On choices and the course I've charted

I was in a friend's wedding this past weekend. I would have been six months pregnant exactly.

When I found out I was pregnant, in the little game of What If's that one imagines and plays out in her mind, I imagined calling my dear friend  J. to tell her: "I am sorry. I can't be your bridesmaid. I can't stand up there at the alter with you with my belly bursting out of that lovely eggplant purple dress you chose for me." I imagined drinking water while my friends toasted champagne. I imagined sitting at a table while my friends danced. I imagined that maybe I wouldn't go to the wedding at all. I imagined that I might wind up quickly married before my friends' long-planned wedding, that I might be moving in with my boyfriend during that wedding weekend instead, that I might be painting a baby's room in some tiny city apartment.

What if, what if, what if.

But instead, this is what happened:

I stood at the alter as two of my best friends joined in union as a couple. I was not pregnant and I was not married. I toasted them with champagne, and I danced to every song the band played. I was happy. Overwhelmingly so.

But still, there are moments. There was a woman at this wedding--a friend of the couple. She sang during the ceremony. She was 15 weeks pregnant.

At the rehearsal dinner, friends crowded her and touched her emerging belly and awed. She was only one week further along than where I had been when I had the abortion. My mind raced, and a lump rose in my throat. I walked away, took photos of some of the tables with the camera I had brought to help my friends document their weekend and got caught up in a long conversation with friends. Without too much effort, I breathed through my feelings of sadness, I grounded myself, I returned to my table for dessert, and I was fine.

That's what things are like these days. I think about the What If's, but I don't let them occupy too much real estate in my mind. They're there, and that's fine. Something would be wrong with me, I might be dealing unhealthily or repressing, if they weren't.

I recently stumbled upon a fabulous advice blog called Dear Sugar. Sugar responded to one letter writer who asked how he should know if he wants children, quoting a beautiful poem by Tomas Transtörmer:

'Tranströmer’s narrator is capable of seeing his life for what it is while also acknowledging the lives he might have had. “The sketches,” Tranströmer writes, “all of them, want to become real.” The poem strikes a chord in me because it’s so very sadly and joyfully and devastatingly true. Every life, Tranströmer writes, “has a sister ship,” one that follows “quite another route” than the one we ended up taking. We want it to be otherwise, but it cannot be: the people we might have been live a different, phantom life than the people we are.'

It's a stunning image, that sister ship setting course in a different direction. But the choices we make set us on the course we take. 'Thank you for this life!,' his narrator exclaims. And that is the wonderful thing: We can shout our gratitude both to the void for the beautiful improbability of our existence and to ourselves for making the choices we have to define our lives.

Sharing the Experience

I didn't expect to tell as many people as I did about my abortion. In the end, I told 14 people--12 friends, my parents, my boss--that I found out I was pregnant at thirteen weeks and aborted at fourteen.

I didn't tell everyone beforehand. Seven people knew where I was when I suddenly dropped off the map for a week. The other people I told later for varying reasons. And while everyone I told supported my decision, the reactions varied.

My boss, the first person to know aside from my boyfriend, witnessed my breakdown after seeing my ultrasound. She placed her hands on my head as I doubled over sobbing, and tried to say something helpful. "Tell your boyfriend and be sure to consider all your options," she said. I know she meant well, but well, sometimes we don't say quite the right things. I assured her that my decision was made, despite the feelings of confusion and upset that waved about me.

My best friend K, whose apartment I immediately drove to after telling my boss and leaving work. She was my biggest support throughout the process, an amazing friend. When I told her she hugged me and listened and supported. After I left, she later told me she cried when she shared with her boyfriend, who is also my friend.

My parents learned two days before the procedure. I shared with them when I decided I really needed their support. Losing our house to foreclosure last summer and having them live with me since has strained our relationship. For the first time in a long while, they could be my parents, support and love me, and I could rely on them. I learned that my mom had an abortion, and while we both confront our experiences differently, it was a comfort to know she had been through this as well, that one of the 1 in 3 women I knew who had an abortion was my mother.

