At the age of 18
I became pregnant
I was scared
confused
I didn't want to
tell my parents
I was brought up Catholic
so
I felt like I had disappointed them
so
instead of going to my parents
I went to a
a local Planned Parenthood
that was just a little bit outside of our town.
I was 19 years old
full of
insecurities
low self-esteem.
For me
the appreciation
that I have for myself
it was nothing.
When I was
in my early 20s
in graduate school,
I had a long-term relationship
and found myself pregnant
and
I was not
Christian
I didn't consider myself Christian or
or Catholic
very far away
from anything like that.
I was a pretty angry
sort of troubled woman
I'd had a pretty rocky upbringing.
My mom had committed suicide
Shortly after I went into depression, I started
using drugs and alcohol. And through a period of time, I would get pregnant two
more times and I would have two more abortions. It wasn't until I really
contemplated suicide and I knew if I didn't seek help that you know that
would be it. I didn't really have any emotional connection to my pregnancy
probably because I had lost my mom at such a young age so I just did not
feel that maternal tie. Something inside of me...
I wasn't the same.
I was not the same. All I wanted is to have my child back.
Women who have abortions...it's a complicated grief. Many of them have symptoms of depression,
anxiety, some problems in relationships. There's an empty emptiness about them.
Humans have an amazing ability, too, to put things, you know, in the background,
push it down, don't talk about it, and continue on with their lives. And when we
do that, then there's other things that pop up in our lives and problems and
issues. Sooner or later sometimes they start
realizing that something is not right and that's when they seek help. You know,
it takes a lot of courage to even make that first phone call. Project Rachel was
founded in 1984, and it's an outreach of the Catholic Church
that helps anyone who's been affected by abortion, whether that's mothers or
fathers, grandparents or siblings. I think, ultimately, what Project Rachel
hopes to achieve is to be a door that begins the process and walks with particularly a
woman through the process of post-abortive healing. They do it in a number of
ways. It really is a program that seeks to meet the needs of the individual
person, and that means there's a commitment, through Project Rachel, of
ongoing work. In other words, that that initial contact, those initial programs,
whether it is going to a weekend program or a day of recollection or retreat, that
that's really just the beginning and launching point to
a real journey that the Church is taking with that person, that woman, to healing
in Christ. People feel the remorse and regret and the guilt
behind abortion at different times. Sometimes it's right after, sometimes
it's when they're young, sometimes it's when they're old. It takes real courage and a
strength for a woman to come in and admit to someone that they have
committed this sin in the past or that they have they have the secret that
they're hiding and that they're holding. For me, it's a powerful moment of
walking with someone, accompanying them, even, in bringing the mercy and the
goodness of God into a situation and into a moment, a past experience,
that's been so difficult and so trying for them.
It took me almost 30 years...29 years to figure out or to understand what was going on with me.
I knew then that there is nothing that God cannot forgive.
I had my first confession, and I was terrified. When I went in, I put my head
down, and I wouldn't look at him, and I told him: 'Father, I had an abortion.' And he
asked me to look up at him, and he was crying. And he told me that he was not
only crying for the loss of my little one, but he was crying for me, as well.
I just saw Jesus' face. Just Jesus' face was right there: His hands, His
healing touch, His words...and I just knew in an instant that I had found, you know, my
true home. So it was just a wonderful, wonderful, it was just a wonderful, amazing
thing. This is a time God is giving them the opportunity to share their burden,
either in the form of sharing that with a friend, or with a priest in a kind of
pastoral counseling, or especially, I think in the most powerful way, when
women who have had an abortion come to seek the mercy of God, the forgiveness
and the freedom that comes in the Sacrament of Penance.
It's a real blessing to work with women who reach out for help.
We're there just to listen and to walk with them through their healing journey.
God does amazing things. When someone is open to His grace, there's definitely
a transformation that happens. Don't be afraid.
You'll just find love and healing, tremendous healing, and it's the beginning of a wonderful
journey from darkness into the light and into healing.
God is loving and merciful, and He assures us that there is no sin greater than His mercy. What we have
to do is to acknowledge our need to be forgiven, to resolve our lives to do what
God is asking of us, and then simply to embrace, to celebrate, the precious gift
of mercy, forgiveness, that will allow us to begin anew. Not because we deserve it,
not because we earned it, but because we have a loving and a generous God who
never ever gives up on us. And so we must never give up on ourselves.