My Miracle Baby (edited 10/8/14)

Have you heard the famous Eleanor Roosevelt phrase, “You must do the thing you think you cannot do?” There is one time in particular in my life when I felt that thought run through me in a terrifyingly “I can’t survive this” kind of way.

Well, let me tell you, there is a BIG upside to doing the thing you think you cannot do.


Before I share what that was, I need to give you a little history…


A month earlier I had had a miscarriage. It was my fourth pregnancy and would have been my third child. As if the miscarriage itself, which took over a week to complete, was not painful enough, when I woke up in the recovery room at the end of that long week, I was suddenly transported back in my mind to the clinic where I’d had an abortion eleven years earlier.

At that time of my miscarriage, my husband was going to seminary school at nights to become a Catholic deacon, and the pressure I felt from my religious upbringing and his new vocation created incredible tension and anxiety in me and between us, to keep my secret. Although I did not know it at the time, our abortion was a reason that could have precluded his ordination. He was disconnected from our marriage in every way. I was in overwhelm and alone in parenting our two young children and now I had two dead babies I needed to grieve for, but could not. When I left for a healing retreat a month after my miscarriage, my husband sent me off with very clear instructions – “Do whatever you need to do to fix yourself and pull this family back together.” I was breathing and barely alive, but spiritually and energetically I was close to dying. 

At that retreat, I had to acknowledge that if I was going to survive, I would need to tell my story. I would need to say what I did out loud. And then, when that was done, I would need to acknowledge my unborn children and bring closure in a ritual similar to a funeral.

I had to choose. It was my life or death. Could I do the thing that I thought I could not do? 


To my great surprise and utter relief, I discovered that releasing the story and its attendant emotions brought me peace, relief and a new support network I never knew existed. My shadow side was exposed; my dark side was bared for the other women at our retreat to see. This opened a door to a non-judgmental love I had not experienced in a long time. Contrary to my thinking, my vulnerability and full disclosure did not make them hate me – just the opposite. I was welcomed into a hospitable and loving community unlike any I had ever known.

Two and a half months later, after doing these things I did not think I could do, I found out I was pregnant with my third child. 

At age 41, he was my miracle baby and a symbol of healing for all the inner work I had done at that retreat. I learned that good things have room to grow when the toxic emotions are released. I had created space for a new beginning, for both of my baby and myself. 

That little guy was born on October 12, 2004. In five days, he will be ten years old. Thank you my “I love you more” guy for all the lessons you have brought to me. Mama Chop loves you to the moon and back again.


Namaste.

 

PS: Next Tuesday at 6 pm PST I have the honor and privilege of being interviewed by Mama Char on her show, The Quirky World of Mama Char on Blog Talk radio. I will post the link on when it will air.


And…my new website is almost complete! Hurray! I hope you will catch my blog next week at www.unborn angels.com/blog.


Thank you!

 

Destiny: Predetermined or Taught (Part 1)

My parents had a story they loved to tell me when my kids were first born. It was about when I myself was a newborn, perhaps six weeks old at best. 

Although they say I was not colicky, apparently one afternoon during my first spring, I was crying for no reason. Despite their best efforts they couldn’t get me to stop bawling, so they put me in my crib, shut the windows and door to my bedroom, and then left the apartment with me wailing inside. They say they sat on the stoop for over 30 minutes until they were sure I must have stopped crying. Sometimes my dad will tell the story and joke that I learned from that experience to keep my mouth shut. The interesting thing is, over my childhood years, I heard the expression that children should be seen and not heard so many times, that even as a joke, it wore thin pretty quickly. My dad had a quick temper at times and between that parenting philosophy and a devout Catholic upbringing, I grew to be quiet and studious, rarely stepping out of the tight boundaries that were erected around me.  

It’s no wonder that I met and married a man who treated me very much the same way. His ‘normal’ and my ‘normal’ way of living were far from most people’s usual ‘normal’ behavior, but very similar to the type of home environment in which we were each raised. His role model, his step-father, was physically, verbally and emotionally abusive as well as an alcoholic, spendthrift and womanizer. He brought this emotional template into our marriage, along with approximately $35,000 of mostly credit card debt. This was back in 1989.

