Every month brings me a "scare" while sexually active. You know what I mean, right? This month was different. I knew before I took the test. I had no initial reaction because I knew. I wasn't even nervous. I knew the morning after conception up until nearly three weeks later when I took the test and saw the plus sign. I walked out of the grocery store bathroom stall, purchased a chocolate bar, and walked back to my car. It was there that I let myself cry. It was there that I decided to call my mom for the first time in months.

I had spent about three weeks binge drinking my way through Christmas and New Years. This was before I was sure and just figured that I was going crazy. On January 1st I woke up and rubbed my belly and asked the "baby" to be okay. I made excuses for why I couldn't drink from that point forward. I didn't take a test for another four days when I really missed my period. Like I said, I knew. The test confirmed.

I've always been pro-choice but abortion was never going to be an option for me after a certain age, a certain degree, etc etc. Well, I reached that age. I was six months shy of graduating with my master's. And still-- this was not what I had signed up for.

We weren't careful. It was the first time since I was 15 that I hadn't been on some form of birth control while sexually active for an extended amount of time. I had an IUD but had it removed due to complications earlier in the year. I should have been careful for many reasons, including his reputation, but for some reason I wasn't. Stupidity at its finest? I had also been told by two doctors that I would likely have fertility problems. This was always playing in the back of my head. It was there when I made the decision to abort the fetus. It is still there now. It hurts to think that may be true ... yet the pregnancy proved that I could conceive. Was that my only chance?

Our relationship was rocky to put it best. He had confessed his love for me but I wasn't quite there yet. We started off on a bad foot and just rolled with the punches. My draw to him was inexplicable and still is. We were both working on our theses. We were both underemployed. I was en route to move across the country. While we were both on the same page in so many regards, including wanting to have a baby, he was not able to get to my point of view from his. He took it very personally. Gratefully he kept his cool through the decision making process, mostly, it is only in the rubble that his truest and most painful feelings about my "awful" decision have surfaced. I feel like a monster. I was afraid of that the entire time; but not as afraid as I was of having a child born into a broken relationship. Surely I want to be in love with the person whom I choose to bring children into the world with. I also want to have had conversations about religion, upbringing, diet, where we'll live, etc. beforehand.

I want to be a mother. I even named her. I wonder when this heartache will subside. I have dreams about her on a weekly basis. I still wake up holding my stomach. The due date is approaching and I am just overwhelmed with guilt and the desire to be a mother ASAP. I feel abandoned by the person who could've been the father. I feared his love would never be enough and now that there's no baby he's proved that in such a short time. It makes me resentful but reminds me that I made the best decision for the both of us. I just hope he's able to come to that understanding eventually. I know I could've made it on my own, though, but I couldn't consciously put my child through something I could see with such foresight. I grew up in a twice-divorced family. There's no way I was going to do that. I am going to do it differently in the future. I just wish this baby could have been a part of that future. I am still in disbelief that this happened. I have to separate the heartbreak from the loss of my relationship from the loss of the possible life we created. It's proven rather difficult because they are so intimately intertwined. I miss them both, terribly.

I hope one day he and I find peace. I hope we can recognize the potential life that we made and make sure it was not lost in vain. I felt that she would've been a girl and for as sad, isolated and upset this decision has made me her spirit is keeping me lifted. I have to stay strong and motivated for my future family.

My message to other pro-choicers out there who have been troubled with this decision, let yourself be. There are not enough resources for those of us who believe in a woman's right to choose but have remorse for making such a choice. It infuriates me that my body and my future is the source of constant political debate. My mind, feelings and soul cannot and will not be categorized based on a political agenda.