My ex-boyfriend, J who, as a raised Catholic, was petrified of abortion in our relationship. When I took the morning after pill in our relationship, he was conflicted and upset by it. But when he learned of my news the day before the procedure, he was nothing but supportive. He checked in after the procedure to see how I was doing, and we talked at length about his current relationship and their birth control choices.

My boyfriend's ex-girlfriend, C, who learned from my boyfriend before the procedure. They went through this experience together. She even had the same doctors and nurses as me. She's the only other woman I've been able to talk to who has been through this experience, and we've shared some really great conversations. I'm thankful that she has been there for both my boyfriend and me.

My friend at work, M, I told a few weeks after the procedure and only after learning that she was seeing my old, terrible gynecologists. When I learned that, I first blabbered about how terrible they are and not to see them anymore. She asked, "What happened?? Your face is turning red!" and I told her everything. She cried when I told her. She was the only person who did that, and I'm relieved it didn't happen when the experience was fresher.

My old college roomie, J, I told on the phone after the procedure. I'm in her wedding next month, and we've remained close through the tough times we've both experienced these last few years. She shared with my friend and her fiancee, M. I saw them last week, and we three talked about it together.

My old college friend B, who I told weeks after the procedure. I blew off plans with him when my complication happened, and we have been close confidants for years. It was natural to tell him, and his reaction was one of shock and support. He, like many people I told after the fact, wished I had told him before so he could have been there for me.

My boyfriend's family friends, B and C, who are brother and sister, found out from each of us after the procedure. Two weeks after my abortion, they learned their mother had had a daughter when she was 18 and when she could not receive an abortion as it was illegal. That news shook us both--it seemed to relate so strongly to the "what-if's" I was experiencing at the time, and we each shared our news with them.

B's girlfriend, K, shared with me her own reproductive issues a few weeks ago--she most likely has endometriosis and is in the midst of tests. In turn, I shared with her my own, also assuming incorrectly that B had told her. We grabbed drinks and talked for hours about the procedure, her reproductive issues and birth control.

The two women I know who had abortions have not told many people. My mother doesn't understand why I shared with people and even suggested I shouldn't tell people. She and my father told no one of her abortion until they told me. C, my boyfriend's ex, did share with a few people but does understand why I would be compelled to share my experience.

And why share the experience?

To destigmatize it.
If one in three women you know have had an abortion, could you say who they are? Probably not. I'm not happy that I had an abortion--nobody signs up smiling for that kind of thing, but I am happy to talk about it, to reassure women who have not had abortions that it's okay, to share experiences with women who have had abortions, to talk with as many people as possible about birth control and reproductive health.

To be close with the people I care about.
I am a sharer--extroverted and generally open. It was important to me not to block out friends from my past and present from this experience. We talk about everything else--why not talk about this?

To create a conversation that I hope goes forward.
I hope that these people tell others that they know someone who had an abortion. I hope they tell them that this person had an abortion when she was fourteen weeks pregnant. I hope it stirs conversations and further destigmatize the experience. I am not ashamed nor do I have any regrets about my choice. I want as many people as possible to know that, and I want women to know that they will be okay if they one day choose the same thing I did.


Finally, there was one woman who I did not tell but with whom I did have a long conversation about abortion. A. and I grew up together--ballet class at age seven was where it all started. We've never been particularly close friends, but she was visiting in the city, so we got together for drinks a few weeks ago.

"I like all your Facebook posts," she said with a smile, referring to my multitude of pro-choice and pro-Planned Parenthood postings.

"Oh," I laughed a little. "I may have gone a bit overboard, but it's something I feel really strongly about."

A. went on to explain that she worries that she and her husband, both musicians, cannot afford a child but that her husband staunchly opposes choice and abortion. It's a difference between them, she explained.

"I don't know," she said, sounding slightly defeated. "I always say, I'm pro-choice, but anti-abortion. I could never do it myself."

