Culture

I Got An Abortion At 17. Here's My Story

For over a year I begged my mother to get me on birth control. I’d already escaped an abusive first love and a circle of friends determined to destroy themselves with pills, alcohol, and each other. Then I survived a suicide attempt and was forced to live with my father, a man who had a bad temper and sometimes made it worse by binge drinking.

By Jessica Marie Baumgartner4 min read
Pexels/Nayla Bernardes

I lived in his finished basement after my suicide attempt. My mother had given up trying to raise me. That left Uncle Dad ─ a term my sister and I coined because he was more like an uncle than a dad.