Remembering Why We Write

Why we must look at ourselves without flinching

(note: discussion of sexual assault and abortion)

Hello wonderful writers,

Today I woke up and saw that Roe v Wade is being overturned, and I cried. I imagine that you, like me, are inundated with discussions surrounding this verdict.

I categorically support abortion rights. I have had more than one abortion, and I’m grateful for those abortions. Often, I think of my gratitude being about not having been forced to raise a child I wasn’t prepared for— but today I realized that much of my gratitude is actually about being alive. Without access to safe, legal abortions, I would be dead.

I had my first abortion when I was sixteen. I’d lost my virginity three years earlier. I was early to sex, in general. I was raised in a way that convinced me my body wasn’t mine, and I was taught very early to give my body away, so sex was natural to me. It erased me. I wanted to be erased, so I didn’t have to feel.

I found out I was pregnant after having sex with someone under a bridge, where I was sleepin…