I am the father of an aborted son, I am now 60 yrs old, when I was 48, I was married to same woman for twenty plus years, we had two early teen sons, we found ourselves unexpectedly pregnant, at first it was a shock but soon I was bragging about being a father at my age, late in pregnancy we went for seemingly normal checkup which turned into worst day of my life, our doctor ran a test for Down's syndrome and told us that it was 99 per cent sure fact our child had Down's syndrome. Doctor talked to us about how hard it would be especially at older age to raise him, doctor suggested abortion and told us we had to decide that day as we were at point in pregnancy when legal option of abortion was running out immediately.
We were heartbroken at the news and in turmoil as what to do, our dreams were crashing, in the end I decided for our family to abort ,wife was heartbroken and let me decide, I remember wife laying on hospital bed myself sitting on chair beside her holding her hand and doctor asking if we were sure, I said yes, he then put a long needle into my wife's huge belly and gave baby a shot to stop his heart, once they confirmed no heart beat wife was given something to induce labor and baby was born dead, my wife was attended to and nurse ask if I wanted to hold him, I took him in my arms, he was a baby which filled from my hand to elbow, he was skinny and small but a full baby, I held him and cried in torment all night, how could I have asked doctor to end his life, from bottom of my soul I wept. In the morning, the nurse came to take him way and said we had to name him and arrange a burial as he was late term. We named him for records, and he was given to us to take to funeral home ourselves, he was given to us in a white casket like box, we took him to our hometown funeral home and that is when the lying began, I could not tell anyone what I had done, not parents, siblings, friends or even my sons,
After burial it was never talked about again, I had such guilt and shame I never asked my wife once how she felt as I couldn't bear any more pain. We remained a family for a few years, but marriage did end as guilt erased any love we had. I felt God was punishing me for what I had done and accepted his punishment as many years as I could, as it neared 10 years I tried praying on my own, I tearfully prayed with a pastor but felt no forgiveness, I searched and found Rachel's Vineyard and contacted my local representative, It took a year of me being scared but my rep didn't stop encouraging me and finally I attended a weekend, I found there are others who knew how I felt and a place I could let go of my secret, through their sharing and instruction I found on last day that healing is possible and God' s grace includes forgiveness even for me.
That weekend changed my life and will be forever thankful. My story is no more traumatic than any other abortion only that I held my son, more has to be done for parents facing the most traumatic decision ever to be made, and more has to be done to let people know there is healing, and for this, I am silent no more.