Athena’s Story

Faced with credible medical reasons to have an abortion.

Athena had had an emergency surgery. The surgeons removed a cyst from her uterus and cleaned out all of her female parts. During the process she had been given about five pregnancy tests. They all turned out negative. Nothing seemed to be there.

Two months went by and she was not bouncing back from the surgery. She couldn’t seem to figure out what was going on. She was always tired. She just didn’t feel good.

When she told her girl friend that she just can’t seem to bounce back the friend told her very assertively that she was pregnant.

Athena told her that they both knew it just couldn’t be true. Athena was sterile; the doctors told her that she was sterile. They told her she would never have children.

When her mother was pregnant with Athena, she had taken a medication to prevent miscarriage. Because of the effects of the drug, Athena had been told she would never have children.

In addition she had done nothing to cause a pregnancy. She had not made love for two months. Her girlfriend insisted she was pregnant and she would prove it. She bought a drug store pregnancy test. It came out positive.

Athena said it had to be wrong, it was one of those false readings. But the test does not give false positives, only false negatives.

She went back to the doctor and she told her she was two and a half months pregnant. They told her to get an abortion. During the surgery they had cleaned out all of the uterine lining; there was nothing for the child to latch on to. The chance of a normal child was close to a million to one.

She called Lee at work. With her background it was her only chance to have a child. She could not bring herself to abort. He said that, “we’re not going to abort it. It’s just wrong.”

The doctors even called him at work a couple of times. They told him that his girlfriend really needs to abort this child. They were not married at the time, but they did marry shortly after.

Phillip was born seven months later. He’s perfect. He’s smart. He’s brilliant. He won 48 trophies as the most beautiful baby in the United States in 1989.

In 2010 Phillip has recently married and is a senior at a local University.