Introduction | Taé's story | Katie's story | Erin's story | Vanessa's story

Taé’s story

The unborn child’s heartbeat sounds so fast and so loud coming from the speaker in the doctor’s office.

Aside from the image coming in and out of focus on the sonogram, you can’t tell she’s pregnant. She’s 16, 100 pounds and one hell of a first baseman ­— her stomach as flat as ever.

Taé smiles at her mother standing beside her bed.

In that moment, everything is OK.

It doesn’t matter that her ex-boyfriend, the baby’s father, had left her for someone else before she knew they were over.

It doesn’t matter that she has just finished her sophomore year in high school and is four months pregnant because, contrary to what her boyfriend said, pulling out doesn’t stop you from getting pregnant.

It doesn’t matter that her own father wants her to have an abortion.

“This is a pointless visit,” her dad booms from the other side of the room, where he’s standing, gritting his teeth against the sound of the fluttering heartbeat.

It’s an anti-abortion, Christian hospital, the nurse tells them. No help for them here, at least not if abortion is what they’re looking for.

“The Kleenex are beside you to wipe off your stomach. We’re all done here.” The nurse gives one more meaningful look at Taé and walks out.

Taé, her mother and her father have barely crossed through the sliding glass doors before her dad pulls out his cell phone, dials Planned Parenthood and schedules an appointment for an abortion the following week.

* * *

When they arrive at Kansas City’s Planned Parenthood, they walk past a pair of women holding anti-abortion signs on the sidewalk.

Taé fidgets in the waiting room, upset and confused by her father’s behavior.

A woman calls her name and she walks back for her appointment, alone.

Taé learns from the nurse that she’s too far along for the abortion pill. She has to have a procedure. A pill will induce contractions. Expanders will help her dilate enough for the extraction. All told, it will take about four days.

The nurse schedules the abortion for next week and is about to leave to get the pill when she hesitates.

“Is this what you want to do?”

A door opens in Taé’s mind. She shakes her head no.

The nurse puts down her pencil and looks Taé sternly in the eyes.

“It doesn’t matter what your dad wants. It’s your body.”

The nurse tells Taé she has to leave, that they can’t perform an abortion on an unwilling patient, no matter how young.

Taé walks out into the lobby, unable to hide her smile.

“She said it was my choice. And I don’t want to have an abortion,” she tells her father.

Her dad’s face turns a dark shade of red. He storms out ahead of her.

* * *

During the next few weeks, her dad brings in the cavalry. Her godsister’s mother. Her mom’s brother’s ex-wife. Anyone and everyone her dad can think of to dissuade her from keeping the child.

Her dad even takes her back to Planned Parenthood a second time. And for a second time, she leaves making the same choice.

Only her mother says she’ll support Taé’s decision, whatever it is.

After the second visit and a fresh round of pro-abortion lectures from family friends, Taé decides to give John, the baby’s father, one more call.

She puts him on speakerphone, her mother standing silently in the corner.

“What is it, Taé? I’m with my girl.”

“John, we need to talk about this baby. I need to know what you think. I mean, do you care? It’s part yours. You do have a say.”

Silence. Then…

“Fuck it.”

He says it so suddenly, so forcefully that Taé’s mom sucks in a breath through her teeth.

“Kill it. I don’t care,” he says.

This is new; he’s not denying it’s his this time.

“Fuck you. Don’t call me with this bullshit anymore. Just get it over with.”

Click.

Her mom steps toward her, but Taé dashes upstairs. She locks her door before she collapses onto her bed, heaving sobs so deep she can hardly breathe.

Her dad doesn’t want the baby.

Fine.

The baby’s dad doesn’t want it either.

Fine.

The decision is hers, but among those she loves, she’s the only one who wants to keep the baby.

Fine.

But if she’s going to abort, she wants it her way. She wants the fetus to remain whole.

* * *

On June 30, Taé returns to Planned Parenthood for a third time.

She walks back to the nurses’ offices, alone, goes through the same questions and gives the same answers.

All except one.

“Is this what you want to do?”

Yes.

The nurse silently leaves the room, returning just a few minutes later with another nurse, an IV and a plastic cup.

They start the IV to sedate her. Taé takes the pill.

In 20 minutes, the doctor comes in, and Taé puts her legs into the stirrups so he can have a better look.

She can’t feel a thing while the doctor inserts the expanders into her vagina – double the normal amount so the fetus can come out unscathed.

He’s done in five minutes, but he says it will be four days until it’s time to extract the fetus.

The nurses walk her into a waiting room, where she sits, alone, while the sedation subsides.

That’s when she feels the baby kicking and the nurse tells her it is a death spasm.

Taé is doubled over in grief, her tears creating a growing dark spot on her jeans, when her dad comes back to get her.

* * *

At 2:30 in the morning on June 2, Taé wakes up screaming.

Pain like she’s never felt before sears across her abdomen.

I am going to die, she thinks.

Minutes later, her mom helps her into the back seat of her dad’s Chevy truck. Her mom’s boyfriend rides shotgun. She slides in next to Taé and puts her daughter’s head on her lap.

Taé is still screaming.

Planned Parenthood is a half-hour drive from their home.

Speed.

It’s the only word Taé can manage.

She rushes into a back room; the doctor and his team of nurses are waiting for her in their green scrubs.

They connect her to another IV — probably Fentanyl for the pain — and place her legs in the stirrups again.

The doctor numbs her cervix and the pain subsides.

She can’t feel anything, but she sees the doctor’s arm, scooping. She hears the suck of a vacuum.

It’s all over in five minutes.

“Was it a boy or a girl?”

“Looks like a girl,” the doctor tells her.

Taé passes out.

Her vagina is sore for the next two weeks, but it’s summer. No school. She stays home playing Skipbo and Rummy with her mom.

She has to take tiny white pills so her muscles can tighten and get back to normal. The pills make her legs and arms cramp up and spasm.

Throughout the summer, Taé thinks of that moment in the hospital, right before she passed out.

A girl. I would have named her Taé — the pseudonym she asked be used to protect her identity in this story.

* * *

Today, she has a 3.98 GPA as a KU sophomore with plans to attend law school after she graduates in 2012.

She spends her days juggling a 15-hour class load and her nights watching The Food Network with her boyfriend of four years. He doesn’t know about her decision, even though they started dating only a year after the abortion.

She doesn’t think about the pink lines or the waiting room or the pain very often. And when she does, she feels gratitude toward her father.

“If it weren’t for him I wouldn’t have done it, and I’m really glad I did,” she said. “I wouldn’t have a successful life.”

Five years after the abortion, Taé has just one regret.

“The only reason I feel guilty is because I don’t feel guilty about it,” she said. “You shouldn’t regret anything you do in life.”

Introduction | Taé's story | Katie's story | Erin's story | Vanessa's story

— Edited by Sarah Kelly