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Thursday, August 31, 2017

40 Years Ago I Survived an Abortion, Thank God I’m Alive Today


By Melissa Ohden
Life News


If you’ve ever wondered what goes through an abortion survivor’s head on their birthday, I’ll give you a sneak peek into mine on my 40th birthday.

12:33 am: I’m woken up by our 3-year-old. I glance at the clock, realizing it’s now the 29th. I say a prayer, thanking God for being alive and continue this prayer multiple times throughout the day.

6:30 am: I think about how I was delivered around this time in the final step of the abortion procedure. I’m saddened and horrified thinking about it, while at the same time, so thankful to have been born alive.

These thoughts automatically trigger my questions about who all was present at the time or shortly thereafter and the effect all of this might have had on them. My grandmother was there. Nurses were there. I worry about them. Yes, even my grandmother. Did this haunt them throughout their lives? When did the abortionist first find out the abortion had “failed”? When did he begin to panic? Was I his first botched abortion survivor?

I reflect on the panic that so many must have felt. This wasn’t supposed to happen. And then to be told I needed to be left to die. To hear me, to see me, this suffering newborn gasping for breath. My heart breaks for them. I wonder, do they realize today is the 40th anniversary of that fateful day?
9:00 am: I wonder how long I had been in the NICU forty years ago today at this time. I wonder if my grandmother kept checking on me. I wonder if she was allowed anywhere near me? I wonder what that was like for her to have me there at the hospital she worked at, trained nurses at, for the next twenty one days. Was she ever thankful I was actually born alive, or was she simply angry that the abortion failed, and I was there like a black eye for all to see–the child born to her daughter out of wedlock?

1:00 pm: I can’t remember what time my medical records state that the neonatologist visited me, but I think of him today. “Approximately 31 weeks gestation,” he wrote in my records. I’m sure he assessed and directed care for many premature infants. I wonder what he thought of my circumstances?

3:00 pm: The words “it is finished” keep rolling around in my head. Of course, it reminds me of Jesus on Good Friday, as He hung from the Cross, but the words have been echoing in my head all day. After four days of the abortion procedure, today was meant to be the day that it was finished. Except, much like Good Friday, God was not done. What looks like the end, could very well be just the beginning. Thank God, truly!




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