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The biggest blessing Sarah recounts is that she was raised in a godly home. She knew that God loved her. She gave her heart to God at age fourteen. Sarah describes her early Christian years as being “on fire for the Lord” which involved the typical list of activities for teens; missions trips, youth group, sharing her testimony to friends. Her life was peaceful; she was free and living for the Lord. But at the same time, she remembers the voices of the world that constantly pulled at her.
Then what seemed to be the catalyst for a season of poor choices began her senior year in high school. Sarah was in a relationship with a boy who did not share the same values she did. He did not know the Lord. Her parents had advised her against the relationship “I remember thinking that my faith was strong enough for us. I could change him. What a huge mistake! I began slowly moving away from God.”
Little things crept in that were pulling her away from God, such as being too tired to go to church on Sunday because of a late Saturday night. “I still loved God,” says Sarah. But she knew she was drifting. As the relationship progressed she was in a physical relationship with the boy that she knew was not right. Sarah knew it was wrong, it conflicted with life-long values that her parents and church cultured within her, but turning around was difficult to do. The relationship came to an end, but Sarah was left devastated with having given away not just her purity but she also gave away her heart. She was very vulnerable.
Sarah had done what many young teens do to try to find comfort and acceptance. They look to others for a tangible way to be loved and cared for. She was trying to find her heart again. She didn’t look to find it from God, Sarah found it in another boy. “ I had lost my peace, had sleepless nights. I knew I wasn’t going down the right path, but at the same time I was out there wondering what else is there?”
Now a student in college, and not living for the Lord, it wasn’t long into the relationship with this boy that Sarah was pregnant. “I was so afraid, but knowing that there was a life in me, and God was the giver of life, I was somewhat excited. So I went and told him. I never expected that he would have reacted the way he did.”
“No. No, I’ve got a life in front of me, and this is not it”, the boy replied. He gave me the money and said “go do it”.
“I remember thinking oh Lord, what am I going do? I was so afraid. I was in a box. I couldn’t tell my parents — your parents have raised you up, and they do believe the best in you, they have such expectations for you, and then you go and fail.”
“That is a huge lie of the devil”, Says Sarah.
“No matter what you do, God will take you back. When you continue to turn away from God you get involved in more trouble, because you just don’t’ think he will forgive you for the things you’ve done.”
“There is so much fear there, so much uncertainty, especially for young people. They live in the moment and die in the moment and when something huge affects their balance of stability, they can’t see the long run, they can’t see to the future, they can only see that ‘this is crowding me now’. ‘What am I going to do?’
Not wanting to confide in my parents I ended up going and having an abortion alone; knowing it wasn’t the right choice, laying on the table crying, knowing that it was wrong.”
Sarah speaks of the visual memory in the doctors office that will be with her for the rest of her life, one picture in her mind that she will never forget, “God is so wonderful, he has forgiven me and given me grace, but I still have to live with my actions, even though the sin is over, the consequences of sin are still there. — “I was laying there, the room was white, the doctor and the nurse came in and they started the procedure. I remember crying out, I’m so sorry, I’m so sorry I’m so sorry.”
“The nurse took my hand and said, ‘it will be okay; you don’t need to apologize to us.’
“They don’t get it! Those are the people I pray for now. I pray for those doctors because their eyes are so blinded, they are killing babies every day, and that hurts me. It hurts me to know that I was apart of it. That is why I am at the Pregnancy Care Center. I want to do what’s right in the eyes of the Lord, I want to give back, I want to help stop it.”
The procedure was done, Sarah tried to put it behind her and continue on with her life, she continued with school and lived at home. She had to hide the emotional trauma she had gone through. “I remember feeling this emptiness that life had been taken out of me, that, I was a murderer and I remember feeling this way and thinking how did I get here? How could I have done this? Every night I would cry myself asleep, where as in the day I would pretend everything was okay and I would smile.”
The peace, the joy, the hope that Sarah experienced as a young teenager was gone. There was nothing left to live for. Sarah began experiencing the typical symptoms that follow an abortion; Post-Abortion Syndrome. She began having migraine headaches, anxiety attacks and depression. “I had so much depression that I could barely get up and go to school, I barely did anything except for what I had to do. I would come home and go to sleep. I didn’t do anything with my friends, they didn’t know what I had done.”
Sarah was trying to overcome the guilt and shame of the abortion. “I remember sitting in church for all those years trying to be numb. Trying to build up walls to forget what I had done. Sarah couldn’t do the things she had set out to do. School was too difficult. The day-to-day living was difficult. Sarah compares her abortion to a woman being raped. “It was a traumatic experience that just continued to replay” she says. The abortion kept her in bondage.
During this time Sarah married, and was involved in drug and alcohol use. “The drugs and alcohol were a way of numbing the pain I was in,” recalls Sarah. Out of the marriage arrived baby Lolah, who Sarah boasts today as a true blessing and joy. Shortly, the marriage ended.
“After about three years all the guilt had finally knocked me down and I couldn’t’ take it anymore.” Sarah was attending the same church she had when she first accepted her Savior. It was this same savior that was calling her, “Now is the time, now is the time”. “I was afraid to confront God with it. I felt I deserved the worst punishment.” Finally, Sarah obeyed Gods calling and went to the altar.
One of the greatest obstacles Sarah had to overcome was that she believed her sin was greater than what Christ had done for her, that His dying on the cross was not enough, and somehow, there had to be a greater punishment for what she had done. It wasn’t until God broke through and healed her heart. “I had to believe what God was saying, which was, “I still love you, I gave my son to die for you. Your abortion is not bigger than the cross. Finally, Sarah was on the road to recovery.
The road to recovery has been a long process. Getting through the issue of forgiveness was instrumental to her healing process. Once she was able to accept that God had forgiven her she was able to move forward, Through counseling, and prayers of a loving Christian community Sarah has been able to face her sin, accept that God loves her and has been reconciled to her Lord.
Sarah recalls that she wished someone could have offered her a solution in her time of crisis. The fear of failure and rejection is what lead her to having the abortion. “I was so scared when that happened, all I really needed was someone to give me a hug and tell me it was going to be alright. It wasn’t the best choice you made to get involved in the relationship, but we can get through this and we will walk through this together. It won’t be easy, but we can do it.”
Sarah shares her concern that being raised in a Christian home and church, tended to build up high expectations for her as a teen in crisis. “I was raised in a Christian home and being holy and perfect was just expected. We as Christians expect each other to be better because God expects something better” Sarah shares that sometimes religion gets in the way of truly caring for brothers and sisters in Christ. That the expectation of being held to a higher standard makes it difficult for teens to ask for help because they fear the rejection of having failed.
Sarah is grateful for the Niles Pregnancy Care Center. She had gone through their post-abortion counseling so she could then counsel those who had been through an abortion. The center is faith based, and provides loving compassion for teens that face the same decisions that Sarah faced. “They already have enough guilt on their head, and we need to share the Gospel. We’re not perfect, we are sinners, we pray and we are thankful to the Lord that he has redeemed us.” This is what Sarah finds most rewarding about the center. It is a place where girls can find hope. As a volunteer with the center, Sarah is grateful that she can share her experience and offer a solution to other girls like herself.
Sarah now twenty-nine, eleven years after the abortion is once again on fire for the Lord. She has received her Bachelors degree in Sociology. She is anxious to take what she has learned and serve God by helping others. She is engaged to be married in August. She is in the process of writing a book that deals with two girls who are faced with the issue of becoming pregnant and the choices they make to deal with their crisis. She hopes to have it published in the next year.