Ashley's Story...

November is National Adoption Month and I've decided to share our experience with adoption.

Before my daughter was born I reminded her birth mom to keep being honest with us, and that if she were to change her mind at any point that I would understand and support her in her decision. Of course, I would be in a lot of pain, but having given birth to a child myself, I couldn't imagine the strength and courage it took to place a child for adoption.

Throughout her labor I stayed by her side.

We took this picture after 21 hours of labor, when my daughter's birth mom was able to rest for a bit before pushing. While the room was quiet and tears were streaming down my face, I prayed for God's peace and comfort for her. I needed the Lord more than ever in this moment as I couldn't even fathom what the next couple of hours were going to be like.

After she delivered, my husband followed our new sweet baby into another room to be examined, and I stayed by her side.

I can't even begin to explain the emotions that flooded the room from the nurses and OB, to me and my daughter's birth mom. She closed her eyes and wept. It's a sound I could never bear to hear again. A sound I imagine any woman would make knowing that placing your child for adoption is the best choice, but one that breaks your heart in the most painful way. She turned to me and said "Congratulations. Please go kiss her."

I couldn't. I couldn't even speak. Tears flooded my eyes as I held onto my daughter's mother's hand so tightly. I told her I wouldn't leave until she was ready.

Birth moms don't give away their children. They sacrificially, painfully, courageously, place their child in a home where a life could be provided for them that they cannot at that current time provide for their child. I watched as a brave 15-year-old woman said yes to life, mustered the courage and strength to choose life for her daughter, and with joy, hand her baby to me.

It was one of the most painful yet happiest moments of my life, one that has forever changed me as a woman and a mother. ‪#‎ShoutYourAdoption‬

 

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 Post by Ashley Baldwin‬

Tips for Offering Women Non-Violent Alternatives at the Clinic

From SAFL-

Sometimes, it's the little things that count.

That's no less true for reaching a women-in-crisis, especially in a critical moment in which she's considering abortion.

This week, we thought we'd share with you a few little tidbits to keep with you on the sidewalk in order to make yourself more approachable to an abortion-bound woman...

• Be a person, not a protester -- This is the main thing we want you to remember: be someone she feels she can talk to.  Be a "safe person."  Think about it this way -- if you were caught in a desperate situation, who would you want to talk to?  The person yelling at you?  Or possibly, a person who looks like you and simply says,"Good morning ...how can we help you?"  It's really something to think about.

• Avoid "ganging up" on someone -- Even the best sidewalk counselors sometimes miss the opportunity to look around them and say, would this setting be intimidating to a woman-in-crisis?  She's not going to want to talk about her business with a huge group of people around, so try to separate yourself from the group a bit and create a more personal, confidential space for you to converse with someone and share vital information.  A car naturally creates this, but think about the setting for someone who might approach you on foot.

• Don't be a billboard -- Peaceful messages are fine, but avoiding looking like a pin board for a bunch of angry messages meant for the culture.  Remember: your audience is the heart of a woman-in-crisis; your main goal at an abortion center is to reach her.  You want to be a safe, approachable person.  You don't want a woman to dismiss an opportunity to talk to you because you are "preaching at" them through your clothes.  Be someone who looks professional and approachable.

• Project your voice, but don't yell -- I still remember the day I called out to a woman across the parking lot of an abortion facility -- I naturally had to project my voice, otherwise, she wouldn't have been able to hear me.  Unfortunately, she went in anyway.  However, she came out about 30 minutes later and came over to talk to me at the fence.  She said, "I decided to come talk to you because you weren't yelling at me."  I marveled at that because I naturally had to call out to her in order to reach her.  Again, there is a difference: if I had yelled out, "Hey, you, what do you think you're doing?!" or related, we would've never had the conversation.  But because I said, "Hi, I'm Lauren!  We'd like you to know that we have real help available ...You can come talk to me at anytime..." and projected my voice in a friendly manner, that made all the difference.

Read the full list of tips here!

My Abortion Story

Originally posted on Stand True.

In a half-asleep daze, with my abdomen in knots, I stumbled to the bathroom, fell to my knees, and began throwing up into the toilet. After a few heaves jolted me fully awake, I sensed someone standing behind me. Before I could turn my head to confirm my suspicions, my mother’s delicate hands swept past my cheeks and lightly pulled my hair out of my face.

