That day
When my mother and I arrived at the clinic, a security guard checked our IDs to make sure we weren’t trying to get in to sabotage anything. A black man in his 60s, he acted as if we were entering a movie theater and he was checking our ticket stubs. He noticed a penny on the ground and picked it up, saying, “See a penny, pick it up, all day long, you’ll have good luck.” He handed me the penny and told me to hold onto it. I squeezed it for the rest of the day.

       After we registered, we waited about 30 minutes. A nurse then asked me to come upstairs with her. I didn’t realize I had to leave my mom behind. I cried while the nurse explained it would only upset me more if loved ones were allowed upstairs. She was right.

       Upstairs, I sat in another waiting room, surrounded by young women. No one said a word. We all sat and read magazines. Statistics show that nearly 45 percent of woman who have had an abortion will eventually have another one. I prayed I would never have to be in a room like that one again.

       I was flipping through magazines, unable to concentrate, when I came across a douche ad I’d had seen before. I really liked this watercolor painting of a woman’s torso; she’s holding a bundle of flowers to cover her breasts. I had seen the painting months before and torn it out of the magazine and taped it to the wall near my bed because it was so beautiful and uplifting. After seeing the painting again, I felt at ease. I was surrounded by strangers, holding a dirty penny and calmed by a douche ad. I still have the painting next to my bed. Looking at it relaxes me.

       Twenty minutes later, I was asked to go into one of the operating rooms and put on a hospital robe. The room was very cold. The nurse began to give me nitrous oxide, a gas administered to calm the patient. It doesn’t numb anything; it just makes you feel a bit loopy. I tried to focus on the colorful mobile that hung from the ceiling. It had many different shapes that intertwined and kept spinning. I still don’t know if that was the nitrous or if it really was moving. I stared at the mobile throughout the procedure. The doctor entered, did a quick pelvic exam and gave me a numbing shot, which ironically, I didn’t feel. The next thing I heard was something that sounded like a vacuum. I began to cry, even though I wasn’t feeling any pain. The procedure was over in what seemed like a minute. The doctor was gone before I even realized it.

       I got dressed and was sent into a room with recliners and heating pads. I sat in a comfortable chair and ate crackers and drank juice. Physically I felt fine, but mentally and emotionally I was in shock. After 20 minutes of relaxing and receiving a sack of birth-control pills, I was reunited with my mom. We paid and left. I didn’t break down and cry until 15 minutes down the road. I never had any pains or cramps, and I barely bled, as they said I would.

Today
Now I feel fine physically, but mentally and emotionally I’m different. A few months after the abortion, I began experiencing severe anxiety. I would have random panic attacks where my heart raced and I was filled with fear. There were times when I felt I could die. I’d like to think I have the anxiety under control now, but it still affects me occasionally. Therapy has helped. I used to speak with a therapist about once a month. She didn’t specialize in abortion recovery, but she really helped me learn how to deal with the anxiety. Sometimes when I feel anxious, I visit her, but that’s only about once a year.

       Joe and I broke up about a year ago. Our lives were going in different directions. We don’t speak much now, which is fine.

       I like to think I’ve dealt with the whole thing pretty well. I still think about it a lot and sometimes cry. I worry about how hard it’s going to be when I become pregnant again and think about what I did. I know deep down it was the right decision, though. I haven’t been back to Cincinnati since that day, and I don’t think I ever will.