CHALLENGE
I
don’t like to get personal.
I am inherently distrustful
and cynical. But I need to
challenge myself.
On March 30, 2016, I
found out I was pregnant
with my emotionally abusive
ex-boyfriend’s child.
I have not attached my
name to this piece, not
because I’m ashamed of
my story, but because there
are important people who
don’t know. So here is my
challenge: telling my most
personal, most intimate
secret, and finally putting
into words what has been
haunting me in hopes that
it will help other people
and, more selfishly, help me
overcome this important
issue and feel liberated.
FRIDAY
I left work early to
drive to my consultation
appointment. Luckily for
me, the clinic was close by.
I pulled into the parking
lot past three older women
decked out in denim passing
out pamphlets and shouting
at cars. “Please come
and talk to us before you
make the worst mistake of
your life,” one particularly
aggressive woman shouted
at me through my open
car window.
Inside, the warm, neutral
walls bore little adornment.
It smelled almost like a
veterinary office—not like
animals, but an “other” kind
of sterile. At 9:45 a.m., only
three other women sat in
the waiting room. A nurse
gave me a sign-in sheet; all
the names before me had
been redacted with thick,
black ink.
A nice nurse in colorful
scrubs handed me a
clipboard with a generic
medical history form on
it. The second page asked
me how many times I’ve
been pregnant, how many
abortions I’ve had, how
many children I have. With
blood rushing to my face,
I immediately scribbled
0’s into all the boxes and
quickly signed my name at
the bottom.
The protesters were
getting louder outside. The
aggressive one stood at
the curb, peeking her head
through the foliage, and
seemed to stare deep into
my soul through the tinted
windows. I couldn’t hear
what she was shouting, but
through brief moments when
the door opened, I heard
broken phrases.
“…God will protect your
baby…”
“Don’t give up on what…”
“…sinners in the eyes of
our…”
A nurse in purple scrubs
called my name. She took me
to an exam room with weird
mood lighting; the overhead
fluorescents were turned off
and a five-headed lamp in the
corner sported five different
colors of shades. She
instructed me to sit down on
the examination bed as she
flicked on the light switch
and closed the door.
“Okay, just go ahead and
lie down, and pull your pants
down below your waist,”
she said.
As she washed her hands
and put on gloves, she talked
me through an ultrasound.
She’s going to squeeze the
gel—oh that’s a bit cold—
onto my stomach and use the
machine to look at the sac.
She switched the lights off
again, leaving us stuck in this
weird sunset-colored room. I
couldn’t see anything on the
screen that illuminated her
face. It beeped as she began
to press into my abdomen.
For what seemed like ages,
she moved the thing around,
trying different angles,
pressing harder. I started to
wonder if my home test was
wrong, if that false positive
I’d been hoping for was
actually real.
“Everything okay?” I
asked.
“Yeah, just still looking
around,” she murmured, eyes
focused on the screen.
“Am I even pregnant?” I
asked rather bluntly.
“Oh, you’re definitely
pregnant,” she said. Shit.
“Oh.”
More“ than
ever before,
I started to
cry again...
the sorrowful
cry of a woman
who’s making
a conscious
choice.
”
“Yeah, you’re barely at
six weeks. I’m just looking
around trying to get the best
angle.” Everything she said
after “six weeks” seemed like
miles away and underwater,
and that echoed around
in my head for a while. I
tried to think back to how
it happened, but I couldn’t
focus. I was reeling at the
fact that there was a tiny
pea-sized thing inside me
growing, developing into a
person it would never be.
The cost of my actions
was a human—a person
that could grow up and do
wonderful things and love
people. But I’m not fit to be
anyone’s mother, and this
was the choice I had to make
for myself and for the people
I love. And this is never a