After the procedure I purposely looked down to see if I could see remains of my baby, I saw nothing. I know it sounds disturbing but i needed to know that it was done. The nurse helped me to my bed in a recovery room where the other girls were. Some girls laid in their recovery beds crying and some vomiting from the anesthesia, probably from the whole experience. I felt like a part of me left when my baby was taken, but i had programmed my brain to think that this was for the best and how i would have relief from not being pregnant anymore would, i though that would sustain me. I laid for 30 minutes in the recovery hospital bed. A nurse gave me the green light to get dressed and go home, I was prescribed pain medication. My mother came to pick me up and from the clinic. My best friend waited at the train station, my mom picked her up on the way home. I looked to see if there were any missed calls from him, nothing. Once I got home I quickly took a shower, changed into comfy clothes, and took my pain medication. Jamie and i sat in my room watching television and eating popeye’s chicken. Furious I called him and on the first answer he sounded irritated by me calling i asked “where were you”? In tears I asked, he replied “man, I will get there when I get there”, and he hung up on me. The feeling that I had after the phone call was a feeling I had never experienced in my life. My heart broke was broken. I felt alone,and stupid. If my best friend did not come that weekend I don’t know what I would have done. My ex stopped calling after that day. I was devastated. How could he leave me after this traumatic event? What did I do wrong? Why would he do this to me? My spirit was crushed.
I convuninced myself the abortion was the right thing to do and that I should feel relieved that I didn’t have to carry that burden of potentiality raising a child alone. I didn’t feel relief at all, I was overcome with enormous guilt. Amy Winehouse “back to black” album was the soundtrack of my life at that time. I tried my best to move on without my ex, but i was a mess. I tried to push him and the abortion out of my mind. My best friend Jamie helped me, she was the rock I leaned on for support.
Putting the abortion behind me, i tried to live my life as normal as possible. I worked with children so it was hard to look at them and not think of what I had done. I would became sad, my appetite was non existent, and i lost 30 lbs, i thought that’s a good thing at least i didn’t turn to food, drugs, or promiscuous sex that could have affected me mentally and physically.
It was a surprise when my best friend Jamie let me know that my ex was looking for me just 3 months after my abortion. Jamie dated his friend at the time and she always mentioned that my ex would ask about me. When she asked my permission for her to give him my number I was nervous but mostly mad, he had big balls to ask about me after all these months. Nonchalantly i gave her permission, i told her “Sure, give him my number I have a bone to pick with this ass”. He called me later that night. Hearing his voice again made me smile, i missed our times together, i missed having fun and talking to him, but in the back of my mind, i thought of how he left me all alone to grieve alone. When we talked for the first time in months he claimed he wanted to come see me and that he wanted to apologize for the way things went down between us. I agreed to meet him outside of my apartment building. In the cold of the night, he came. When he first walked up I felt a blood rush of emotion, anger, love, and nervousness. “you look good cc”. He said smiling like nothing ever happened, “thanks” I replied, that was the only reply that I could mustered up. He spent a half an hour apologizing and the other half hour trying to get into my apartment. “Typical male” is what I thought to myself. He did not get into my pants that night, but he got into something much worse, my heart.
We tried the relationship again. I fell even harder for him. Things were great until a female started to call my phone frequently saying that my was sleeping with her too. I asked him about it and he denied it.
I spent the night at his house on one ocassion. It was my first time meeting his mother. It seemed things were looking up for our relationship. The next morning the same girl who was stalking me and calling me daily(and late at night) was at his door, she came to fight, she came to draw blood. Till this day I don’t even know if she knew I was there but I was too busy thinking of a way to escape the apartment he lived in. My ex physically fought this girl and her brothers, defending himself from them jumping him. I was looking for a way out to run, I didn’t know what she was capable of. I didn’t do this, this wasn’t me to fight, let alone over a guy. I was scared, I didn’t know what this girl would do once she found out I was there, i was ready to defend myself if it came down to it. My ex came back into the house five minutes later with bloody knuckles and scratches on his face, I then asked him to take me home. After that I thought things couldn’t get any worse but sure enough it did. A few days after the debacle he and I were on the phone talking like we would regularly do. He sounded weird, he said “cc I have something to tell you, I got my ex pregnant”Coldness ran through me, “she is keeping the baby, so I have a kid on the way”. My world stopped, my heartbeat raced. “I’m so sorry cc I fucked up, i know i lied and said i didn’t know her but I have to take care of my responsibilities”. “Are you kidding me? i screamed “So, you got this same girl who has been calling and harassing me, and who beat you up pregnant? And you’re saying you have a responsibility”? I was livid! i thought he loved me, i thought we were moving in the right direction. Yet again he treated me as if I were a random girl. I feilt so stupid and betrayed. I thought about my child. What made this girl so special that she got to keep hers with his full support.
I couldn’t bear talking to him, the thought of what he just confessed made me sick. I hung up and cut off all contact with him once more, that was it for me, i didn’t deserve this. I didn’t’ want to be a part of the drama, my heart could only take so much from him at this point.
