I suppose my story is not that uncommon. I discovered I was pregnant in December of 2001. I had been dating my boyfriend for 2 years and we had our share of problems. We were not using protection. I felt at the time that I could not raise a baby because I had just bought an expensive new car and lost my job a month later. I was scared, so I decided to have an abortion. I was not attending church regularly; I was going my own way instead of God's way.

At the clinic, I looked around at the other women who were there for the same reason that I was. It felt lonely.

It seemed as though we on an assembly line, one after another. I had many thoughts. I thought I would just walk out at any time and forget the whole thing. When I was called in, the doctor asked me to undress from the waist down and cover up with the sheet. Never once did anyone ask if I was okay, if I wanted to talk about what was happening, or if I understood what was happening. When the doctor began the abortion, I lay there and began to cry and scream.  I asked him to stop but he said it would be over soon. And it was. I got dressed and went into the recovering room where I began to cry in realization of what I had just done. I killed my own baby!

The girl next to me told me it would be okay, but I knew that it would not. In the days that followed, I was ridiculed by my boyfriend for killing our baby. I wanted to commit suicide.  If my baby couldn't live, why should I? But I did. 

Four years later, I was in a college health class when an assignment on abortion brought everything back. While doing research, I would cry and feel sick. I began to have trouble concentrating and eating. I cried a lot of the time. I quit the project so many times and considered dropping the class because it was too much for me to handle. I had nightmares where I would see my son playing with my aborted son who would have been one year older.

I have regretted my decision since day one. I still suffer from grief, but being involved in church and prayer has really helped me a lot. Knowing that God forgives me for this horrific sin is what gets me through.