Through a bit of serendipity while researching women who’d spent time in maternity homes pre-Roe for a project with playwright Katie Cappiello, I was put in touch via email with Diane Gelon, an American attorney in London. Diane was immediately open to talking, and told me she’d always thought of herself as “one of the last to ‘go away,’ so to speak, although my going away was only to a home near downtown LA a few miles away.” The next year, she led an art-making class at another “home” as a way of “giving back to the community.” Diane said she’d also had an abortion pre-Roe, and offered to forward me something she wrote “quickly in anger” when she awoke in the UK to the news that Roe had been overturned. What she sent rocked me. I sent it to Katie, who said, “Dear god. What the fuck. The cruelty.” Diane allowed us to publish what she wrote “quickly in anger” in LIBER, for which I’m grateful.
—Jennifer Baumgardner
1969—
it wasn’t easy carrying a pregnancy to full term as a 20-year-old
in my second year of college
even now I remember vividly spending the night with my best friend
one night
in a cabin in the woods
we had never made love before; nor ever again
I woke in the morning knowing I was pregnant
but not really believing it
other than my mother and those of her generation I knew no one who had been
pregnant
I denied it for months
while thinking about it constantly; mind wandering during class
driving my beige VW bug along the California coast
staring out at the sea
long walks alone
going to the library to look at books on pregnancy; did I have all the signs
were there more than simply not bleeding every month
realizing the truth
not sharing with anyone
and thinking I had only one choice—to give birth to a child
abortion was illegal; nearly impossible to get any information
I could have crossed the border to Mexico; or gone to a darkened room somewhere unsafe in LA
and as the weeks passed those options seemed further and further away
and did not come cheap
but most important I also believed strongly that life was sacred
I could not bring myself to terminate a pregnancy
and yet also knew I was in no position to raise a child
a child I never held in my arms; did not name
adopted at birth
a closed adoption
tears slowly running down my face as I drove alone down a winding road a few weeks after giving birth
to sign adoption papers
assuming we would never meet
her birthday remembered year after year
never out of my thoughts
sometimes I wonder if I made the right decision
but to see “my daughter” grow into the woman she is today
with two children of her own
who call me grandma
there is no doubt that having a child when I was in so many ways still a child was the
right thing to do; for me; at that moment in time
this is what “choice” is all about
although sometimes I wonder if I did have a choice in those pre-Roe days
would I do it again
I couldn’t; I didn’t
I had an abortion in 1971; before Roe; after the 1969 decision declaring abortion illegal in California
I could not again give birth to a child
could not drive that winding road to sign adoption papers
could not again live in a home for unwed mothers out of sight
it would have been too painful
and I was still not in a position to raise a child on my own;
I had just started graduate school at UCLA
my life was beginning
I made the right decision; for me; at that time
I made the right decision; for me; in 1969
women must be allowed choice without government interference
I have no regrets
I made a personal choice
I was not raped
I was not forced to have sex
they were pregnancies that came from a night with men I loved at the time
my 18-year-old granddaughter sent me an email the day Roe fell
she said—“I’m sorry that we couldn’t keep it legal for everything you and others have fought for.” D