Despite using birth control religiously, in 1992, less than three years into our marriage, I found out I was pregnant while hospitalized for profuse vomiting. When the doctor told me I was pregnant, I burst into tears. My husband looked at me and said “I know what to do.” I knew what he meant, agreed between my wrenching sobs, and within days I had had an abortion. I am sure that I left my body that day, and while I may have been back in it over the next eleven years in the physical sense of the word, I certainly was not aligned with myself in any way, shape, or form. It wasn’t until a miscarriage in 2003 that the memory of the abortion flooded my being and brought me to my knees, literally and figuratively. 

It took me many years of therapy and other experiences to find answers and wholeness from my pregnancy losses. Along the way, I have learned many valuable lessons, lessons I now believe were available to me because of my experiences with abortion and miscarriage. And with that realization has come a healing that is deep and lasting. My eyes have opened to the incongruence’s of my life to that point, and been the impetus for a transformation of all my long held beliefs about myself, my family, and my religious upbringing.   


One of the biggest lessons I learned in healing was that keeping a secret (and that could be any secret, not just an abortion) kept me stuck right where I was. The more I held onto that secret and repressed it, the heavier the weight guilt, shame and other negative feelings became in my body. That secret took up valuable space that I needed to build a better life. It needed to be released so that my being, in every way possible, could have room for love, joy, and freedom. 

Letting go of all those feelings has been some of the hardest work I’ve ever had to do in finding my way back to being in alignment with my soul. There was another pivotal incident which I’m going to share with you next week that also helped me enormously regain my footing on the path to wholeness. This incident not only changed and transformed me, but it changed the life of my children, most notably my daughter, as well.

And the most amazing thing about this other happening is that it came from a source I least expected: my own family.

Until next week, 

Namaste.

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Breast Cancer and The Mind - Body Connection

The mind-body connection is being talked about more and more lately. We know now, for example, that stress can be a major factor in causing heart attacks. Eating disorders have emotional triggers. Anxiety can cause acid reflux, nausea, or even vomiting. In her 2013 New York Times bestseller, Mind Over Medicine, Dr. Lissa Rankin writes that “Loneliness can make you sicker than smoking cigarettes.” If loneliness can make you so sick, it is not hard to imagine that illness can be also caused by a deep, lingering shame.

Shame is often referred to as the secret emotion. It’s called a secret one because our shame from a situation compels us to hold onto it, to hide and repress it. If something so universal and prevalent as loneliness can cause illness, then the regret, guilt and shame that many of us feel or felt after an abortion must create quite a cocktail of problems in our bodies.


For years, the question of whether there is a link between abortion and breast cancer has been debated. In many ways, this question seems to be a vehicle for the pro-life and pro-choice camps to put a stake in the ground to further each of their positions. What if we set aside the positioning for a moment and take a different look at this theory?

Christel Nani describes the traits she found in women who have breast cancer in her revolutionary book, Diary of a Medical Intuitive. She observes, “Women with breast cancer almost always have a secret, something they can’t forgive themselves for. This lack of forgiveness lowers their vibration and shuts down the energy flowing to their heart chakra. And the heart chakra, of course, is located near the breasts. In addition, having a guilty secret makes them feel ashamed and gives them a vague sense of owing a debt. It makes them think that they don’t deserve to be happy, to have a good marriage or an easy path in life. The fallout from their guilty secret pervades their entire lives.” 

Christel’s observations in Diary, published in 2004, were ahead of their time. She does not tie breast cancer to abortion per se, but does point out her findings that holding onto a secret is one of the several elements present in causing this disease. Now, ten years later, as we find more and deeper mind-body connections, I wonder if we can start to see the truth in her work. 

One way to get rid of the secrecy is to make our world a safer and more supportive place for women who have had abortions. The organization, Abortion Changes U, began a campaign on March 25 called U R Not Alone. This campaign is being done to show women that they have support in their ability to heal from all over our country. 

It is time for a radical change in thinking.


