My friend Sally and I were on holiday in Dublin when we got chatting to two men in a bar. The alcohol flowed, the lads turned their Irish charm on us and Sally whispered that she was going for a walk with one of the guys.
That left me with his friend, who asked me back to his apartment. Not wanting to spend the rest of the evening alone, I agreed and we ended up having way too much to drink and having a one-night stand. We parted without swapping contact details the next morning and never saw each other again.
I’m not proud of it, especially as we failed to use contraception, something which came back to haunt me a month later in July 1999 when, during a routine smear test, I discovered I was pregnant.
I was mortified. How could I have allowed this to happen? I was 27, I’d just bought my own house and had a great job as a travel agent. I didn’t even know the surname of the man who’d got me pregnant and I was adamant I didn’t want to bring up a fatherless child.
The reason I was so certain is because that’s exactly how I’d come into the world. In August 1971, when my mother was 28, she’d gone on holiday to Majorca and come back pregnant. She didn’t know how to contact my Spanish father, but was so against abortion she decided to keep me.
Although I grew up close to my grandfather, I always wanted a dad and hated it when other children at school asked me where my father was. All I knew was that he was called Carlos and lived in the Majorcan town of Palma Nova. My mum had one blurry photo of him and though we used to go there to try to find him, we never did.
I didn’t want history repeating itself. But when I told my mum I was pregnant, she seemed pleased.
I found the secret drawer of baby clothes my mum had been saving for the grandchild she'll never have, I know she can never forgive me.
She wanted grandchildren and thought I should consider keeping the child. After all, she had chosen to keep me and had coped well as a single mother, never regretting her decision.
But I was so appalled with myself for the way I had conceived I couldn’t imagine keeping the baby.
At nine weeks pregnant, I was admitted to an NHS hospital for a chemical termination. After taking the first tablet I began to bleed and went to the toilet where I haemorrhaged, an experience I’ll never forget.
In the aftermath of my abortion I felt more relief than regret. While I never allowed myself to get pregnant again, I repeatedly got into disastrous relationships.
I assumed I’d have plenty of time to meet somebody special and have a family, but now I’m approaching 42 and I know it probably won’t happen.
This does make me sad, especially as many people assume I don’t like children. I want to tell them that I, too, was once expecting a baby.
While my main regret is that I behaved the way I did and had to have an abortion at all, I increasingly wonder what life would have been like if I’d kept the baby, as it now appears that was my only chance of motherhood.
With no siblings and no children, I worry about how alone I’ll be in the future. If I’d had the baby, my life would be very different. I would have a teenager and there would be grandchildren of my own to look forward to.
Certainly my mother has never forgiven me. She’s now in sheltered accommodation and when I was clearing out her flat I was stunned to find a special drawer of baby clothes she was keeping for a grandchild. I donated them to a charity shop, but it was a poignant reminder of what might have been.
No comments:
Post a Comment