My experience with a "late term abortion"

Holden at 33 Weeks

No, I didn't have one. No, I didn't perform one. In fact, my story doesn't really have to do with an abortion, but rather a tiny little girl I came into contact with while my son was in the NICU.

I do not know her name, but I will never forget her face. Before I gave birth, I was wheeled into the NICU to see what the tiniest of babies looked like so that I wouldn't be so shocked when my own micropreemie was born. I was wheeled over to an isolet covered with a blanket. When the blanket was lifted I peered in and saw the most beautiful child I have ever seen. She was lying with her little eyes closed(she did not have the strength to open them) curled up into the little ball that infants so prefer. She had Jet Black hair, and alot of it! She was tiny, but looked so safe in that isolet. They had done their very best to make her an imitation womb, and she looked quite comfortable in her dark, warm, little room. She was born at 23 weeks weighing just over 1 lb. She was fighting!

Soon my own preemie was born. We named him Holden. He weighed in at 2lbs 4oz. He was born at 31 weeks. He was quite small for his age due to IUGR and thus was in the room with the micro's rather than the other 31 weekers. Every day I saw the parents of the Beautiful Black Haired Baby come to sit next to her. They could not touch her, or talk loudly to her, but they could be with her and she could smell them.

On those parent's facese I saw love and grief and heartache and hope. They so desperately wanted their child to live, and she was so desperatly fighting. After a few weeks, Holden was transfered to the "big room" though he was the smallest "big boy" by far! I never saw the Beautiful Black barred Baby again. She changed me. Before I saw her face I never really imagined what a half term infant could look like. There she was, lying on her little stomach. I looked at her perfectly formed features and thought "this, THIS is what is being killed?" This is not termination. This is murder.

I pray for that little girl and her family. I do not know if she lived or died, but I know that her exsitance, her LIFE was worth something. The Beautiful Black Haired Baby touched my life, my views, my heart. I can only imagine what she did for her family.

The picture at the top of this page is a picture of my Holden at 33 weeks old. The teddy bear on top of him is the size of a beenie baby.