Bells rang inside of me. She sounded like me at age 17 in our high school AP Government class arguing for choice but conditioning my own response. She sounded like me when I learned two years ago that my current boyfriend and his ex had had an abortion. She sounded like me only a few months ago, before I learned that I was pregnant.

"I don't think you can know that, A., until you face it," I said quietly.

She nodded and then said, "I think you're right."

I Have Sex and I am Political

I didn't expect my blog about my abortion to wind up being so political. But unless I only focus on the physical aspects of the process, which was never my intent, it's bound to get political and fast.

I'm a political person generally. I've been to rallies in D.C., knocked on congressmen and congresswomen's doors, demanded to be heard by my leaders, made calls from home for politicians' campaigns, joined political groups on my college campus, led political groups on my college campus...

I now live in a liberal area and am no longer registered to vote in my home state, where I often felt I could influence state (but not local) politics. Since then, I haven't been as political as I once was. In fact, I burned out a little bit on being political. It's exhausting, and I don't know where people get the energy for it. It took me two weeks leading my campus College Dems to realize I had no interest in politics as a career.

But only two weeks before I found out I was pregnant, I had a conversation with my boyfriend about how nothing brings out the liberal warrior in me like an attack on women's reproductive rights.

Mostly, I have only seen those attacks at a distance as news about government spending. It had been years since I had seen those attacks up close. Back then, I was a liberal teenager in a conservative town in a conservative state with (mainly) conservative friends. It was those friends who launched ideological attacks on women's rights. It wasn't personal then, and I would try to argue my perspective to them, try to find a middle ground, excuse their judgmental and uncharitable attitudes. We'd usually wind up agreeing to disagree, and I'd excuse their nasty rhetoric and move on.

Even when we discussed my "liberal warrior," my boyfriend asked me how I could be friends with some of these people from my past on Facebook. I'm even relatively close friends with one anti who, on the day I returned to work from my procedure, posted an article about why rape and incest are not reasons to 'justify' abortion. (The article used the film Rob Roy as the basis of its argument... simultaneously laughable and pathetic.)

I made excuses for this friend and others from my past, explained that their judgment of women was something they were raised with, they are good people otherwise, and on and on. He rolled his eyes, expressed that he can't understand how I excuse the behavior of a "friend" who would limit my rights, and we reached our ususal impasse on the topic.

Then I got pregnant, and then I had an abortion.

From my perspective, since then there has been a confluence of personal attacks and political bullying that turns my stomach.

I've seen and experienced in great intimacy what kind of churlish, self-righteous, un-Christian people it takes to personally attack women's rights and choices--be it by commenting on the blog of a woman who is just coping with her experience, by posting judgmental rhetoric on Facebook or by protesting outside of a Planned Parenthood in hopes to intimidate at least one woman and force their opinion upon her. And the political attacks have taken on an even darker tone. What kind of politician will shut down a government and leave his fellow Americans out to dry over pap smears and STD testing?

I could add plenty here about how disappointed I am (and expected to be) by President Obama's weak political hand, or how I wish that other Dems would stand up to the schoolyard bullying by Boehner and his cronies.

But I don't want this blog to become another Internet political blather bucket, so I'll leave it at this: I am incredibly frustrated by this country and its leaders on both sides right now.

In the meantime, I am posting this video (Thanks for linking to it last month, OmMama!!) and calling my leaders to tell them that I support Planned Parenthood. I'm turning off comments on this entry and ask that you, whether you agree or disagree with me, direct your energy toward calling your political leaders instead.

Help Indiana Women Out

Indiana's state House just passed one of the most restrictive bills on abortion rights seen in this country.

Most abortions after 20 weeks will now be illegal. In addition to its other restrictions, there is no exemption for women who are pregnant as a result of incest or rape and no exemption for women whose pregnancy threatens their life or may result in serious, irreversible harm.

The bill is passed, but I still feel there is so much we can do to support the women of Indiana.

I suggest making a donation to Planned Parenthood Indiana on behalf of Rep. Eric Turner R-Cicero, who authored the bill. (Or make a donation on behalf of whatever other co-signers you wish. A donation for each, by all means!)

