No doubt their intention was to ingrain (and traumatize) us into a pro-life stance by forcing their young pupils to watch graphic abortion videos – both early and late trimester. My Catholic elementary school made sure we were well-versed on every kind of abortion procedure as if we were surgical interns. None of the parents were explicitly informed that graphic pictures and videos of mutilated fetuses would be part of Sex Ed. Sex Ed should’ve been renamed Abortion Ed. We learned more about abortion than sex itself. By age 12, the infamous year of finally learning where babies come from, my parents, our parents, handed over the reins of their child’s sex education to my Catholic school thereby ceding absolute control to include abortion as part of the curriculum. The student body of my Catholic elementary school was predominantly Filipino and Mexican, the children of first-generation immigrants. Catholic school was 12 long years in the LA suburbs. It begins in childhood.Ĭhildhood consisted of pro-life propaganda starting at age 9. But my traumatic experience with an unwanted pregnancy and abortion begins even way before my abusive relationship in college. You studied hard, got straight A’s, and went to college. Boys and dating were nonexistent topics growing up. His parents disapproved of my being Filipina and Catholic. Rape would be the appropriate term to describe this, but even still, that is a hard word for me to say. Though I couldn’t admit it to myself then, I had an abusive boyfriend who forced me to have sex. When I had my abortion, I had just turned 20, still one of my more memorable birthdays. As investigated by the American Psychological Association, Post-Abortion Syndrome is scientifically proven to not exist as the immediate result of all abortions, just as much as post-partum depression does not exist as the immediate result of all births. If we applied the same mental health reasoning of post-partum depression to pregnancy, no woman would ever want to become pregnant. Under the pro-life movement, the subject of trauma has become a weapon against the pro-choice movement where Post-Abortion Syndrome, specifically coined by the pro-life movement, has been used to perpetuate the myth that abortion is a harmful procedure resulting in regret and depression. After experiencing trauma after my abortion, I question what a pro-choice person is supposed to look like. It still remains difficult to say I suffered trauma after my abortion as I fear I am somehow criticizing a fundamental right I so fiercely believe in. Is there a link between abortion and trauma? For me, the answer is yes. My emotions took over and trying to keep busy felt like I was dragging my feet.
I didn’t want to cry every night for hours. How do I explain it? I didn’t want to be sad. I would relive the memory when my boyfriend had taken me to my appointment as I sat uncomfortably next to a woman in her eighth month for her prenatal appointment while I had been there to end my pregnancy.Īt 20, I had an abortion and for ten months afterward, suffered trauma.
But it was just me crashing as I suddenly remembered it would have been the baby’s due date. The birth would’ve been that day, I was sure of it.Īfter my first semester in New Zealand was over, I had decided to visit relatives over the winter break in Australia, when one July night, while flying from Sydney to Perth, I looked at the stars through my window seat, the moon, the darkness, the Southern Cross, and cried inside as if the whole world were spinning and the plane was about to crash.
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