In that moment I felt like a little girl again – cared for, watched over.

No matter how bad things were growing up, my mother always gave me as much unconditional love as any two parents combined. Oftentimes, our unshakeable familial love was all we had.

She helped me up to the sink. As I began rinsing my mouth, she eyed my midsection as if expecting to see something. I rolled my eyes and assured her it was just a bug, probably something I ate the night before. “I am not pregnant!” I said.

In my mind though, I knew she wasn’t the only one I was trying to convince. I was only 16, and my on-again, off-again boyfriend had started using drugs again – this time more than just recreationally. As I stared into the sink, my hand nervously jostling the toothbrush around my mouth, my mother disappeared.

I wanted nothing more than to shut down my brain and push these anxieties as far out of my mind as possible. I climbed back into the reassuring comfort of my warm bed. As my eyes grew heavy, the hum of my fan lulled me back to sleep.

What must have been hours later, since the sun was shining through my window, my mother walked back into my room and gently placed her hand on my arm. “I need you to get up and pee,” she said. What? When did I suddenly become a toddler again, in need of reminders for this sort of thing? That’s when I rubbed my eyes open and noticed the Dixie cup and tiny white stick resting in the palm of her hand.

Immediately, my heart plunged down to the base of my spine. No! Was this really happening? I reassured myself that there was nothing to discover, and so with the last sliver of blissful ignorance I would ever have, I scooped up the cup and did as I was told.

When I returned from the bathroom, I handed over the paper cup and I found my way back to the warmth of my bed. I could only see the lower half of my mother’s body as she leaned over the sink. And just as my head rediscovered the pillow I saw her rock back on her heels, letting out a slow and steady sigh. Surely, she couldn’t tell anything yet.

“How long do those things normally take?” I asked.

“Three and a half minutes,” she replied.

But before I could relish my relief, she finished, “But it only took 30 seconds.”

And then, my world imploded.

As I wailed into my mother’s embrace, all I wanted was to rip my stomach out of my body, or better yet leave my body behind all together, for someone else to deal with.

How could I have done this? I knew better. I knew better.

I knew the damage being a single teenage mother would do to a child, because I was that child. My mother was only 19 when she became pregnant with me. She was a sophomore at the University of Texas with such a bright future ahead of her when I came along. Because of me, our lives were racked with hardships. Was I prepared to put an innocent child through that, seeing as I was little more than a child myself?

The following days were a blur, and so many choices lay ahead of me. Being single and 16, it seemed only logical to have an abortion – at least to other people. Every time someone suggested it, though, I would flinch. Didn’t they realize all of the reasons they were giving that I should abort were the very same reasons my mother should have had an abortion? Didn’t they realize every time they said I’d be better off without this baby, they were saying the world would be better off without me?

I was spared from death and, while life hadn’t always been perfect, it was much better than the alternative. Who was I to take the life of this child, brought into the world by no fault of his own? I felt like I would have been a coward to make such a choice. And if my mother had taught me anything, it was how to be strong. No matter how many times life kicked us down, we got right back up.

This was no different. I wasn’t going to let the world tell me how weak I was, how this precious child was going to ruin me, how miserable we would be because of our circumstances. I knew since my mother was strong enough to choose me, I was strong enough to choose him.

Thirteen years later I look back on that time and I see how much I’ve grown, how much this child has changed me for the better. It’s hard to remember that day’s fear and the panic now. The only time I feel those emotions is when I realize how easy it would have been to buy into the lie the doubters told me and lost my child forever.

I panic when I imagine my life without this kid.

I feel scared for women going through crisis pregnancies with less support than I had. My heart breaks for the girls who choose abortion because, rather than believing they are strong enough, they’re told, “You can’t.”

If you want to know where the “stigma” surrounding abortion comes from, it is from pregnant women being told they are not good enough, strong enough, or woman enough to be a mother. It’s not the pressure society puts on women to carry children in less than desirable circumstances; it’s the fact that they know when they make the choice to abort they are accepting defeat. They are denying the biological awesomeness their bodies are capable of, and the inherent strength they have to turn “a mistake” into the best thing that will ever happen to them.

So, until you find a way to rid us of the sense of our own feminine strength, you will never be able to remove the stigma of abortion, which denies it.

*Oh, and as you can probably see, not all abortion stories have to end in abortion, some can end like this…