This story appears in the comments section of a New York Times article titled “Let’s Talk About My Abortion and Yours.”

I had my first abortion at 19, because I was in an unhealthy and abusive relationship.

I had my second at 31 because my husband and I were not ready to have children.

My husband passed away when I was 32 and while it still makes me sad, I don’t regret the choice I made and I was grateful to have the choice.

I was a child in the early 70’s and I saw first hand what young women do when they have no choice. I was sitting in the ER, my mother was a nurse and probably could not get a babysitter. A young girl came in, bleeding heavily. The police rushed over and tried to get her address out of her so they could go and look in the garbage cans for her newborn.

I watched a young girl bleed to death on the floor of an inner city hospital because she didn’t have a choice.

~Virginia Flores