyday is hard, the nights even more so…I just want my baby back.
I just turned 19 when I found out I was going to be a mommy.
It was a month after my birthday. I found out on Jan 06, everything changed after I saw the test. I didn’t know what to do. I don’t have a mom to help me through my pregnancy. So I guess, so what, I am alone. I have only one person there for me and that is my boyfriend.
I did some things I wasn’t happy about after I found out. I dumped him. I don’t know why I did. He was the love of my life He is the dad of the baby but we are back together now and have been for a couple months now. I don’t have a GED or anything like that. I had no job, didn’t know how I was going to take care of my baby, but things are looking better now. I have a grandma to help me out but she already has a grandson from my brother and she doesn’t really like me.
Anyways, I guess really all I’m trying to say is for the girls who are going to be a mommy, you’re not the only one. I don’t have anyone there for me but one person and thank God for that. I don’t know what I would do if I didn’t have him there for me. Now I am 37 weeks and still don’t know what to do. All I know is that I am going to try my best to be the best mom ever, not like my mom.
I am having a boy and I already love him to death. If anything would ever happen to him, I don’t know wat i would……
I am 20 years old. I am still in college and live with my parents… My boyfriend and I have been together for 2 years now and I just found out that I was pregnant about a month ago. I am 8 weeks pregnant.
When I found out, I was happy and scared at the same time. The first person in my family to find out was my closest brother. Little did I know he was giving me a time limit to tell my parents or he was going to tell them myself. My siblings are all older than me and live on their own. The reason he was doing this is because he felt that it was best for me to get an abortion and that if I waited any longer, that I wouldn’t be able to get one. They didn’t consider this baby for even a second. They could care less how I felt about it and that really hurts me. My mother told me that if I wanted to keep this baby, than my boyfriend and I were out the door. From that point on, things have been really awkward between me and my family…. It’s like they look down on me and it makes me feel like crap.
My mom keeps saying that I’m ruining my life, my boyfriend’s life, and her life. My boyfriend’s family is happy for me and very supportive so that helps a little. All I have ever done my whole life is try to make my mom happy. I’m not going to have an abortion to make her happy. Now I’m just worried about money and finishing school. But most importantly, I can’t wait to see the baby that I decided to keep in my life. I have had an abortion before and it was so horrible I could never do it again. I was so worried that I wouldn’t be able to get pregnant again after that abortion. But now that I am, I consider it a blessing.
My life is sure going to change but I am ready for it and I cannot wait!!
I want to thank all of you, as you are each special in your own way, and so brave.
We initially wanted to adopt, (and still do) as we knew we may be able to help a woman give her baby a loving home. We have waited for what seems like years, but it’s not even been a year yet. With that said, we have decided to try with a surrogate. I am excited, but at the same time, I wanted to adopt since it may keep a woman from going through the hell of an abortion, and the baby would have a very loving life.
I have read many posts and blogs, and I have learned so much. No matter what your story is, or the future you are facing, I wish each of you the very, very best. I can’t wait to hear the melody of my own child crying for me to pick him or her up to feed, change, etc. Adoption is a very beautiful thing when it works, but the wait and not-knowing when it will happen, is so very hard.
To any of you that are giving the gift of life and love that a child will bring to an adoptive couple, you should know there is a very special place for you in the heavens. You will never know what that will mean to someone that can’t have children. Many blessings to you all.