Don't forget to include Rep. Turner's office address so you are sure he receives a Thank You note for your donation:

Rep. Eric Turner
5541 S. Harmon St.
Marion, IN 46953

See also Abortion Gang's write-up on this bill's passage.

Unpleasant Questions and Personal Truths

"What do they do with it, you know, afterward?"

My friend asked the question after I'd talked at length about the procedure. She'd asked me lots of questions throughout my story, throughout the last two weeks. She even rubbed my swollen belly. "Careful. It's contagious," I warned her.

But this was the first question she asked me that threw me, unsettled me, and my answer got caught in my throat for a second.

"Oh, uh," I struggled, my energy suddenly drained from me. "They incinerate it."

"REALLY?"

"Yeah," I was quiet for a second. "I had actually forgotten all about that, but the nurse told my boyfriend and I just before the laminaria insertion. It was surprising."

"Wow." She sounded stunned, but in a very removed and clinical way. "I've always wondered, you know. I mean, the hospital must go through so much human bio-waste. What do they do with all of it?"

And off she went, chattering without thinking about all the things a hospital must get rid of in a day: kidneys, appendixes, aborted fetuses... I felt sick to my stomach.

I didn't tell her straight up that it was a painful question or that I didn't want to talk about it. I just tried to segue us back into the story of the procedure.

"Well, I do remember thinking when I came to in the operating room--I could hear all these things being thrown away and gloves being taken off and stuff like that. And I thought, I wonder if any of those sounds are the... you know," I said. "But I was back under really quickly, and when I woke again, I was in my recovery room, and then..."

I continued rattling on just to get past the moment. But it stuck with me.

After she left, it kept coming to mind. Laying in bed last night, I brought it up to my boyfriend. He got upset. "Why would she ask such a stupid thing like that? What was she thinking?"

Honestly, I don't know. This is one of my best girl friends--the only girl friend who I told about my pregnancy and abortion.

I know she didn't mean to hurt me. She's had all sorts of clinical questions about the entire process, as she's never had an abortion, and I'm a very candid person. She wanted to know if I felt different knowing I was pregnant. She wanted to know if it felt "like something had gone on down there" after the laminaria insertion. She wanted to know if I "felt hollow" after the evacuation.

I've answered all these questions relatively unemotionally and openly. I think it appears that I'm handling everything really, really well. I think that she didn't even think about how her question might affect me because I appear, on the surface, very unaffected in general.

And while I haven't and don't have any regrets, I was feeling relatively unaffected until last night when my friend asked that question. Today, I am really sad. I feel loss and grief in a more acute way that I haven't felt since I was ambivalent about my decision.

When I started this blog, the subhead didn't mention abortion. It simply said: "A pro-choice blog chronicling an unplanned pregnancy." I was confused, upset and unsure I could choose to terminate a second trimester pregnancy. I actually don't remember at what point I added "and its abortion," but I did add it. After talking with many support people and weighing endless considerations for myself and my future children, I decided that terminating this pregnancy was the right choice.

I do feel loss, but I am not and will not be unhappy. My choice was right for me, my partner and the potential life I carried for 14 weeks. I am grateful to be 26, unmarried and without children, paving a life path that is right for me and that will allow me to flourish as a woman and, one day, a mother.

Recovery Day 1 - Update 2

Ugh. No sooner do I say I'm feeling pretty great and I'm suddenly super nauseous. Could be partly due also to having spent most of my afternoon reading more pro-choice blogs online. The computer reading seems to make me feel extra sick to my stomach.

Had to update though because I made myself some Traditional Medicinals peppermint tea to help calm my tummy and head and the paper pull tag's little inspirational message read:

The choices you make will change the world.

Maybe it's because I'm super hormonal/emotional right now or because I've been reading so many brave and strong women's blogs, but I feel like that tea bag is right!! What an awesome and empowering message.

Thank You, Abortion Providers.

