Steven’s Story
Dear Amy,
I found out my girlfriend was pregnant during another chilly New England winter in early 1984. She was not quite 20. I was almost 25. We’d been dating for less than a year. I do remember thinking, ‘I could get into being a dad,’ so part of me wanted her to see her pregnancy to the end. I told my parents. My father was excited about becoming a grandfather for the first time. I don’t remember my mother’s reaction.
For my girlfriend, however, there was never a doubt about what she wanted to do. She wanted to have an abortion. She was still a teenager, working as a dental assistant after escaping an abusive relationship in Georgia. She had her life ready to unroll and no clue at that point what she wanted to do.
I don’t remember our conversations around the life-altering decision we needed to make. I may have expressed a wishful desire to be a parent. My girlfriend, also named Amy, was clear: I’m not ready.
So she made an appointment at the local hospital, Mt. Sinai, which had an abortion clinic, and I gave her the money and went with her. I don’t remember much from that day. I was sad and scared. Amy was going through surgery, so there is always a worry about what might happen. It could have been a sunny day with a brisk wind blowing across the streets of Hartford, CT. Or it could have been overcast. Maybe there was snow on the ground.
I do remember the nurse or office assistant at the door of the clinic telling me to call them from the hospital, located right next door, in a couple of hours to see how Amy was doing.
“For obvious reasons,” she said, “men are not allowed into the clinic.” She said it was often too stressful for the women. I sat and waited in the lobby of the hospital. I may have read the paper or a magazine or munched on a snack from the gift shop.
I called the clinic from a payphone and they initially told me that Amy would be ready in an hour. When I went to meet her at the entrance, I gently grabbed her arm and guided her from the wheelchair to my car. I saw how her body was weighed down by what she experienced. Her slowness looked sad, and her face revealed how tired and anguished she was. Any surgery is a big deal.
I am nearly positive that we came back to the apartment I shared with two friends and their two-year old son. Amy lived a good 45 minutes away from the clinic, so it made sense for me to bring her to my place. I know she slept immediately and then later I made her a light meal, maybe soup.
Amy and I broke up in 1986, but have stayed connected even though we live on separate coasts. She married later in life, about nine years ago when she was 50, and never had children, though she is an excellent stepmother to her husband’s two kids.
After we’d ended our relationship and she had moved to Florida to train as a flight attendant, she came to visit me and another friend in Connecticut. We were sitting in a restaurant reminiscing and eating when her abortion came up. I wish I could remember why we started talking about it. As the conversation about her experiences wound down, she looked at the friend and me and said, “I couldn’t have gotten through [the abortion] without you both.”
Choosing to have an abortion I imagine is one of the harder decisions a woman makes. I know it was a painful and scary one for Amy. But it is a reproductive choice all women deserve and must have.