I am speaking up to those considering or who have had an abortion. By the time I was 24 I had a troubled past - a child I had placed for adoption, one divorce, a growing alcohol problem and many sexual affairs under my belt. Now, I was on my way to an abortion. I had, once again, found myself pregnant and abandoned for the second time. I regretted giving up my first child and did not want to do it again, so I decided to keep the baby this time. So I packed up and moved to Los Angeles from the Bay Area to continue my singing and acting career and become a mother.
Once I arrived in L.A., the lady I was staying with convinced me to go and talk with someone at Planned Parenthood so I would be able to make an ‘informed choice” about this very important decision I thought I had already made. My meeting with Planned Parenthood went on for a grueling three hours. After many tears were shed, I finally relinquished myself to the fact that I had come to Los Angeles to pursue a career, not to become a mother and abortion was the only answer. I scheduled my appointment for the following week for I was closing in on the crucial 10-week deadline.
I arrived at Planned Parenthood with a man I had just met at an audition the previous day who insisted upon taking me. I recall being extremely nervous and scared so they decided to put me to sleep during the procedure. When I woke up, I was crying and thanking the doctor all at the same time for I thought that my dilemma had been resolved. Little did I know that I would continue to careen down a 10-year path of deeper self-destruction. As I pursued my show business career, I buried my pain by continuing on in my quest to fill the hole left in my heart. I continued to have more affairs leaving me with a total of 3 marriages, and a need to anesthetize myself with alcohol, and drugs. This madness brought 10 years of numerous diagnoses and medication for bi-polar disease, chronic depression, hypomania, and borderline manic-depression, several psychological counselors and psychiatrists, and an inpatient treatment center. I also suffered from emotional outbursts, fits of rage, paranoia and an inability to understand or embrace God’s love for me. A miscarriage during my third marriage and severe depression eventually left me with such a sense of hopelessness, guilt and shame that suicidal thoughts became a regular occurrence. When I finally gave birth to our first child in my third marriage, I spent the whole pregnancy anticipating yet another loss of another child and was unable to bond with him for the first year of his life.
But then Jesus happened! He came into what was left of a heart that had been carelessly and foolishly broken off piece by piece and given to any man that would have it. He came into the small piece of my heart that was left and began to put it back together, breathing life back into it. Since Jesus entered my life, my third marriage has been restored and we will celebrate our 25th anniversary in 2010. I have been delivered from debilitating depression and a ten-year dependency on anti-depressant drugs. God has replaced my aborted child and my miscarried child with two sons, David and Scott. And God allowed me to be reunited with the daughter I gave up for adoption. What Satan tried to destroy, God has restored and made whole – therefore, I am silent no more!