I Know His Purpose

  Vicki
California,  United States
 
 
This year before I tell you my story God put it on my heart to speak to the people in this audience who may be dealing with infertility. My heart truly aches for you. You may be offended or really hurt by our stories because we got rid of our babies, and you cannot even conceive one. Please know we pray to you will someday be able to have that child that you so long for. God bless you in your struggle.          

I had 2 abortions in the early 1970's. At that time abortion was only legal in New York and California. I lived in Massachusetts... It was a long time ago but sometimes it seems like yesterday. Some things about the abortions I will never forget. I was pregnant both times by the same man. He did not want to get married. If my parents even found out that I was sexually active let alone pregnant it would kill them. . These were enough reasons for me to choose abortion. My boyfriend went with me for the first one, the second one he did not know about.           

I remember the procedure itself and feeling very removed from my body when it was done. I remember nothing after the first one but after the second one I remember trying to console another women who was crying after the procedure. I stayed at a hotel in New York city that night and could not get warm. I called the front desk and asked them to check the heater, there was nothing wrong with it. I was freezing, chills passing through my body like a knife. It was a sensation that was to return many times over the years … The next day on the bus going home I felt a huge emptiness inside and cried out to God to never let me do this ever again. I got pregnant again by the same man. It sounds crazy but I kept wanting to put the babies back in my womb. When I found out I was desperate .so desperate I went to church, they had a guest speaker that day and she talked about adoption. God had answered my cry not to do abortion again . This time I moved to California and my son was adopted here in San Francisco.    
            
For years I struggled to make something of my life. I married a man I met in group therapy…we were both mourning the loss of a child his by divorce, mine by adoption. I did not recognize my losses by abortion. I had another son and my stepson came to live with us. I was still not happy, and I did not know what was wrong. I thought it was about the adoption but an astute pregnancy center counselor said it was more likely about the abortions. I did not want to go there. I worked and worked to be the perfect wife and mother and step mother. I overachieved constantly at my work. I was still miserable, and my children and husband knew what people saw on the outside was not who I really was.                 

I took the training to be a pregnancy center volunteer and was told I would have to go through their post abortion Bible study before I could counsel. I thank God that they made that rule and I believe they made it when they saw me coming.  Finally through this Bible study I began to see how the abortions had affected me. I let myself feel the incredible grief I had for the babies who I had aborted. I saw how my relationships with my husband and my children were marred because I could not let myself get close to anyone. I could only punish myself because of what I had done.   I saw how the anger I had at myself for what I had done was being taken out on my husband and children.  I began to heal, the truth that Jesus had paid the price for me with his blood began to be real to me. I did the study a second time a few years later and accepted His complete forgiveness and restoration . I knew then as I do now that my babies are with Jesus in Heaven and I will see them there some day. My mother is having that joy now.   

Eventually I told my parents about my birth son and also shared with them about my abortions. My mom never forgot any of my children. When she was 94 and in a nursing home, she told me she had a dream that the Irish ladies in the room next to hers were taking care of all the aborted babies. I was able to share with her that she would meet them in heaven before I would and to love them for me. We held hands and wept over the loss that we both felt intensely. I do not get that chilled sensation hardly ever anymore, except when I know about someone having an abortion at the time they are having it, and actually this year on Jan 22 the anniversary of Roe vs. Wade. I feel when I do have it is God reminding to be praying for those women and their babies who are in danger.

Even when speaking up here I don’t feel chilled.  I thought for so long that I should never have been born but now I know His purpose for me is to lead other women in healing Bible study.  

I have met and know so many women and men like myself who struggled for years and did not know why and that is the reason I will be SILENT NO MORE!
   
   
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