My name is Patricia and “My Choice has a Name” Francesca, Josephine, Anthony, Joseph and Angelica and they are with the Lord.
I am here today to share my testimony on how abortion harms women. I want to take you on a journey back into my life in 1979, six years after abortion was legalized when I was 16 and because I had no rights! My mother made the decision that day for my abortion accompanied by my boyfriend who supported her decision. My mother would not have wanted to hurt me, so she must have been believed the lies Planned unParenthood told her that the abortion would be better for my mental health. They played on her fear that day using it against us that I was too young and this would affect my ability to complete my schooling. Well little did she know this would be the reason I later dropped out of high school. She bought into the lies that I would be alright. They made abortion out to be a solution to our problem and she believed them. I was terrified while in the office of Planned Parenthood and with a frantic plea to not make me go through with the abortion it fell upon deaf ears and hardened hearts, they removed me to a room and proceeded to force the abortion on me. No one protected me that day or listened to my cries! The very fact that they ignored them and still did the abortion violated me down to the core. I have experienced rape and I would say I was raped by Planned Parenthood physically and mentally of my life and my child’s life that day in 1979.
If we want this nation to be healed we must RECALL abortion.
They say abortion is for mental health, but I attest it led to my need to receive mental help. The coercion was a traumatic experience and what I believe led me to four subsequent abortions. I got into very destructive behavior using drugs and alcohol that would lead to reckless and irresponsible relationships leading to several more pregnancies in a span of two years. I once again was overwhelmed by fear and did not choose life consequently the relationships ended immediately after the abortions. I would later marry into an abusive relationship at 18 have my first child at 20 with that marriage ending within the first two years. I got back involved in a destructive life at which time I attempted suicide. I got married a second time had another child and another divorce within two years. I was finding myself incapable of loving or receiving love or bonding to anyone. I am on my third marriage now for 23 years and had two more attempted suicides prior to and after my third child was born and was misdiagnosed with “situational depression” what later turned out to be Post Traumatic Stress Disorder.
One might ask why all the pregnancies, well evidently the birth control Planned Parenthood provided me didn’t work, so then I would use abortion as contraception. Planned Parenthoods claim to be PRO_CHOICE; is a lie. I never felt like I had a choice. I believed the psychobabble from Planned Parenthood telling me in my later abortions “it” the baby was not a life. I was so driven by fear of what would happen if I kept the pregnancy going and that fear was used against me by Planned Parenthood.
We cannot love apart from the truth and the truth is in the person of Jesus Christ. I was not in the truth and did not know our all loving and merciful God. It was through entering the Catholic Church I began my healing journey through Rachel’s Vineyard. It was there that I began a personal relationship with the Lord and experienced His love and mercy which has led me to true love! It is in Him that we receive true freedom. He uses our suffering to bring us to a greater good! He transforms our hearts to be able to love and receive love and most importantly forgive others and ourselves. I have seen wonderful graces come out of so much despair and grief. The hope lies in that slow subtle transformation and looking back when years have passed to see where I once was and where I am today.
I hope by speaking out about my experiences some light will be shed on the tragic consequences abortion had not only on me, but my entire family! Our society requires warning labels on cigarettes, alcohol, products of all kinds. Abortion is the only procedure that does not carry a warning on the physical and emotional harms it causes while ending a life it takes the life of the mother and father as well. I am here today to demand that Abortion be Recalled and until then I will be Silent No More!