towards the end of my senior year of high school, i had a casual encounter with a guy that was a little older than me. one thing led to the another and we ended up having sex.

i was 18 in 1968. i had sex for the first time - unprotected because the student health center at my university would not provide birth control without parental permission. when i found out i was pregnant i knew i was not fit to be a parent at that time. i heard rumors of mexican abortions. through friends of friends of acquaintances, i found a "clinic" in juarez mexico.

it all started with the final end of a very rocky relationship. i had finally ended things after a year and a half. it took me 4 weeks to realize i was late on my period.

when my body expelled my iud about three months after its painful insertion, i didn’t even feel it. somewhere at some hour, minute, and second, i joined the few women whose iuds, and with them trust, security, insurance, had vanished.

no one knows that i’ve had three abortions.
almost no one.

i have told one woman and one man in my life.

i had an abortion when i was 42, going through divorce from a man who turned out to be gay, so i was in a very dark and sad and confused place.