Aly

I was always the one out of my friend group that had everything together. I worked three jobs, had just gotten accepted to the university of my dreams, and then, out of nowhere, I found out I was pregnant. Five weeks to be exact. I spent the day in tears, but I immediately knew what I had to do.

“I will not let anyone make me feel like I am nothing because I had to make the best decision for me.”

I was 17 years old. I had dreams bigger than the city I grew up in. I felt like a failure for allowing this to happen to myself. It wasn’t fair that my pregnancy was the product of an abusive relationship. It wasn’t fair that I couldn’t give a baby everything it would need, both time and materials. It wasn’t fair that the man that I loved so much hit me and told me he wasn’t the father, even though he was the only man I’d ever been with.

So I made the decision, without telling my mother, and I let the past be the past. It was hard at first because I’d felt so empty. I cried every night wishing I could take it back.

It took months, and now years, but I finally realized that I made the best possible choice. I am so proud of myself. I am a full time student. I have a full time job. I pay all of my own bills. I freed myself of my abusive relationship.

I am going to be a mother one day. It’s a future dream, but the dream I have right now is a degree. When I do reach my future dream of being a mother though, I will be an amazing mother, and I will love my children even more because of what I’ve gone through. I will give them absolutely everything that I could not before.

I am finally opening up and talking about my abortion. I will not let anyone make me feel like I am nothing because I had to make the best decision for me. I will continue to love and support any woman who makes this choice, because for me, this was and probably will always be the hardest choice I will ever have to make.