My Journey Through Abortion and Back

by Shari
February 1, 2009

My story starts in my childhood.

I grew up with 2 alcoholics and a stepfather who sexually abused me. My parents divorced when I was 9 years old and my mother quickly remarried. The sexual abuse started within a month of their marriage. I was never raped, but it was always threatened and I lived in constant fear. What a terrible thing for a child to live through. I looked at my kids at 9 years old and wondered how anyone can do something so horrendous to a child.

I decided early on that I would not have sex until I was 18, so I could at least support the child if I became pregnant. I stuck to this promise to myself and did wait. As a child of sexual abuse, I looked for love within sex. I wasn’t going from man to man, but I definitely equated love with sex. I met my husband and we became friends first, then after a period of time, lovers. We started living together and became careless one night and I ended up pregnant. I was 22 years old.

Looking back now, I cannot fathom what I was thinking, although at the time I was drinking and doing drugs to numb the pain of the childhood I had experienced and I believe this played a big factor in my decision. As an adopted child myself, I often wonder why I didn’t chose this route. The sad truth is I felt scared and alone and it was easier at the time to “just get rid of it.” the rest