So I gathered up the courage and took the test. It confirmed what I already knew.
What was I going to do… What would people say… What about my family… What about his?
Life was growing inside me, something I had dreamt about for years, but the circumstances were too complicated. I would be a single mother… Would the father even want to know… I couldn’t do this.
I kept the news to myself for a day or so and then told my parents… I’d told them I was having a termination (I still find it hard to use the abortion word). My parents were really supportive.
I quickly approached an organisation who would counsel me and if necessary arrange appointments. These places get a lot of bad press but the ladies were amazing. Kind, non-judgemental. They approached both sides, for and against, showed pictures etc. They made the dates for me but said these could be cancelled at anytime.
There is things that happened along the way… maybe someday I will go into in detail.
The actual procedure came and went but that night when I got home the pain had begun. There was emptiness, sadness. I was still talking to the baby as though I was still carrying it. I was bad to my body. I couldn’t look myself in the mirror. For years this went on but I suppressed it.
Roll on five years and I was in a relationship. I fell pregnant but had a miscarriage. I didn’t expect anything else. Look what I had done.
"The actual procedure came and went but that night when I got home the pain had begun. There was emptiness, sadness. I was still talking to the baby as though I was still carrying it."
A couple of months later I fell pregnant again but that’s when the darkness hit me. This should have been a happy time but I was being torn inside. Ripped apart. I didn’t deserve such things as happiness. It was a burden. But the child was born and happiness came looking into that wee face but also depths of hurt that I had caused myself.
Before I gave birth I believe God already was working on me. Trying to break down the darkness. I went to church etc. I wanted this wee one to know God and have His peace… something I hadn’t experienced for a long time. My child was eight before I got a revelation of God’s full peace and forgiveness. It is only by this love and comfort that I can write this today.
It was years of torment. On reflection I never want anyone to feel that way… irrespective of their decision.
God has given me the opportunity to turn my experience into something positive. To let them know its ok… I will hold your hand… Like God did when I eventually let Him.
Now when I think about the baby I return to David and Bathsheba from the Bible in the Old Testament. The baby they had that passed away. David stopped mourning the day he died and knew he would see his son in heaven with God. I comfort myself thinking my baby will be 18 now and having a whale of a time in heaven with other babies like him.
Perhaps if I had more conversations with people of different views my 18-year-old child would be with me today.
