This was beautiful, and so many pieces resonated with me.
“I can imagine a parent reading this, scoffing at the suggestion that my weeks spent gestating a little lizard-like embryo could amount to even a shadow of what they’ve experienced, wishing to tell me that parenthood is so much more than I could possibly imagine. My answer: I believe you.
My question: can you imagine standing on the bank of this sacred sea and then walking away?”
I am a new mother to a 5-month-old. I suspect the gap in understanding of what it means to be a parent between someone who’s never conceived and you, between you and me, and between me and someone with a five-year-old, are all massive. It’s not so binary. I remember, especially late in pregnancy, sometimes filling out surveys and it would ask if I was a parent and it felt sort of bizarre to say no? Like this person inside of me that I've never met is also the one I feel most protective over, that I put so much literal energy into, that it would be most tragic to lose. I sure felt like a parent.
Before I was a parent, like you, I walked away from it once a few years ago. As you describe, I really did get a taste for it. Being so close to parenthood made it easier to imagine. Like you, I had wanted kids badly since I was a child, and the possibility was so tempting, so hard to give up.
For me, it was actually the experience of the accidental pregnancy and abortion that made me realize how within reach having children was. Not just that I was fertile (though this was also a thing I joked about at the time), but that even at twenty I could have followed through with it and had a wonderful life, I could have made it work okay. Then with a couple years, I could really set myself up right to start a family, so that’s what I set out to do and I did it. I’m not sure if that specific takeaway was live for you, but the intensity of the experience and the love that you describe actually convey remarkably well why the experience was so life-altering for me, better than I’ve been able to explain before. Thank you :)
Romy this is so stunningly, harrowingly, beautiful. I'm so, so sorry for your pain. And I so appreciate you putting words to this; it is eerie how little discussion of abortion (and postpartum depression) as anything more than political weaponry exists out there. As usual you have a precise clarity and candor in phrasing things such that they hit particularly close to the heart.
This was the line that struck me the hardest:
> My grief has settled into a shape small enough to carry around the world. It goes out with me to dinner, and seems to like it when we take evening walks around the neighborhood. Sometimes, when I know it won’t cause too much trouble, I take it out and marvel at it. It’s heavier than it looks, the weight of it on my chest enough to knock the breath out of me if I’m not prepared. Many nights, my grief unfurls and wraps its long tendrils around me. I wake sweating and tangled in my blankets, planets still bright in the sky. Soon enough, it will learn to sleep through the night.
“Anti-abortion activists are correct that abortion is terrible, but they are wrong about the frame. Abortion does not exist in the domain of pointed fingers and defendants, but rather that of cancer and wildfires. In a better world abortion would not happen not because it would be criminalized, but because it would be unnecessary. No person should find themselves performing the grim arithmetic of an axe hanging between two lives.”
22 years ago, i was the beneficiary of Australian laws that allowed my then-girlfriend to terminate an unwanted pregnancy. My personal perspective is that the decision we made was simultaneously both right, and fundamentally wrong. That may seem illogical, but whilst i can acknowledge the rank horror and injustice at the idea of terminating an inconvenient life, i’d do exactly the same thing if i had my time again.
Absolutely incredible and brave of you to dare to put your experience into words and share with the world. Our culture has such disrespect for life and I am sorry for your immense loss.
Thank you for your immense courage in writing such a beautiful, heart-wrenching, honest essay. I read it while lying next to my 18-month-old daughter. Should you ever want to become a mother again, I hope you can and do. You will be wonderful. I’m so sorry for what you’ve gone through.
This may be the finest piece of writing I’ve ever read. I was once as you describe, impish and flippant with a capacity for the sacred, recast by a latticework of grief upon a pyre
"Anti-abortion activists are correct that abortion is terrible, but they are wrong about the frame. Abortion does not exist in the domain of pointed fingers and defendants, but rather that of cancer and wildfires. In a better world abortion would not happen not because it would be criminalized, but because it would be unnecessary. No person should find themselves performing the grim arithmetic of an axe hanging between two lives."
a gorgeous gorgeous essay that resonates so deeply, though our experiences were different, as I was in the 85% (I had not before imagined the pain and absurdity of being in the 15%) nor did I have the compulsion to eat it. I didn't really feel like a mother. Mainly, I did a lot of suppression, alongside confusion about why there was anything to suppress. The conversations I'd had about abortion were quite removed from what was to become actually present and pressing. but this essay is true.
Stunningly beautiful and heartbreaking and well-written and a gestalt of all that and way more. I'm sorry you went through this, and I appreciate you turning it into this piece.
really moving, extremely well articulated, i didnt realize it was possible to empathize this much through text on a screen
i'm sorry for your loss
This was beautiful, and so many pieces resonated with me.
“I can imagine a parent reading this, scoffing at the suggestion that my weeks spent gestating a little lizard-like embryo could amount to even a shadow of what they’ve experienced, wishing to tell me that parenthood is so much more than I could possibly imagine. My answer: I believe you.
