Fortunately, time did its job, very slowly. I cried less, I no longer necessarily had a tight throat and saw a round belly. It took me three years to able to talk about it. Four for doing it without crying. And always, certain remarks made me deeply sad: “ I am for abortion, but if I became pregnant, I could not. Me, I always said to myself the opposite: ” If I get pregnant, of course, I’ll have to buy abortion tablets in Dubai!”
Time Duration
The more time passed, the more I brooded. I counted the months. Six, seven, eight, nine. Always nothing. Always empty and always alone. And here is Marin Cotillard giving birth to his first child and stealing from me the first name I would have dreamed of for my possible son. It sounds ridiculous like that, but it was really one more blow. And me still empty, still a teenager in the back of her room. Then it continued like that. They would three months old, they would six months old, or a year old. And I stood there, still empty, still not mum.
Contraception
I did, yes, but not with as much conviction as during my feminist speeches. During the years that followed, and during which I had sex that could possibly lead to pregnancy, I was completely obsessed with my contraception. I did not want a surprise pregnancy under any circumstances, I absolutely wanted not to have to go through an abortion. And I had a secret dream: to get pregnant by accident and have my boyfriend at the time say ” Don’t worry, we’ll keep him if you want, I want to parent with you, I want us to have children together, don’t worry. » I had no problem with contraception, and therefore no surprise pregnancy.
“We are all legitimate”
Today, the scar has closed, and I even like to tell my story – although I must say that while writing these lines, I could not hold back my tears. I don’t regret anything, I feel strong to have gone through this ordeal and to still there. I still want to a mom, deeply, absolutely. But I manage to rejoice in the pregnancies of others (even if I would often like to in their place), I manage to live with an empty uterus, and I manage to take the time.
Traumatic Experience
When I heard about the abortion pills in Dubai company, I’m fine, thank you, I obviously thought it was a great idea. But, also, I wanted to shout to all these people that it was not my case, that for me it had been horrible, that it was really a traumatic experience – not the abortion itself, but its consequences. But I felt that my word had no place in this space, and I still do. So where is its place? Obviously, the anti-abortionists would delight to receive my testimony, but that’s not what I want to do with it.
Complications
Even if for me the consequences of abortion have indeed been terrible, my experience should in no way call into question this fundamental right. There’s just no connection between the two. I remember wishing, when I was pregnant, in my heart of hearts, that buying abortion tablets in Dubai was illegal. If it had been more complicated, if I lived in another era, I would have been forced to marry my lover and continue the pregnancy, as I would have wished. And may in fact I would have aborted anyway and I would have been even more traumatized, or even dead. I nevertheless regretted that at Family Planning I was not told about other possibilities.
It was either “ You want to have a baby and we’ll help you ” or “ You want to terminate your pregnancy and we’ll help you ” – which is already huge, we agree. While I dreamed of myself in Juno, I would have liked someone to talk to me about an in-between, adoption, childbirth under X, the gray zone. But who would have told me about it, apart from the anti-choice? I know very well that these are complex situations, that if I had asked someone would surely have enlightened me, but there may something to question here. This is what I would like to do: continue to support PMI centers, continue to thank Simone Veil and the others, but also have the right, find the strength to criticize, question certain aspects, and above all, able to say that I was going extremely badly, without being ashamed of it.
Defending Abortion
Yes I defend abortion, yes I am a feminist, yes I had an abortion, yes I experienced it badly. It’s part of my story, like my depression, like my loves, like feminism. And we are all legitimate, regardless of our backgrounds. Abortion is part of personal history, the right to abortion belongs to our collective history.
And it remains important today to specify that feminism does not mean abortion without suffering, and abortion badly lived is not synonymous with a reactionary thought. It won’t change the face of the world, it won’t bring Simone Veil back to life, but it will show the diversity of our backgrounds. It will show that we are a unit, and that, regardless of our past, we have a common goal. And then, too, it will do us good. To me and to all those people who have probably one day also felt guilty for being in pain.