This isn’t about your baby’s life.
It’s not about the politics behind abortion or what the Bible has to say about it.
It’s about you.
Nothing about the decision you’re considering is ‘normal.’ That’s why the process you’re in right now is painful and terrifying. It’s not ‘normal.’
After a D&C? After an abortion? Your baby is gone. Officially. Whether you wanted this or not. The reality is sickening. There aren’t any choices left to be made. There aren’t any more appointments to make or people to call or research to be done or pills to take.
Your baby is gone.
And you have changed.
That part? About you changing? You don’t know that you’re choosing that, too.
Maybe your baby’s heart had already stopped beating, or maybe it stopped beating during your ‘procedure.’ It doesn’t matter because the pain is the same.
And that ‘normal’ that will come when it’s all said and done?
It doesn’t come.
Sure, you’ll find a new ‘normal.’
But when you get your period, you’ll think about that one that should have been ‘normal,’ and why it wasn’t.
When your cramps tell you that your period is about to start, you’ll remember the cramps that should have been ‘normal,’ and why they weren’t.
When you have sex, you’ll have a moment of sheer panic when you remember, and then a tiny part of you will wish for the moments ‘before’ all over again.
And all of a sudden, your new ‘normal’ consists of choices that have become memories, and no matter how hard you try, memories don’t change.
The emotions that follow something like a D&C, no matter how or why that D&C happened…they don’t go away.
It’s true, I haven’t been in your shoes. And I’m thankful for that.
But I’ve been quite a few things.
I’ve been the girl who only ever wanted to be a Mommy. I’ve been the who wanted so badly to experience a pregnancy. I’ve been the girl who lost babies in the adoption process. I’ve been the girl who got pregnant after 7 years of infertility. I’ve been the girl who had a miscarriage. I’ve been the girl who lost a baby. I’ve been the girl who had a D&C.
I AM the girl who is trying desperately to recover, and I’m the girl who is absolutely terrified for every woman who will ever face being who I am right now — who I have been for the past few months, who I will be if and when my new ‘normal’ ever comes.
Choose to parent. Choose abortion. Or choose to place your baby for adoption.
It’s true that the after-effects of all three will last forever. When your newborn hasn’t slept in days, when your toddler is laying in the middle of Walgreens throwing a fit because he wants a pencil. Or when your best friend gets pregnant and you somehow know in a split second exactly how far apart your babies would have been. When your period reminds you every month of the one that should have been ‘normal.’ Or when every picture, letter, and visit with your precious child makes it possible for your heart to break and heal all at the same time.
Only one of those choices makes a face disappear forever. That part is about your baby.
Only one of those choices results in a pain and memories so deep and so gut-wrenching that it has the potential to ruin you. That part is about you.
I’ve also been the one who was blessed enough to become a Mommy by two different women who chose to push through the pain and fear. Even though the choice they made was painful, it at least carried with it the chance for a lifetime of healing, and of knowing the precious face that they chose to carry.
I didn’t choose to lose my baby, but I wish I could change it every second of the day.
I don’t know how our family will grow from here, if we’ll adopt again or if I’ll get pregnant again. While both of those are exciting things to think about, neither one will bring that baby back and neither one will ever take away the pain of the process of losing him/her.
Now? I’m the girl who wishes I could do something to make sure that no woman ever has to experience this pain. From a miscarriage? I can’t change that. From an abortion? Maybe I can.
I have friends who have had abortions. I don’t know anyone who has had two. I no longer wonder why.
I have friends who support abortion, who have also had miscarriages and D&C’s. The pain I hear in their voice every time their precious baby and that horrible ‘procedure’ are brought up is excruciating. It makes me wonder how, even if they see abortion as simply a choice and not a decision between life and death…how they would support anything that could cause that kind of pain for another woman. How can they think it isn’t the same?!
I can’t promise what your future will look like. But abortion? It will change you physically and emotionally. That I can promise you.
I don’t envy the decision you face, and I’m praying that you feel supported. I wanted you to just know, maybe not from someone who has been right where you are right now, but from someone who has been on the other side where you could be soon.
I wish I could hug you and tell you that, no matter what, it will be ok. But that’s not comforting for me to hear right now and I won’t put that on you, either.
Even if I don’t know you, I’m sorry you’re in pain, and I’m praying with everything in me that your pain stops here. It’s comforting to know that you can make that choice. This place where I am, choose not to be here. For you.
The choices that come later can be for your baby. This choice? This one can be for you.
