The Mudcat Café TM
Thread #89412   Message #1687790
Posted By: jacqui.c
07-Mar-06 - 06:58 PM
Thread Name: BS: abortion south dakota
Subject: RE: BS: abortion south dakota
Like Kat I had my first child before I was 18, in the UK. We were just as ignorant of birth control and abortion there. It was a case of 'having to get married', although my parents objected and I had to go to court to get permission.

I would not change the way my life has gone, I was lucky enough to be able to make a life for myself and my two younger children after divorcing their father for adultery after five years of servitude. (I had three children in four years as he would not use contraception)

I think if the option had been available I would have had an abortion and my life would have been different. It would have been good to have had the choice.

More recently a close friend was in what she thought would be a long term relationship when she got pregnant and the father became very controlling and started to be threatening. She decided that this was not a relationship she wanted to be in and she talked to me at length about what to do about the baby. We went through the four alternatives - keep baby and stay with partner, keep baby and raise alone, have baby adopted and abortion. She made the decision, after a lot of heartache, that she could not deal with the first three and I went with her to the clinic when she had the abortion. Another woman may have made a different choice but for my friend this was what she needed to do. I would hate to think that her choice would have been denied to her because of someone else's beliefs.

I think that this is about control. I was certainly kept in my place during my first marriage, and with three small children and no family support (my parents disowned me) there seemed little choice but to accept the situation. I was lucky to have got out from under. Others aren't so lucky.