Several years after my divorce from the father of my son, I had a brief reunion with someone I had dated prior to my marriage. He was also divorced many years by that time and we were reintroduced by mutual friends. I was busy running/owning a gift store in New Jersey and raising my five year old son as a single mom. I rarely dated, but I really loved the friends who put us back together. Neither of us were great relationship material at that time, but we did enjoy each other’s company a couple weekends, as we lived in different states.

Anyway, the result of those brief encounters was an unexpected pregnancy that threw me into a rapid decision making process. Having already had a child, I knew the fetal development and how quickly the baby was forming. One can’t think its a baby when they want it and a mass of cells when they don’t. I quickly realized, in the fifth year after Roe vs Wade became legal, that many of my friends were self avowed feminists at that time. Assume that as a divorced woman most of my friends were single, divorced, or unhappily married. It was the way one got sorted after divorce in those days. I didn’t have a definite position then and was willing to see the pros and cons of each side in any individual’s life: I was wary of head knowledge and always preferred experience over wishful thinking. This was no longer hypothetical for me, so given a very short timespan to decide and because I didn’t want my fetus to have any more body parts than it had at that moment if I was considering termination, I quickly devised a test to use when seeking advice from my very few close friends or relatives. I asked them “have you ever had an abortion, a child out of wedlock or given a child up for adoption?” as those were the three not so great options I was facing. There were also no Crisis Pregnancy Centers that I was aware of in 1977.

The result of my test was I lost one friend who had an abortion that I had actually driven her to, who refused to talk when I called her asking about her feelings after; she hung up on me in tears. Most others didn’t pass the test and just offered what they thought they would do in my place. Not helpful. My doctor had told me in a check up he didn’t know how I ever conceived my one child, as my female parts seemed upside down and sideways. This wasn’t a birth control method I should have relied on. When I was back in his office for the pregnancy test six months later he handed me the name of a doctor who would take care of my problem. I was never in his office again for care or advice. My own father wrote me I was never going to have enough time, money or love beyond what I needed to raise my one child and owed it to my son not to have another. Also that no man would ever want to take that on in a future marriage. Feeling somewhat at a loss to make the right decision, I scheduled an appointment to terminate the pregnancy. The night before I called a friend in California, someone I had dated but we were coasts away; both divorced, crazy busy and again, neither of us the most stable at that point in our lives for solid relationships. Oh, I should add that I had also driven to the other state to get input from the father of this child, who was supporting his ex and their three children already. A heavy drinker and again, not a great candidate for long term solidity, though he did think I should not terminate, yet offered little else.

My phone call to the friend in California cast the final vote. Though as a man he had not had an abortion personally, his only natural child was aborted without him even being consulted and it had made an indelible impact on him. His wise response to my dilemma was “What are you doing the next nine months you couldn’t do pregnant?” I found myself suddenly laughing and crying on my end of the phone and found myself surrounded by light at nine pm at night standing in my basement. I had just found my true north on this matter. I cancelled my appointment the next morning and went forward to the two choices I had left. My friend bought me grey time in a mostly black and white matter. I went to talk to adoption agencies and then later, about the fourth month, I decided I would not only have but raise that unborn child. When I shared the news with my wonderful five year old he responded “Oh Mom! Remember when I threw that penny in the fountain at Bloomingdales? I wished I could be a brother!” While I didn’t blame him for the outcome of his penny request, I did love that he said he wanted to be a brother, not to have a brother! Although he did get that wish too, if it was one. The two of us had the relationship, guts and grace to follow through with my decision and I have never had a moment of regret.