My question: can you imagine standing on the bank of this sacred sea and then walking away?”
I am a new mother to a 5-month-old. I suspect the gap in understanding of what it means to be a parent between someone who’s never conceived and you, between you and me, and between me and someone with a five-year-old, are all massive. It’s not so binary. I remember, especially late in pregnancy, sometimes filling out surveys and it would ask if I was a parent and it felt sort of bizarre to say no? Like this person inside of me that I've never met is also the one I feel most protective over, that I put so much literal energy into, that it would be most tragic to lose. I sure felt like a parent.
Before I was a parent, like you, I walked away from it once a few years ago. As you describe, I really did get a taste for it. Being so close to parenthood made it easier to imagine. Like you, I had wanted kids badly since I was a child, and the possibility was so tempting, so hard to give up.
For me, it was actually the experience of the accidental pregnancy and abortion that made me realize how within reach having children was. Not just that I was fertile (though this was also a thing I joked about at the time), but that even at twenty I could have followed through with it and had a wonderful life, I could have made it work okay. Then with a couple years, I could really set myself up right to start a family, so that’s what I set out to do and I did it. I’m not sure if that specific takeaway was live for you, but the intensity of the experience and the love that you describe actually convey remarkably well why the experience was so life-altering for me, better than I’ve been able to explain before. Thank you :)
Romy this is so stunningly, harrowingly, beautiful. I'm so, so sorry for your pain. And I so appreciate you putting words to this; it is eerie how little discussion of abortion (and postpartum depression) as anything more than political weaponry exists out there. As usual you have a precise clarity and candor in phrasing things such that they hit particularly close to the heart.
This was the line that struck me the hardest:
> My grief has settled into a shape small enough to carry around the world. It goes out with me to dinner, and seems to like it when we take evening walks around the neighborhood. Sometimes, when I know it won’t cause too much trouble, I take it out and marvel at it. It’s heavier than it looks, the weight of it on my chest enough to knock the breath out of me if I’m not prepared. Many nights, my grief unfurls and wraps its long tendrils around me. I wake sweating and tangled in my blankets, planets still bright in the sky. Soon enough, it will learn to sleep through the night.
You nailed it with this:
“Anti-abortion activists are correct that abortion is terrible, but they are wrong about the frame. Abortion does not exist in the domain of pointed fingers and defendants, but rather that of cancer and wildfires. In a better world abortion would not happen not because it would be criminalized, but because it would be unnecessary. No person should find themselves performing the grim arithmetic of an axe hanging between two lives.”
22 years ago, i was the beneficiary of Australian laws that allowed my then-girlfriend to terminate an unwanted pregnancy. My personal perspective is that the decision we made was simultaneously both right, and fundamentally wrong. That may seem illogical, but whilst i can acknowledge the rank horror and injustice at the idea of terminating an inconvenient life, i’d do exactly the same thing if i had my time again.
Good luck with the future.
Maybe like millions of other young parents all around the world, you'd have done just fine and had a happy child.
Maybe
Definitely. You're not a psycho or a retard. You are conscientious. That and avoiding catastrophically bad luck is all it takes.
Absolutely incredible and brave of you to dare to put your experience into words and share with the world. Our culture has such disrespect for life and I am sorry for your immense loss.
Thank you for your brutal, naked honesty. This essay is going to stick with me for a long time. I am so sorry for your loss.
haunting, haunted, so many silently sobbing
the unspeakable, propriety's silence, broken
brought me to tears. thank you for your openness.
Thank you for your immense courage in writing such a beautiful, heart-wrenching, honest essay. I read it while lying next to my 18-month-old daughter. Should you ever want to become a mother again, I hope you can and do. You will be wonderful. I’m so sorry for what you’ve gone through.
thank you for putting yourself into words in this way. Profound writing. I’m weeping.
I teared up. I'm sorry for your loss.
This may be the finest piece of writing I’ve ever read. I was once as you describe, impish and flippant with a capacity for the sacred, recast by a latticework of grief upon a pyre
"Anti-abortion activists are correct that abortion is terrible, but they are wrong about the frame. Abortion does not exist in the domain of pointed fingers and defendants, but rather that of cancer and wildfires. In a better world abortion would not happen not because it would be criminalized, but because it would be unnecessary. No person should find themselves performing the grim arithmetic of an axe hanging between two lives."
a gorgeous gorgeous essay that resonates so deeply, though our experiences were different, as I was in the 85% (I had not before imagined the pain and absurdity of being in the 15%) nor did I have the compulsion to eat it. I didn't really feel like a mother. Mainly, I did a lot of suppression, alongside confusion about why there was anything to suppress. The conversations I'd had about abortion were quite removed from what was to become actually present and pressing. but this essay is true.
Beautifully written and so helpful
Stunningly beautiful and heartbreaking and well-written and a gestalt of all that and way more. I'm sorry you went through this, and I appreciate you turning it into this piece.
Wow, that was simply one of the most real things I have ever read. Thanks for sharing.