What if the pro-life movement really was pro-life? What if instead of saying “I told you so” when the aftermath of abortion is identified, we stopped the judgment process long enough for to allow women to grieve, to heal, and to find wholeness - to support the life already here? What if the pro-choice movement stopped denying that there are aftereffects to abortion? What if we were privy to the stories of other women in a way that opens us up to support and community? 

One in every three women in the United States will have had an abortion by the age of 45. Despite this common occurrence, it remains so stigmatized that the mere use of the word in conversation triggers many women. For the sake of our grandmothers, mothers, daughters, sisters, girlfriends, aunts and cousins – for the sake of any woman who has ever had an abortion – won’t you please consider signing your name to the U R Not Alone Campaign? Please let our sisters know that they have support in their healing journey. I believe this can be a powerful first step to bridging the divide and bringing peace to the abortion debates. 

A dear friend of mine once shared with me his fear of not taking the opportunity to help someone in need when it was offered to him. This is a chance to be of service - maybe to one woman, potentially to many of us. Signing this statement of support is an easy way to make a big difference.

Thank you, from my heart, for your support.



Namaste.

Magnet and Steel

In his 1978 hit, Walter Egan sang “With you I’m not shy/to show the way I feel/with you I might try, my secrets to reveal/for you are a magnet and I am steel.” Egan may have been singing about romantic love, but as I reflect on my experience with holding onto secrets, I realize the concept of magnet and steel — two materials that make a powerful force of connection when they meet — holds a much deeper truth.

For over a decade, I believed I was the only Catholic woman in the universe to have an abortion and hid behind a cloak of shame, never guessing that I actually have a lot of company (did I mention I had a flair for exaggeration?).

It started when I stepped out of the private little world I had kept for myself for eleven years by attending a Project Rachel retreat (Ten Year Anniversary Blog). Because of their admonition to keep my experience to myself, I held tightly to my secret back at home, even — and especially — with my closest friends.


I had (and continue to have) wonderful girlfriends. Like me, many of them were practicing Catholics at the time. I knew them from grade school, college, work, my children’s schools, and church. Once I became a parent, I didn’t see them as much as I had in earlier days; my children took top priority. As my marriage fell apart, I realized that the marriage counselor we were seeing was only trying to save the marriage. I needed my own therapist, one who would help me save me. I went out and found one.

It was with this therapist’s advice that I began to share with my best girlfriends the biggest secret of my marriage. Despite the closeness and intimacy we had as we held each other through the births of children, the deaths of several pets, and the ups and downs of marriage, I had never shared with them the truth: My first pregnancy had ended with abortion.

The first friend I shared my secret with had worked for my husband for many years, even commuted with him to work for two hours every day. Logic would dictate that she be one of the last people I have this conversation with, not the first, yet my intuition said she was the one.


With great anxiety and fear, I told her the truth of my marriage, all of it, the good, the bad, and the downright ugly. To my utter shock, when I was finished, she told me she wasn’t surprised. She cried as I cried, and told me she loved me.

My friend’s understanding and sensitivity made sharing my story with my other friends a little less difficult. As I began to open my heart, to expose the real me to my circle of friends, I discovered I had attracted women who were just like me. The statistics are that one in every three women by the age of forty-five has had an abortion. For my circle, it was twice the national average. Talk about a magnet and steel!

I am forever grateful to the therapist who gave me the homework assignment to reveal my secrets. We are not alone in more ways than we realize. Taking that one step began a journey of transformation from shame and despair into freedom and peace. 


Perhaps you can find that one person and “show the way you feel, your secrets to reveal.” On the other side of the door where your secret lies trapped is a lighter and brighter you. 

And check out the song I’ve dated myself with here (Walter Egan with Stevie Nicks) The idea of two metals attracting may be a message you’ll always remember and give you the fortitude you need to take that first step towards freedom.

 Namaste.

The Perfect Mother

The instant my daughter was born I made a promise to myself and to her that I would be the best mother ever. It didn’t take too much sleep deprivation to remind me I was human!

And yet, for years I continued on my mission to prove myself as a mother. I had to prove I was a good mom — to myself and to the world. I had such deep shame over the abortion I’d had years earlier that aspiring to sainthood seemed the best way to hide my secret. Afterall, if I was an impeccable mother, no questions would ever come up to suggest that an abortion was part of my past. I wondered, how could a “good” mother choose an abortion?

