Poor, Pregnant, and Pro life: My experience at a Crisis Pregnancy Center

 About two years ago, I found myself in a situation that I never thought I would be in.

 I was pregnant. At 19 years old, it wasn't as bad as it could have been, but it was still technically a teenage pregnancy and I was scared. I had no job, I was not emotionally stable, and I was facing housing problems. My parents lived across the country and Aaron and I had not known each other for very long. It was a real mess.

 Being anti abortion is easy when you are not accidentally pregnant. You feel like you can tell people, perfect strangers, what to do. You can hold up pictures of fetuses in the womb, late term abortions, little babies with tiny feet in the air and halos around their sweet heads. You can shout slogans and pray in front of clinics for the women going in. It will most likely not mean a damn to any woman who is desperate and scared. I know that discovering that I was pregnant with a baby that I wasn't ready for shook my dedication.

 As a teenager, I feel like I fought pretty valiantly for the cause. I organized Stand True's yearly Day of Silence twice at my high school. At the time I felt it was not a protest, but rather a day of silent prayer for all of the mothers and babies affected by abortion, to inform others. I held my head high as I was mocked and threatened with rape, and even shoved down the stairs as I wore that red tape over my mouth; I knew that I was right and that these children can joke and hate and try and hurt me as much as they liked, I would never break. I saw my younger sister and dear friends treated similarly.  I helped design fliers and make t-shirts and passed out red tape. I was the president of our Young Republicans club and I called state senators or congressmen or whoever to ask them to pretty please not support such and such or this bill. I was a good little warrior.

 I reflected on that two years ago, as Aaron and I drove to my appointment at the Crisis Pregnancy Center.