I wasn’t immune to the fact that not everyone would agree with me that what I was doing was the right thing. But those were probably people who’d led perfectly normal lives and who’d never experienced the tragedy I had.
I had that perfect life once. A husband. A house. A belief that my life was going exactly where I wanted it to go. He went out to work and it was my job to make us a home. To make us a family.
It was my body that had let us down.
It was so unfair. Unfair and cruel. Lots of women didn’t want a baby in the way I did. Lots of women didn’t want a baby at all. I had friends who’d ‘gone to England to deal with a tricky situation’ in the past. Who’d destroyed perfectly healthy pregnancies because it wasn’t something they’d wanted at the time. They were nothing more than cold-blooded, selfish murderers.
I’d tried to find forgiveness and understanding in my heart for them, but couldn’t.
I wondered if they’d have thought any differently if they’d known what I’d known. That nothing can be taken for granted. A happy ending wasn’t always promised, and certainly never guaranteed.
Sometimes you have to make your own. Steal your own, even. It didn’t make me a bad person.
I’d never hurt anyone in my life. I’d always done the right thing. I’d followed the rules. I still went to Mass every week, even though I couldn’t understand how my God could make me endure so much. Before I realised He had a bigger plan for me.
I’ve lived a good life. I could give this baby a good life. Full of love and happiness and faith. I knew I could do that. It’s what I was born to do.
I had to remain careful, though. I had to protect myself from sinful ways and sinful thoughts. God would’ve punished me. He might have taken her away from me, if I’d given in to my temptations.
This man in front of me was a temptation sent to try me. I couldn’t help it. Each time I saw him, I felt more of a pull, but I knew this was the final test. I had to resist.
Yet, still my heart skipped a beat when I saw him. When I sat outside their house and watched him arrive home. He looked so handsome. His tie loosened. His hair messy. For just a second I wondered, would he ever think me attractive? I wished I could be her – and have him come home to me. I wondered what it’d be like to have him hold me in his arms. To kiss me.
I touched my fingers to my lips. It has been so long since I’d been kissed. So long since I’d been held and loved.
It would have been so easy to give into temptation. So easy and so good.
But it would have destroyed everything I had planned.