Shame is often referred to as the secret emotion because of the intense need the person feeling it has to conceal it. For me, the longer I buried the experience and tried to hide it from even myself, the harder it became to live my life authentically. I wasn’t living for me or for my daughter, I was living in fear and shame.

I have no doubt that my Catholic faith had a lot to do with these feelings of shame. Sermons about the evils of abortion, combined with teachings on original sin, reminded me regularly of what I had done and how mortally I had sinned. 

It took many years and many hurts to realize that my religion did not need to define my spirituality and that the Church was made up of human beings just like me. None of us, not even our priests, are exempt from the imperfections of humanity. I watched the clergy-abuse crisis unfold in my own backyard in Boston, and realized that my “sins” were no worse than many of the clergy who espoused a life’s vocation of following Jesus. 

As I learned to open up to other viewpoints, my spirituality evolved to where I could begin to think for myself, not simply as I was instructed to think by my religion. I began to see myself and my abortion in a whole different light. I wasn’t a sinner, I was a human being made in the image and likeness of God. And abortion wasn’t a sin, it was one possible answer in a world where both options were painful.  

Today, I strive to be the best mother I can be to my three kids. It isn’t easy to do as a single parent, but I no longer do it out of fear for being discovered, going to hell, or finding myself otherwise unworthy. I do it because I was chosen by them to be their mom for all the gifts I have to offer them. I make mistakes just like everyone, but I no longer berate myself afterwards for long periods of time. I take a deep breath, think about what I can do better next time, reminding myself this is where I was born to be and what I was born to do. 

For anyone still trying to reach sainthood, attain perfection in parenting or otherwise hide behind the mask of shame, I hope you find peace one day knowing that you are whole and perfect just the way you are.


Namaste.

A Ten Year Anniversary

It was ten years ago this past week that I started my healing journey with abortion. I was at my wit’s end and knew if I didn’t deal with my complex feelings from over eleven years earlier, I would probably end up institutionalized.

There were many factors contributing to my suppressed feelings of grief and shame. The biggest factor, by far, was my Catholic upbringing. While it gave me a deep faith in God, it also informed me I had committed a mortal sin. 

My Catholic roots went deep. I attended a Catholic girls’ school for four years before high school, and a Catholic college. To make matters worse, by the time I finally fell apart, my husband was enrolled in the seminary to become a deacon. Soon there would be many more eyes upon us both, looking to our family as model Catholics. After the years of parochial education, Sunday sermons and deaconate formation training, I felt like a failure as a human being. The pressure to live up to these standards was unbearable. 

Thankfully, there is a program for healing in the Catholic Church called Project Rachel. Project Rachel changed the course of my life.

Project Rachel helped me to understand the weight I had borne for over a decade. They helped me grieve and stood with me as I released my grief and asked God and my unborn daughter for forgiveness.

As with many retreats, the confidentiality of the group was a requirement of participation. Given our purpose for being together, that made absolute sense. Unlike other retreats, however, the Project Rachel retreat required secrecy in other facets of the weekend as well. Our location was secret. No one knew where we were meeting and we were advised not to share that information, except with our spouses. Also unusual was our final instruction - not to share with family or friends anything about our abortions or our weekend together. It might not be safe, and therefore was something we should keep to ourselves. For me, there was continued fear and shame as I listened to this final counsel. 


The one thing I was not able to release, my shame, stayed with me far longer than any other difficult emotion. Even Project Rachel’s Christ-like leadership and its generous love and compassion could not do for me what I so sorely needed. They could not change the language of the Catholic leadership and populace to remove condemnation or judgment. In the end, I was able to release the shame and find freedom only by looking outside the Church.

 

Since my retreat, as I listen to discussions between so-called pro-lifers and pro-choicers, I continue to wonder why the Church uses the language they do. Sinful, wrong, unthinkable, senseless murder – these are all words used in Catholic sermons and dialogs about abortion. The judgment these words evoke made it very difficult for me to release the shame of my abortion and I am certain make it difficult for most others. 