Today happens to be Abortion Provider Appreciation Day. I read about it on both Blog for Choice and The Abortioneers today. The Abortioneers wrote a fabulous thank you note, which I have quoted below. While I've always respected the brave men and women who provide safe and healthy abortions to patients, my true appreciation has only just begun.

From the bottom of my heart I thank all abortion providers for all that they do. You endure harassment, even death threats, new laws restricting your job, news articles denouncing you and what you do, and even more. Through all of this you continue to go to the clinic, day after day, to help women access choice.

You spend hours calling funds, discussing her finances, and looking for ways where you can discount the cost. You do all of this to help low income women access choice.

You volunteer your time to answer phone calls, before, work, after work, on your lunch break, on the weekends. You listen to her story and try to give her as much money as you can to help her. You participate in activities to fund raise more money. You do this to help women piece together they money they need, so they can access choice.

You get up early to wait outside the clinic and are yelled at by protesters, pushed around, harassed. You do this to help women get into the clinic.

All of those that work in abortion care - doctors, nurses, counselors, receptionists, clinic escorts, local funds, and all of those that I missed. You are amazing. You are the reason women have access to safe, legal abortion care. From the bottom of my heart, I thank you.

Second Trimester Abortion - Life and Liberty for Women's take

This article is an excellent resource if you are like me and facing a second trimester abortion.

It offers a lot--reasons why women have second trimester abortions, the right's emotional manipulation of the second trimester woman, how the numbers of second trimester abortions could be lowered while still respecting women's rights.

Support

In dealing with my feelings and ambivalence about my choice, I found this video remarkably helpful. I am lucky that I have relationship with a great therapist who I’ve seen for several months to help me work through my feelings, but I hope that this video might be helpful for someone who might not have someone to talk to.

Abortion Clinic Days has a series of videos for people of different faiths or non-faiths for guidance.

Finally, it's International Women's Day, which seems like an appropriate day to start this blog. Despite abortion's taboo place in our culture, I am thankful that I live in a country that allows me to choose what is right for me, my body and my life.

How I got my values, got here, got knocked up

My views and how I got 'em

I was raised by liberal parents in one of the reddest counties in the country.

I don’t remember discussing pro-choice values with my family, but I do remember when abortion would come up in my classes at school.  Somewhere along the way, I developed my pro-choice beliefs and debated with my classmates about the true value of life, a woman’s rights and what a government can and cannot control about its citizens’ physical bodies. I can count on one hand the number of students who agreed with me.

When these pro-choice/pro-life conversations came up, I always added as a caveat or a conceit (to the pro-life students or to myself, I am now not sure): “But I could never do it myself.”

And that’s the line I’ve been towing—more or less—ever since.



Sex, the pill and staying"unpregnant"

When I became sexually active in college, my college boyfriend and I had many discussions about birth control and abortion. We both equated staying unpregnant with being responsible. I took oral birth control, riding a rocky hormonal road on triphasic pills until I settled into a monophasic pill that worked for me, albeit all while zapping my libido. That ex-boyfriend used condoms as an extra precaution, mainly because he didn’t trust my reliability with my pill or the pill itself.

We were responsible young adults, going to a top university, with stellar records behind us and bright futures ahead of us. Pregnancy in college and at the beginning of our professional careers was simply not an option. It didn’t exist as a possibility, as far as I was concerned, and thus, abortion didn’t exist as a difficult possibility either.

My current boyfriend is my second sexual partner. We have been together since December 2009. When we began dating we had the usual birth control discussion. We talked about our options and when he brought up his past experiences with abortion—two of his exes had terminations, I repeated my line to him: “You should know: I could never do that.”

I countinued taking my monophasic pill like normal until September 2010.


Horrible terrible no good very bad infections, lousy and lazy gynecologists, and changing my menstruation schedule

In the summer of 2010, I started to have almost monthly vaginal infections. I’ll spare you the details, but it was not pleasant for me, my body, my boyfriend or our sex life. I remember sobbing, frustrated and wondering what was wrong with me.

