Leslie Graves
My name is Leslie Graves and I’m
from Wisconsin. I’m glad you’re all here. From a very early age I
wasn’t just pro-choice, but I also thought that abortion was a reasonable, and
probably the right thing for a woman to do who wanted to achieve a quality, have
a career, and take advantage of her education. So, before I was ever in an
unexpected pregnancy, I would’ve known that I would have chosen an abortion.
As soon as I got pregnant when I
was 20, I was in graduate school in philosophy. I immediately scheduled an
abortion. It was a very physically safe abortion, it was a very kind,
caring staff, a clean, nice clinic. So it was certainly quite inexplicable
to me why two months later I couldn’t get out of bed in the morning because I
was so depressed. I didn’t understand why I ended up dropping out of
graduate school later that semester. And I certainly didn’t understand
why, a few months later, I turned to my boyfriend with whom I had had the
abortion and said, you know, “Let’s get married.” And I chose as our
wedding date the weekend that our child would’ve been due, because that was the
only way that this still, small voice inside me that affirms life knew how to
acknowledge and memorialize my child at that time.
So as life went on I was still
very pro-choice. I didn’t know why I was starting to hate myself. I
didn’t know why whenever I was pregnant again, and I would be two and three
months pregnant, I would wake up every morning and think that I probably should
kill myself. So I would feel suicidal throughout my pregnancies. And
when my babies were born, as much as I adored and loved them, I would wonder why
I felt as if there was an invisible wall between us.
So, my experience is that that
still, small voice we are all born with, that knows that life is sacred, in
spite of whatever ideologies we may embrace when we are young and foolish, is
still there and speaks through us. And I’m sorry that Georgette started
crying because now, I might. The only thing – it’s been a wonderful day –
but the only thing I wanted to say is that there’s, as Helen Keller says,
there’s a great deal of suffering in this world, but there’s also a great deal
of overcoming. But when I saw that sign that said that every child is
wanted, what I wanted to say about that is that we all still want our children,
but they are gone forever…
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