It’s unusual to talk about abortion. And while it isn’t everyone’s thing to share their story with the world, I do believe it is important that we share our stories with someone. One of the most productive things we did in the Project Rachel retreat weekend was to share our stories with each other. Sharing stories healed us because as we listened, we forgave. As we forgave and understood our sisters’ pain, we were able to access and release our own pain, and begin the process of forgiving ourselves. With greater support from Church leadership, women would be able to leave Project Rachel feeling more supported in their healing and fully releasing the shame - the contradiction and tension between emotional freedom and faith tradition would dissolve.

I hope and pray that one day soon Catholic leadership will really listen to the stories the women of the church have to tell and comprehend the compassion of the Project Rachel ministry who allowed us voice to tell them. I hope they will begin to understand and accept the experience of women that compels them to make this choice. Until we are able to speak without fear or secrecy, the road to full healing will be longer than it needs to be. 

As I reflect on my ten-year anniversary this week, I realize how lucky I am to be able to share my story today feeling strong and secure in who I really am – a woman of light and love who knows all is very well with her soul.


Namaste.

Homemade Applesauce and Festering Secrets

Yesterday morning I cleaned out my refrigerator. Lurking in the back was a Tupperware container filled with homemade applesauce from several months ago. Mold was growing all over it. 

I knew the applesauce was there, I noticed it at least a month ago. But every time I came back from the grocery store, instead of taking out that tub of applesauce, I squeezed in all my new food around it, pushing it deeper into the refrigerator so I could get everything else in. 

How long did I push it back, cover it up, pretend it was not there, letting it grow mold?  If I waited, perhaps one of my kids would discover it and squeal, grossed out.  Perhaps a girlfriend might stop in and find it as she reached in for a cold drink. How much longer did I think I could put off the inevitable?


I finally decided this morning that it was time to take out the applesauce and throw it away. It’s not salvageable now, not one bit of it. It’s toxic. It’s time to go. 

Secrets are a lot like that, too. We hold onto them, keep them hidden, cover them up with our “new purchases,” pretend that a new outfit, a new friend or a new neighborhood will mask the past.  

In my experience, eventually a secret becomes toxic too, like my applesauce. 

Before I was ready to release it, my own secret, held tight for eleven years, began to fester, just like the applesauce.  


The release of my darkest secret – having an abortion – went through much the same progression. Initially, I stuffed it down deep, tried to build my life up around it, pretended I was okay, that my life was perfect. Everything looked pretty good from the outside. But when I could hide no longer, when it was too hard to get up in the morning, or I couldn’t fall asleep at night, or my nerves triggered stomach pains, I couldn’t ignore the secret any longer. 

It wasn’t pretty in the beginning (and neither was cleaning out my Tupperware!). In fact, I had let it sit there so long it festered and had gotten downright ugly. If I had dealt with my angst about it sooner, it would have been a lot prettier when I released the guilt, shame and pain I had been carrying around for eleven years. 

Once the floodgates opened, the rest of the job was so much easier. After that, it took a good scrubbing, some patience and time to forgive myself. I was determined not to let this part of my life define me. Today I am like that Tupperware container, squeaky clean and with plenty of room for more goodness in my life. 

This morning as I look into my refrigerator, I see a beautiful open space where yesterday there was no room for anything new. I remind myself that with courage and determination, we can do anything, be anyone we set our minds to. Truly, life is good! (And my refrigerator is clean and spacious, too!)


Namaste.

An Unexpected Moment of Connection

In June 2013 I attended a writer’s conference that featured a speaker who was a well-known female memoirist, and most of the attendees were female. I sat at a table with an exceptional group of women, our ages spanning four decades.

Through writing prompts and group exercises, we got to know each other in personal ways very quickly. I shared my purpose in helping women heal from abortion, explaining that I knew from experience how needed this work was. The responses around the table were positive. 

Until Kathleen spoke. 

Kathleen told her story of being a pregnant teen. Her parents had taken her baby away from her and put it up for adoption, deciding for her that she was not capable of being a mother. She was devastated. She vented anger at them and her sister, who also became pregnant as a teen, but who had made a different choice. She exclaimed both angrily and proudly, “Well, at least I had my baby. My sister aborted hers!”

