“I’ve Never Felt So Alone”

A postcard (shown at right) that appeared this weekend on the popular website PostSecret served as yet another reminder that far from being a means of women’s liberation, abortion is actually a means of women’s oppression.

The text reads:

I told my work that I will be attending an out-of-state funeral for a few days next week.

Im actually (quietly) having an abortion that only my boyfriend knows about it.

I’ve never felt so alone.

Reading this, I was reminded of these words spoken recently by Linda Couri, a former Planned Parenthood counselor who spoke at our TeenSpeak conference earlier this year. Linda herself had an abortion, but is now pro-life: “There is nothing joyful about abortion. Some women are complacent, but most just bare-knuckle their way through it.”

No Woman Wants to Have an Abortion

One of my most important responsibilities here at Generations for Life is to answer questions from students who contact us looking for information on abortion-related research projects. Recently a student sent us a list of several questions, one of which was, “How difficult do you think the decision of getting an abortion can be?”

I responded:

Very, very difficult.

No woman wants to have an abortion. Women have abortions because they’re scared, because they’re desperate, and because they feel they have no other choice.

Pro-life writer Frederica Mathewes-Green illustrated this when she once said, “A woman wants an abortion like an animal caught in a trap wants to gnaw off its leg.”

It’s very important for those of us who are pro-life to remember this: women don’t have abortions because they’re evil, or because they’re monsters who want to kill their babies. Women have abortions because they believe that for their own sake, it’s the best choice — and often the only choice — they have.

The woman who anonymously wrote to PostSecret, “I’ve never felt so alone” is further confirmation of this.

She does have other choices available, but for whatever reason, she is not able to see that. If we as pro-lifers want to be able to reach women like her and meet them where they’re at, we have to put ourselves in their shoes.

We don’t know the name of the woman who sent the card to PostSecret. But we can still pray for her that even at this late moment, she will change her mind.

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