I was a newlywed. We were both using different kinds of protection, however, nothing is 100% in this uncertain world. I had recently fled my abusive parents, sorting out for myself what it meant to be not only running from my trauma of the past and thrust into the world of a newly married person.
The two lines on the test came as a shock. I immediately went to my doctor to confirm and it was true as I saw the yolk sac on the ultrasound, totally in denial of everything. My husband and I made the choice—due to my mental state and unpacking my past trauma—that it was not the right time.
Then my hormone levels started to drop each day when they should have been doubling. I was in a whirlwind of both emotional and physical storms. The numbers never did again double, and I got sicker waiting for the miscarriage to happen. I was filled with fever and infection, the ER told my frantic husband as he rushed me to the emergency room. The D&C the hospital performed saved my life. And when the same pregnancy circumstances happened years later, another D&C saved me then, too.
Now, when abortion is illegal in my home state of West Virginia where they quote the quote, “Mountaineers are always free,” I laugh at the absurdity of the notion as I help other pregnant people free themselves of the chains of an unwanted pregnancy, spiraling miscarriages, and other nightmarish circumstances they find themselves in this era of cruelty and no choices.
I hustle hard answering phones, taking others’ stories down for posterity, raising funds for the pregnant people that would be forced to carry an unwanted pregnancy to term, answering questions from a scared person that by accident thought a Crisis Pregnancy Center was a clinic or abortion fund that would actually help them—all in the name of freedom of choice.
I listen as state Representatives and policymakers snark at me when I tell my story about how abortion not only saved my physical life but also my mental health. I summon the courage each time when I point out the absurdity of the state saying their motto of freedom as their pregnant citizens feel left behind, and plans for the incarceration of people who have had miscarriages gets questioned in the state senate and country at large.
I recite my story at Congress, much to the dismay of some staffers who would rather I stay quiet. I speak not only on my behalf but for all those stories unheard. As a revolutionary soldier once spoke of how they had not yet begun to fight, neither have I in a way, and I will continue to fight till all are free and stories like mine and others are mundane and not cause fear and division. I will continue to fight for abortion till all my people are free to speak and act accordingly.