Kim's Story

I am a 25-year-old single mother. I grew up in a happy home, I was popular in high school and never got into trouble. When I was fifteen I started going out with Brad, the boy who I would continue to spend the next 6 years with. When I was 19, Brad and I were out at a Halloween dance with the rest of our friends in our town and we were drunk. After getting a ride home from one of our friends, we proceeded to have sex without a condom, thus created our son.

I didn't even think twice when I found out I was pregnant the first time, not that we had planned it but I also thought that we would be together for the rest of our lives. Living in Canada and being pregnant at 19 was difficult, all of my friends were just coming of age to go to the bars and I was nauseous and big and the last thing I wanted to do was hang out in a smoke filled bar. I was not a happy pregnant girl.

My family supported me wholeheartedly and helped me anyway they could. After I had our son our relationship deteriorated..maybe it was me. We split up and I became a single mother at 20. It was hard and it definitely had it's pros and cons. Dating is always a challenge when you have a young child. When I was 22 I went out with this guy who lived on an island near by and the first time we slept together I got pregnant. I knew as soon as I found out that this would not be the same as before and knew that I was going to have an abortion.

I made the appointment and the clinic was very supportive and I felt like I really could trust them. I was very ashamed of the whole situation telling myself that I should know better because I am a mother already. I was on the pill the second time. So my friend took me to have the abortion and she was wonderful and held my hand the whole time. As I left the clinic that day I swore that I would never put myself in this position again. I knew what I had done was right for me but it wasn't a situation that I wanted to repeat. I knew I would remember July 27 for the rest of my life.

My life has progressed very well and I have dated a few guys here and there. I have made great strides to make it as a single mother in the past few years and have just recently made a name for myself in the technology industry, when I found out that I was pregnant AGAIN! I have a boyfriend who is amazing with my son, but we have only been together 2 months and I was on the pill. I haven't felt that terror in 3 years and I swore..but I guess I can say never say never!

So I told my boyfriend, he was really good until he told me that abortion was out of the question. I looked at him and said that I couldn't do this, I never told him about the first abortion, but this is different - I really thought we had a future. He told me he told his parents (who are pretty Catholic) whom I have yet to meet. He kept telling me he would stand by me. I had already made my decision and granted I did make the appointment for the abortion before I told him but I don't want to be a single mom of two kids from two different fathers and since we have only been together 2 months we hardly know each other. He told me that he couldn't accept my decision and tried to guilt me into having the baby, he even tried to get me to go to Birthright.

I stuck by my decision and he is coming around, he says that he wants to be with me and that maybe he doesn't agree with what I am doing but that can't change his feelings for me. So we are working through this together and I have an appointment in 2 weeks and I know that I am making the right decision. In the future I do want children but not right now under these circumstances. I know that things happen for reason but we are also given choices in all that happens it's just the path that you choose to take that makes the difference in how you live your life. I believe everything that we may go through makes us a stronger individual.

Kim
10 July 2001

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"I will choose what enters me, what becomes flesh of my flesh. Without choice, no politics, no ethics lives. I am not your cornfield, not your uranium mine, not your calf for fattening, not your cow for milking. You may not use me as your factory. Priests and legislators do not hold shares in my womb or my mind. If I give it to you, I want it back. My life is a nonnegotiable demand." - Marge Piercy