Moving on was hard. I thought I loved my ex but I couldn’t be with him. He showed me that he couldn’t be honest, he showed me that he didn’t respect me, he showed he didn’t love me like he said. Months went by, my life went on. I started to smoke cigarettes, i had difficulty sleeping so i would take sleep aides to help me with insomnia. On Thanksgiving Day in 2008 things took a turn for the worse. One night I felt like I was dying, my heart was beating out of my chest, i thought i was having a heart attack, at my age that couldn’t be possible. I told my mom and she drove me to the emergency room. When I got there, I was sure they were going to say heart attack or stroke, it was neither, it was a panic attack. I stayed in the hospital overnight and when I was discharged a nurse gave me a paper describing what panic attacks are and what I can do to help alleviate symptoms. When I arrived home, fear swept through my body, I was scared to be left alone, I feared that I would have another panic attack. Things went down a dark tunnel from there. I was anxious all the time, I couldn’t concentrate at work or at home. I felt like I was outside of my body and that my sense of reality was distorted, was I going mad? It came to a place where my symptoms would be so intense that I thought I would lose control and go crazy. I decided to see a therapist to find out what was going on with me. The first visit to see my therapist was uneventful. I Had one hour to explain why I was having these scary panic attacks. I was hoping that she would tell me what was wrong with me. My therapist then referred me to a psychiatrist for medication. I didn’t want to take medication, I didn’t know how my body would react to them, so I declined.
My anxiety progressed, both my psychiatrist and therapist diagnosed me with a severe depression and a anxiety condition. I was suicidal, I felt there was nothing left, the memories from him, the abortion, what he revealed, it was a feeling in me that I couldn’t explain, I couldn’t even explain it today. I was hopeless and, sad. I no longer invested time in my friendships, I lost great friends, I became a recluse. I turned down invitations, i missed important events in my friends lives, i stopped calling them and would ignore calls that came from them. I was ashamed, i was embarrassed, i didn’t want them to see how weak i had become. The sweet, funny, bubbly enthusiastic cecilie that they knew had gone. I considered taking my own life, but i thought about my mother and sister. If I were to leave this earth her daughter would be no more, and she wouldn’t be the same. I also knew that it was alap a sin to take my life. The anxiety controlled ny life. I was scared to leave my house, my thoughts ran a mile a minute and I had no one to talk to about it. My mother even noticed that I was not the same. Instead of being a sinner I turned to the lord when I had suicidal thoughts, I grew up in the church, so it was time for me to develop a solid connection to God, I needed god’s forgiveness and mercy. I remember falling to my knees weeping, i started to pray “lord god whatever this is inside me heal me from it, make me stronger”. I prayed so much that getting on my knees was routine. I started reading the bible and getting into the word. I knew that if anyone else wouldn’t be there, I knew Jesus would be there. I reconsidered medication, because the anxiety was getting worse. My psychiatrist prescribed 20 milligrams of Prozac and 40 milligrams of Atarax, after. At this time, I wasn’t sure why the chemicals in my brain had changed, I never once thought that it could have been because of the abortion, i thought it was from all the stress with Dre. My therapist and I talked about the symptoms but we both didn’t know the cause.
I took the Atarax as prescribed, but it just made me so groggy, it made me numb and I didn’t like that feeling. My anxiety was at an all-time high, racing thoughts, thoughts of me going crazy, I was scared to be alone, I feared the worst. I had to do something to get relief, I went to god, I prayed my knees constantly with tears, I would cry “god what is wrong with me? Heal me? I know I’m not perfect, but I’m tired, I don’t know if I can take this any longer”. I remember going to my mother in tears, I think she was worried and fearful to see me in that state, being this vulnerable, this sad. I asked her to pray with me, and she did. We both got on our knees and she held my hand while I wept uncontrollably, after the prayer she wiped my tears and told me that god would take care of me. From that day I started to read the bible. I was getting familiar with my with the word, and familiar with prayer. I grew up in church but sometimes people lose their way and lose sight of what god has planned for their life, so they make their own stories, and that was me. I picked up my grandmother’s bible and started at genesis. Every day I read a chapter and made a point to pray all throughout that day. I took an anxiety class at my local clinic. I started to read up on mindfulness and how to use certain tools for the anxiety, I even took a yoga class on Saturdays, yoga was now apart of my daily routine. I never would have thought that I would be meditating, taking yoga, and reading the bible faithfully, me? but this was my life, this is what I needed to recover, not just to recover but I needed the Lord’s forgiveness and guidence. My mother wanted to know more about anxiety and why it affected me the way it did so she joined me in one of my counseling sessions. She asked “why is my daughter going through this? What causes this”? she asked all the necessary questions a parent would ask about their child mental health and well being. My therapist told my mother “Sometimes people go through stressful situations and trauma, the brain reacts in such a way that our anxiety heightens”. My mother and i never made the connection of what trauma could have took place. I had a great childhood, I was loved, my father wasn’t in my life, but my mother filled that void. Me being fatherless may have affected me but in this instance what other drama could have taken place?
My aunt who helped raise me worried about my mental state. She had no idea that I was in a deep depression and wanted to take my life. I sat and talked to her, I let her know i wanted to leave this earth, i wanted to kill myself. Tears ran from her eyes “I had no idea, that it had gotten that bad, maybe I could have done a better job at supporting you” she replied. I knew that there was nothing that she did, or nothing she could have done. She loved me like a daughter. She wanted to see me happy. She suggested that I come visit her for a weekend, so I could get away from the environment that could have caused the trauma. I accepted. I would still think of dre often. I wondered if he ever loved me at all. I wondered if i would be able to love again. I’m glad that I went to visit that weekend, that trip would keep my mind off of dre. God knew what he was doing, my aunt’s invitation led to how i discovered the root of the anxiety and depression…………
Pic Credit: Hopkinsmedicine.org
Continued In Part. 3
Black Girl Diaries 