My instinct told me that these infections seemed to be related to stress, maybe diet and my period.  In September, I made yet another appointment with my gynecologist, intending to truly tackle the problem this time instead of just getting another prescription to fix its symptoms.

When I visited my gynecologist, Dr. S, I asked her about diet and stress. She scrunched up her face and quickly said, ‘Oh no. Your diet would not affect this system,” which seemed strange to me. Really? What I put inside me doesn’t affect my body? Even this part of it? Dr. S didn’t address the stress issue.

After an examination, Dr. S decided that I might have herpes based on some scarring she saw around my vagina.

Dr. S is manic in her bedside nature, rattled through a couple options, and then said she wanted me to begin taking my monophasic pill for three months straight, skipping periods. The blood’s lower pH levels could be throwing my vagina out of whack, she explained. Eliminating the period might eliminate the problem.

My boyfriend was not comfortable with this decision. “It’s not natural,” he said. “You’re fighting with nature.” I pointed out that the pill itself fights with nature, and as I began the new schedule, I was relieved to find that the infections went away.

It did feel wrong to go without a period, but I wasn’t too worried. I took my birth control daily, though not as spot-on as to the same moment each day. Come three months later, I got my period in early December.

Following my period, I got another infection. Frustrated, I scheduled an appointment at the same office but with Dr. S's colleague, who had treated me once before in the summer of 2010, Dr. D.

Dr. D's bedside manner was calm, collected and reassuring. The antithesis, it turned out, to Dr. S. When I saw Dr. D in the past, she questioned the herpes diagnosis, said she wouldn't want to prescribe any herpes medications based only on a blood test, suggested scarring could be related to an intense sexual experience or two, and wanted to wait to treat me for anything until I had another infection and she could take a culture.

But when I saw her in December 2010, Dr. D suddenly said that she wanted me to take a herpes blood test to determine our next course of action. If the results were positive, then I would go on herpes medication. If they were negative, then I would begin using a topical cream for my vagina meant to thicken and toughen its skin. Problem with the cream is that it actually thins your vaginal skin before thickening it, and ultimately, you can't use it very long because it will eventually thin the skin again. Uh, what?

I reminded her that she once said that she didn't want to rely solely on herpes blood tests. (I have oral herpes/cold sores, and hence my blood test would come back positive.) She had wanted to take a culture (which she wasn't able to get that day) for positive results.

"I just don't want you to suffer anymore," she said. I took the paperwork for the blood tests and left, vowing to find a new gynecologist for the next time I might need one. I continued taking my birth control pills.



A new, shiny, better holistic gynecologist

In February 2011 I had another infection. This one seemed easier to track its causes, but I decided it was time to see a new doctor and at least get acquainted.

I found a holistic doctor who has integrative medicine training and an acupuncture license, in addition to her western medical degree. By the time I saw her, the infection had cleared up with the help of some Monistat, but I was still psyched to meet this doctor.

We first talked for almost a half hour about my diet, my life, my routines. I felt like I was talking with my therapist. Based on what I shared with her, she decided that stress (I hate my job, my finances are in terrible shape, and my parents have been living with me for six months) and diet (I eat fast, on the go, out a lot and lack nutrients) were probably seriously affecting my system. Infections could be related. We decided to do some tests.

First she did my annual pap smear (All normal, which in hindsight seems weird. Do pap smears not tell us we're preggers?) and some blood tests (Again, too bad we didn't test for hCG.). She was right about some nutrients and levels being seriously low, so I planned to make an appointment to discuss supplements with her.

A few days later on Sunday, February 27, I started my first placebo pill for my next menstruation. I waited until Wednesday for my period. It did not come.



Two pink lines

I've always been one of those girls who freaks regularly that she is pregnant. Like plenty of ladies out there, I've gone out and bought pregnancy tests, peed and stood shaking until a lovely single pink line appeared or the words "NOT PREGNANT." Sighing with relief, I'd tuck the stick back into its box, wrap it in tissues should anyone visit me and go back to life as normal. Pregnancy tests had become a way of reassuring myself that I was not, in fact, pregnant.

