i was 19, in college, engaged and happy. my first sexual experience was with my fiance. i became pregnant. it was impossible to share my news with my successful, jewish parents who believed i was perfect . my fiance and i were fortunate to know of a physician who did illegal abortions. i hoped i would be fine. i was taken at gunpoint to a back alley building and told to pee in a kitty litter box. i was alone and scared and unprepared for what was to occur. i somehow thought because i was paying $2,500 it would be in a clean doctor’s suite. the procedure was hushed; i was blindfolded and gagged so i would not scream. my insides were scrapped and then i was returned to the same original location where my fiance was waiting with a dozen red roses. i shook and collapsed, not due to pain but because i was so emotionally unprepared and anxious.

after a few days i was physically fine. the secret though permeated my days at college and i felt undeserving of my rather perfect life as a coed. years later, i grieved the loss of an unborn fetus and the deception that allowed me to pretend that life was good, was convinced. i would be “punished forever ” for the accident of pregnancy.

the physical scars grew distant but the challenge of integrating the magnitude of my decision plagued me for years. i blamed my fiance because i never knew about birth control before we had sex. the 60’s were promiscuous but not well integrated in providing sexual information.
i later became a therapist and counseled young woman before they chose to have an abortion. i gave back to a community that needed to be better informed.

today, we teach about sexual responsibility and allow choice. how i wish i had not been victimized by this lack of education in 1967. i am 68 years old and not a day goes by that i don’t remember the sheer terror of being alone in a back alley and feeling like a criminal for the sin of being young and in love.