If I knew then…

Hello everyone! I don’t know if this is the right place to post this, but I need to tell someone and the only person in my life that knows the whole story is my mother. I have been thinking about what I did a lot the past few years, and I can’t get it out of my mind.

I am 34 years old, and my story starts when I was 17. I was walking home one evening and I was raped. It was a stranger, and I never found out who he was and never reported it because I was too embarrassed. I got pregnant from him, and the only option I could see given the circumstances was to get an abortion. I did it and did not think about it much, except for a few dreams about the baby. Four years later, when I was 21, I got pregnant again, this time by a boy I had been seeing for two years, but our relationship wasn’t going very well. Unfortunately, I thought that since I had already had an abortion before, that it would be no big deal to do it again. This time I waited longer because we didn’t have the money right away – I was three months pregnant. And again I didn’t allow myself to think about what I was doing, but I had worse dreams and nightmares about both babies afterward. I had them for many years afterward. I regret both times, but the second one much more. I can’t even begin to express in words how terrible I feel when I think about those two babies that did not get a chance at life.

I ended up getting married (not to the same person!) and we tried to have a baby for a couple of years, and finally I got pregnant again. It wasn’t until I was pregnant with my son, that I actually allowed myself to think about what had happened so many years ago. My son is a beautiful toddler now, and I am thankful every day that I was given another chance to be a mom. I keep thinking that if I could only have one more baby, I could somehow make things right, even though I know that sounds crazy. But my husband only wants one child, so I need to just do the best I can to be a good mom.

Anyway, I just want to say to anyone who may be thinking about getting an abortion, please think about other options! There are many ways to make things work when we really want them to. I thought that I would never think about this once it was done, like it never happened, but it has haunted me for years.