This time felt different even before I got the positive results.

It had been too many days waiting for my period, for one.

I had a pregnancy nightmare the night before I found out. Pregnancy nightmares aren't exactly unexpected for me, but this time, I woke up at 6:30 AM having to pee like the dickens. After running to the bathroom, I tossed and turned in bed with a knot in my stomach for two more hours.

While I hadn't had morning sickness, I hadn't been nauseous, I hadn't gained weight, various teensy-weensy physical things suddenly seemed to scream PREGNANT:

• Only a few weeks before, my boyfriend remarked that my boobs and nipples were looking bigger.
• I had also noticed that my breasts sometimes hurt when I showered and were more sensitive in general.
• I felt somewhat bloated. But I had recently made a big effort to start drinking tons of water and attributed bloating to suddenly drinking dozens more ounces of water each day.
• In early February, I had been hungry all the time. I felt a combination of hungry and full a lot of the time. But I have a shifting appetite anyway and it was the heart of a cold, snowy winter. I figured my body was doing its instinctive hibernate thing.

I spent the morning at work obsessively Googling pregnancy symptoms until, tortured, I went to the grocery store and bought a pregnancy test. (Self check-out line, naturally.) I went back to work and tried to calm my nerves, decided I'd take the test when I ran home to borrow my parents' car for the evening.

I couldn't relax, and by 4:00 PM I ran home (my office is close), greeted my parents and carried my purse into the bathroom with me, announcing that I wanted to take a quick shower. I turned on the water, did the test and waited for about 30 seconds. My heart pummeled my chest, so I decided I would jump in the shower for the rest of the 3 minute waiting period.

Standing in the shower, I counted the seconds. 120, 121, 122... and tried to ignore how much the water was hurting my breasts. When I got close enough to 3 minutes, I opened the shower curtain and stared at the test where I'd left it on the sink.

Two pink lines.

I don't remember much after this moment, but I do remember feeling like I might pass out, that my head was spinning and trying to think clearly about what to do. I don't remember exactly what I did do. I know I changed clothes and then, thinking it would be weird to go back to the office in different clothes, I changed back. Smiling, I told my parents I didn't need their car for the night anymore. I felt like I was outside of everything my body was doing. Even my voice sounded foreign. I called my girl friends and canceled our plans, claiming to feel like I was coming down with something. Then, I texted my boyfriend.

4:30: Hey. Where are you?
--no response--
4:37: I call, no answer.
4:38: I call, no answer.
4:45: I call, no answer.
4:55: Can you give me acall asap? xo
5:00: He calls and I say that I need to talk to him as soon as possible.

Twenty minutes later, he's getting inside my car. Because of our living situation--he has roommates and my parents have been living with me, we have very little privacy. It seems that talking in the car is the best solution.

When he sits down, I am trying to hold it together and trying to remember how I decided I would tell him. Before I say anything, he says, "It'll be okay."

It'll be okay.

These are the first words I am hearing about this pregnancy, and he doesn't even know it yet. I break down into tears. He pulls my head down and repeats, It'll be okay. I realize he assumes that I haven't gotten a job that I applied for and I need to tell him right this moment. "That's not it," I say. "I'm pregnant."

His grip on my hand loosened and his mouth dropped. He was quiet for a long time.

I wondered if he was thinking back to when I told him my line,“You should know: I could never do that.”

But things change drastically when you are faced with reality: a home pregnancy test sporting those two bright pink lines, a boyfriend who you adore but is not yet your partner, a financially-unstable job that pays you so little you can barely support yourself, no savings and plenty of debt, an emotionally-unstable and inconsistent home environment, living out of a bag and bouncing between your boyfriend's basement apartment and your parentally-occupied apartment.

Suddenly that line I was towing loses its weight in the reality of the moment.

Tomorrow I have my consultation to discuss abortion options and make sure this is what I want to do. Still can't quite wrap my head around the fact that this is happening.