Jess

My birth control failed because I was taking other medication for my headaches. It was my senior year of high school. I didn’t know I was pregnant until I was already six weeks.

“I regret having to have an abortion. I do not regret having an abortion.”

I wasn’t showing, and I was in training for soccer. I felt split between happiness and total fear and sorrow. I knew I wouldn’t be able to continue the pregnancy but I tried to think of what could be. My mom is disabled, and my dad is abusive. I came from a poor family and lived in a $400-a-month apartment to prove it. My boyfriend wasn’t for having a baby either.

I had nobody to rely on. I remembered all the problems of being poor and what hardship my child would go through. There are already tons of children in adoption services, and I feared my baby would’ve suffered so much more due to my and his father’s anxiety.

I planned an abortion in San Diego. I went, and they asked me if I was being forced. I hesitated. I wanted badly to keep the pregnancy, but there were so many reasons why I couldn’t. I regret having to have an abortion. I do not regret having an abortion.

I told my family about my abortion a few weeks after I’d had it. My dad hated me. My parents started seeing me as a delinquent. My mom kicked me out of the house. Luckily I had my best friend to go to.

Then… I got pregnant again, by the same boy. I’d gotten reckless with my birth control. Only a month before graduation. I was planning on keeping the pregnancy. Only I and my boyfriend knew for a long while.

But I got an abortion when I was at 9 weeks. When I was at 7 weeks, my father fought me. He threw me out of the room and kicked me. I had a bruise on my ass for a very long time. The police called it a “family spat.” I realized I couldn’t keep the pregnancy. I was dependent on my friend for food and shelter. And this man who would’ve been a grandfather was abusive to his pregnant daughter. My father is 6’2″ and 280 pounds; words alone from him are intimidating.

It’s been a year and now I’m in college on the other side of the country playing soccer and building my education. I know that had I continued the pregnancies, my life would be so different. I could be sitting in a trailer in 100-degree heat and would most likely be a single mother.

I won’t lie. It’s a tough thing to decide. But having an abortion was the right option.