No sooner had she said the words when she realized it and shot a look across the table at me. She didn’t want to hurt my feelings, and she apologized. 

I understood, and I told her so. Before my abortion I had always sworn I’d never have one either. And I’m used to negative reactions around this issue. When I tell people my experience, I hear things like, “I have nothing against abortion, but I would never choose it.”

 

It’s funny how God likes to teach us humility. 

We were not in a position to speak privately, but at the end of the workshop we ended up next to each other in line for the author’s autograph. It was a long line and we had over thirty minutes together. She apologized again, opening the door to more conversation on the subject. In the past, her words would have triggered me into a downward spiral of negativity. But having worked on my own feelings of self-judgment and self-worth over the years, I was able to step back from her comment and not feel it personally. As it turned out, I was able to provide a safe place for her to share deeply her buried feelings of loss and sadness. She had felt shame over her pregnancy and the loss of her child.

 

She, like myself, had lived much of her life feeling isolated.

Despite the noise and commotion around us we forged a special bond in those thirty minutes. By the time our books were autographed, we did not want to say good-bye. We realized we shared the same experience — having an unplanned pregnancy — no matter how different the outcome. After living in shame and self-loathing for many years with our buried secrets, we discovered that we were more connected than we could have dreamed at first meeting. We lingered a little longer before exchanging contact information and finally releasing each other.  

I believe it is these baby steps, taken one person at a time, that will change the world perspective on abortion. Kathleen and I discovered how much more we had in common than we’d thought. Once we were able to set aside our judgments, a beautiful moment of grace and connection unfolded for us. 

I wish you a moment of unexpected grace and connection in your life today too. And a loving release from judgment, of yourself and others.

 

Namaste.

Safety, Not Secrets

Do you have secrets? Most of us do. We keep secrets for a variety of reasons. We don’t want to hurt people’s feelings. We don’t want to open ourselves up to criticism or judgment. Sometimes we don’t want to acknowledge the shadow part of ourselves. For me, the secret I kept of my abortion falls into those last two categories.

Our world is full of judgment of others. We judge the way people dress, their mannerisms, the jobs they have, their friends and family dynamics.  Many of us were raised in personally limiting environments, taught to believe the only way to have it all is to be the best in a world of scarcity. In that paradigm, nobody wins. With that message, we lean towards judgment as a way of feeling better about ourselves.

I read about caring for children who have suffered from trauma. One of the best things adults can do for these children is give them a safe place, a place where they know they are protected. Without that safe place, they will stay afraid and be unable to heal.

How that resonated with me! I stayed in fear - lived in fear - for over ten years, unable to find support to help me heal from my choice of abortion when I was 29 years old. How many of us could have benefitted from having a safe place to heal from abortion?


It's confusing really - there are judgments from all sides, from people who are "pro-life" and people who are "pro-choice". Whether it is because of judgmental attitudes or actual violence, there are few safe places for a woman who needs to release her feelings, whatever they may be. 

It happened to me many years ago, in my gynecologist's office. I decided to talk to her about my abortion. She was pro-choice and made it very clear to me that she thought I had made a perfectly legitimate choice and I should simply put it behind me and try to forget it. Why should I think any more about it? By the time I left her office, I felt like an overly sensitive adolescent girl.  She must be right! I was determined to “just get over it” and not look back.

The problem was, in a world that seeks to preserve life at all costs and is more frightened by death that anything else, how could I “just get over it”?  


Over time, physical and emotional symptoms became chronic conditions. I built up quite a medical file over those years. Until I allowed my grief, shame and sadness out, I could not be a healthy and whole person. 

I have done years of work to come to a feeling of peace and freedom about my choice to have an abortion. But something that helped me the most is knowing that I am not alone. In sharing our stories, we not only give each other community, but we allow each other to be our authentic selves, and by doing that, we create a safe place.  

We are one in every three women you meet. Chances are good you know many of us already. We may be your girlfriends, your best friend, your mother or your daughter. Let's create a safe place for healing, where we can end the isolation and open the door to peace and freedom.

"It is in giving that we receive. It is in pardoning that we are pardoned.” St. Francis of Assisi.


Namaste.