:: The S.I.C.L.E. Cell ::

:: Monday, August 30, 2004 ::

FFL is interested in the child loss experiences of women. The deadline for story submission was, I think, today. I sent this:

"My husband and I lost our first child in a second-trimester abortion due to a severe and debilitating pregnancy-related maternal disease. I've been through a lot of bad things in my life including mental, physical and sexual abuse, poverty, the cancer-related deaths of both my parents, and the horrible disease I get when pregnant. None of it compares to losing our baby in an abortion. It was the single worst event of my life, and I wish I had not done it.

There is a component of guilt, but the most devastating factors are the suffering my child surely went through and the loss we experience. Attitudes complicate the grief. Most who support abortion do not acknowledge that we lost a child, and many who oppose abortion can only deal with the guilt issue; their focus is on forgiveness and not loss. Their goal is "healing", but my child is wounded and gone; I'll survive, but I can't "heal" from that. Well-meaning friends say we can't think of "it" as a baby. Well-meaning advocates say we aren't allowed to experience lingering despair. They expect us to "give it to Jesus" or else we are "sinning". No one wants to accept our pain or acknowledge it on our terms.

It has been eight years, and I still cry. I love and miss a child who suffered and died. It is harder than our miscarriage. Firstly, a D&E is a traumatic and unnatural death. Secondly, our miscarried child was never ours to keep, while our aborted child was most likely here to stay.

The loss has made me sad and angry and affects my relationships with others. I am not as patient, open or warm as I used to be. My days are cloaked in mourning. We wanted our child but aborted due to illness; these are the results. And no matter what anyone says or wants, I can't make it go away."

:: ashli 10:16 AM # ::
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