Woman traumatized when she learns doctor is aborting twins: ‘Everything inside me cried out, “No!”‘

Sally Thompson, a counselor for post-abortive women at a pregnancy resource center, described the trauma experienced by women in a book of women’s post-abortion stories:

I would sometimes ask my clients to explain to me what an abortion is. I always heard, “It’s terminating a pregnancy, it’s killing or murdering a baby.” Those are harsh words but revealing answers…

Some women who have had abortions think because they willfully walked into the abortion clinic and asked for the abortion, it’s called murder. Some have even said, “I killed my baby.”

What makes it so hard for women who have had abortions is that one day reality will set in.

Getting the revelation that you chose to bring death to your child and family member can take years to digest… The support of others is much needed because, like many women, when reality hits, it is devastating.¹

She describes what some of the women were dealing with:

Many women have stated they stayed in domestic violence situations because they thought they deserved to be there after an abortion. Others believed God was punishing them for having an abortion. Having an abortion is very traumatizing for women.²

Many post-abortive women have written or spoken about the painful aftermath of abortion. Machelle Montgomery had an abortion at age 15. She says:

I dealt with my abortion in very negative ways: more relationships, more drugs and alcohol. I was just trying to numb myself because every time I would allow myself to think about what I did I would become overwhelmed. I struggled with wanting to take my life. Depression set in and my world began to close in on me.³

Another woman’s boyfriend married her after her abortion. She says:

Now he regrets our decision then. I still feel the pain. I suffer every time I see a baby, a pregnant woman. I wonder if it was a she or he. What the baby would look like. And sometimes when we fight, I tell him how much I still hurt and how much of a coward he was. I don’t advise abortion to anybody.⁴

Although they got married, the abortion clearly damaged their relationship. It comes up in arguments between the two of them and causes trouble in their marriage.

READ: Post-abortion ministry founder: Women and men who regret abortion can be ‘the strongest voice’ to end it

Another woman wrote the following heartbreaking letter to her aborted baby:

I was supposed to keep you safe and protect you from harm and getting hurt. I took you from the safest place you could ever be. I took your life…

You were torn apart inside me and flushed down the drain. Your arms and legs were torn and mangled. Your little arms and legs. That mommy should have kissed and put lotion on. Your feet that mommy should have put a little sock on. Your small hands that mommy would wipe off after lunch and would pull my hair. Your little heart that should beat strong, day and night while you explored your new world…

I love you right now, I miss you right now, I want to hold you right now, I’m empty right now, I’m sad and I’m crying right now. Please forgive me… I’m sorry, I didn’t realize how much I loved you until it was too late.⁵

Michelle Bollom wrote a book about her abortion experience. She says:

I justified my actions for years… I had committed murder and here I was just defending and justifying why I did it. I never peeled it back really far enough to say I am truly sorry for participating in the decision of murdering my unborn child…

I remember sobbing so uncontrollably. I actually had gotten face down on my knees on the ground. I simply cried over and over [to God] – saying “how can you forgive me when I can’t even forgive myself?”⁶

Another woman, Teresa LeGault, describes her horror when she realized she was aborting twins:

I knew nothing about terminating an unwanted pregnancy or about the development of a life within. I might have been a university student, but I was quite dumb and gullible… I was afraid and alone…

I was lying on the table with the doctor and nurse working on the other side of the sheet, discussing a local high school athlete, when suddenly the doctor announced, “Oh! There’s another one.” What? Two? Everything inside me cried out “No!” but not a sound or movement came from my horrified body and soul.

Not until that very moment, did I realize I was killing life, my child, actually two children, and my mind was racing. How can I stop this? But I just allowed one to be removed and now they were removing the second.⁷

She says of the aftermath, “There was consternation afterwards… I proceeded to quit my job, quit school and aimlessly drove to California, living a truly “stupid” life for a while, because basically what was the point of anything, anymore, after abortion?”⁸

LeGault wrote a pro-life book. Her abortion made her realize. “The full truth about a pregnancy is intentionally withheld from girls and women who are having abortions, as if hiding the realities makes it okay… But harm was done to me then, and it continues for other girls now.”

All these women, and many thousands more, have been hurt by abortion. And often, it is pro-lifers like Thompson who counsel, help, and welcome these hurting women.

1. Sally Thompson and LaQuita Maxey The Aftermath: Stories of God’s Grace and Freedom after Abortion (Storytellers, LLC, 2021) 10

2. Ibid.

3. Ibid., 85

4. Martha Jensen Abortion: Information and One’s Own Journey (2020)

5. Ibid.

6. Michelle Bollom The Forgivable Sin: Shattering the Silence and Shame of Abortion (undated) 15, 16, 17

7. Teresa LeGault 2020 Sentiments of an American Woman: The History and Future of Women and Abortion(100X Publishing, 2020)  14 -16

8. Ibid., 15-16