Jannica's Story

This was my second abortion and after the first one I thought I would never ever have to make that difficult decision again. How wrong I was.

The first abortion was under very difficult circumstances, I was dating a man, whom I thought was wonderful but he turned out to be married. I became pregnant and we discussed our options and I had an abortion December 23, 1994. Of course he told me months afterwards that he had wanted me to go through with the pregnancy but did not know how to tell me at the time. I suffered self-esteem issues and guilt for many years. I finally forgave myself, stopped seeing him and got on with my life.

Then I met my future husband, he had been married before and has two adult boys, we dated for several years when he asked my to marry him, of course I jumped at the chance and have loved ever minute of it. We talked openly about what we would do if we got pregnant; no birth control is 100%. Well for 8 yrs nothing happened so as we got a little older, we decided to go for permanent sterilization. He is 45 and I am 35. I opted for the tubal ligation, due to him have some problems with infections in his testicles.

My tubal ligation was performed in January 2006, as soon as I felt well enough to have sexual intercourse it was great no worries about the pill or what ifs. Our sex life was great……the beginning of June I was becoming so tired no energy, nauseous etc. My husband was wondering what was going on and so was I, went for a pregnancy test and it came back positive, my world stopped right there and I had thought my heart dropped to my knees. I could only think why me and why now.

I was so very angry that the procedure failed and that the doctor that performed it was not up front with the actual failure rates for female sterilization(hind sight is 20/20 I have done a lot of research and have found out that tubal ligation is about as effective as the pill). My husband and I decided to terminate the pregnancy, since it was obvious that we had not wanted children at this point in our lives.
The nurse practitioner that I see was absolutely wonderful. She set up the appointment for the termination at the hospital, when I arrived at the clinic, I was still very much in shock of being pregnant. I cried a lot, and unfortunately one of the nurses was not all that sympathetic, her comment was “well you know there is a failure rate”, no kidding that’s why I am here. The doctor and recovery nurse were great.

I have no guilt or regrets from the second abortion.

So for those women who thinking having a tubal ligation is going to take all the worries out of getting pregnant, please think again, hopefully I will be going in for another surgery soon, one where the doctor will remove the entire fallopian tube.

TUBAL LIGATION is not as effective as the doctors tell you. The Crest study proves that, and if you are a women over 30 ensure your doctor doesn’t use the clip, the clips only destroy about 2 cm of the fallopian tube.

Abortion is not an easy choice for anyone, man or women, but I am glad I have that choice. I have no regrets about having the abortions.

Jannica
February 12, 2007