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Testimonies
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Giving Others a Safe Place
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Michelle
Wisconsin,
United States
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I was 16 when I found out I was pregnant. My parents never talked with me about sex, or protection, although I knew enough to know I needed some sort of birth control. From public school, I knew I could count on Planned Parenthood to give me free condoms and birth control pills for little to nothing. I wanted to be cool, like the other girls with their cute little compacts full of pills in a circle.
I met my first boyfriend, had my first kiss, lost my virginity when I was about 16 and a half. Coming up on 17 and realizing I was pregnant, I knew I had to run to Planned Parenthood to make it go away. My parents and I had a horrible relationship. I thought for sure they would ridicule me and say hurtful things and hate me.
During my first meeting with the Planned Parenthood nurse, she told me I would need an adult and asked if I had one. She told me I didn't have time to ask my uncle, who I thought might, that I needed to go down to Illinois (I was in Wisconsin) and in Illinois, I wouldn't need parental consent. She told me I needed to do it right away. I was scared, I was depressed, I didn't want to do it, but thought I had no other options. I was never given my options, either. She gave me directions to the clinic, which I still remember today, that it was located behind LaSalle Bank just over the Illinois border. My future husband’s step father and mother were told that I was pregnant and agreed that I should abort it, because I turned 17 and my boyfriend just turned 18 not long before. They were worried he would be charged with statutory rape. They paid for the abortion and lied for me when I told my parents I was going to go up north with them for the weekend. I would stay at their house after I had it to rest a few days.
My boyfriend drove me down to the clinic. I cried to him that I didn't want to do it. He told me that if I didn't, I would just regret it later. I agreed and went in. It was a sad place. The walls were light colored, but it had a doom about it. I saw women in there go behind the door as the nurse called them, and shortly after, being escorted to their family members or friends looking like sick zombies. They could barely walk out of the clinic. After paying the lady the fee, I waited to be called. I didn't want to be there. I didn't want to be the girls stumbling out of the clinic. My name was called. I remember crying and telling them I didn't know if I want to do this, that I was scared, what if I never fell asleep, would it hurt the baby? They put an IV in, told me to count backwards from 10, and I woke up in a stupor weeping out loud, in what I believe was a recliner. The nurse came in to shut me up and get me out of there. I stumbled out to the car, my boyfriend gloomy, asking me if I was okay. We started driving home. We stopped at the Illinois tollbooth and I opened my door and was vomiting. I remember the car behind us beeping at my boyfriend to GO. I went back to his stepfather's house and stayed the weekend. I don't remember much about that weekend, but I will never forget the day. May 27th, 2000. I will never forget that day. Every year, I think about the baby I would have had. Would it have been a boy or a girl? He or she would have been 15 this year. I always think about how my oldest son, now 12, wouldn't be the oldest child had I not gone through with the evil plan that day. He would have been best friends with his older brother or sister. He would have loved him or her.
I was a junior in high school. I went to my parenting class not long after, and we studied the stages of pregnancy. I saw that my baby had not been just a blob of tissue, that I killed a baby with tiny hands, fingers and toes. I was mortified. I thought my parenting teacher was lying to me. I didn't believe it. But it was the other side that lied to me. I was disgusted with myself.
Why did I care so much what my parents thought, anyway? Because I didn't trust myself that I could raise a child. I didn't trust myself that I could do it, and I wasn't willing to add more hatred in my relationship with my parents. I wasn't willing to be the screw up, again. I had not one person try to assure me life would be okay. Harder, but okay. I needed that. I was betrayed by my boyfriend’s stepfather, mom, my uncle whom I confided in, my boyfriend, the nurses and staff at Planned Parenthood and the clinic. I was nothing to Planned Parenthood, but dollar signs. I wish I would have told my parents now. I believe my mom would've been angry and hateful, but who made me feel like life would go on, that it would be okay. But it doesn't matter now. Because at the time, all I could think was that they were going to kill me.
It would be about 10 years later when I found the saving knowledge of Jesus Christ. And though I am forgiven by THE FORGIVER, I cannot forgive myself. I cry still when I think about what I did to an innocent child. I cry when I see photos of what a baby looks like at 12 weeks. I am in horror when I imagine the little body that was taken out of me, little arms, legs and all, dissected and ripped apart. It is too much for me. It is my one big secret, the one regret I'll hold on to until the day I die.
But I don't want it to be a secret. I want people to know that there are other options besides aborting. I want girls to be empowered to know that life will be okay, even if they think their parents will kill them and they don't know how to raise a baby alone or have no money. I want them to understand that it's something they will hold on to forever. I want them to know that the little tiny baby in your womb has little bitty fingers. And that this "mistake" they think they made, doesn't have to be a regret for them for the rest of their life. I want to offer for them a safe place to come and stay if they need it, to take care of their baby until they get on their feet, to love them even though they may not love themselves during this time. There are others out there who would help you, too. I don't want anyone to have to feel like abortion is the only option for them.
There was a girl I had met that got pregnant after me. She was a year or two younger than I was. Her dad was ex-military, very harsh to her...but she refused to get an abortion. I always wished I was like her...strong enough to not care what her parents thought and confident enough to know she wasn't going to abort. I found her Facebook a while back. She had a beautiful son. I would have a child the same age as her. Every day, I wish I did.
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