VISUALLY impaired, living in an “unsafe” environment, and dependent on others to help raise her 13-year-old son, a 35-year-old woman says had it not been for the support from charity organisation Friends for Life she would’ve aborted her second child.

The woman, who also has Graves’ disease, shared that during a visit to her doctor she thought she would hear that her medication was causing her to experience symptoms such as vomiting. Instead, she discovered she was pregnant.

“I was told that I was out of it, and they had to give me injections. The doctor told me I was there just questioning, ‘Why me? Why me?’ She said I was just sitting on the bed saying, ‘I don’t want it.’

“After she told me, I just didn’t know what was happening. I just broke down,” she told the Jamaica Observer.

Upon sharing the news with the father of her unborn child, the woman said she was shunned, ridiculed, and given money for an abortion.

“I just started thinking, ‘Let me work with the father and just do this,’ because I just didn’t want the problem to explain to anybody what happened, and I just didn’t want to put a burden on anyone at all — including myself. I just didn’t want any of that,” she said.

With a heavy heart, she made her way to a clinic that performs abortions, despite the procedure being illegal in Jamaica. However, she said she was told by the doctor that her baby was too far along to be aborted, and she was referred to another illegal abortion centre.

When she arrived at the second medical facility she encountered people from Friends for Life outside the building. The members, who assist women grappling with unplanned pregnancies or crisis pregnancies, were praying.

One of them approached her and assured her that if she reconsidered her decision they would help her bring the child into the world.

Sceptical about their promise, she lied and said she was not there to get an abortion. But, shrouded in guilt as she contemplated the weight of the decision, when pressed, she broke down in tears on the roadside.

“They motivated me to continue and told me that children are a gift from God, and that if it wasn’t supposed to happen then it wouldn’t have happened. They got me a doctor to do my ultrasound and she was very encouraging. She was there telling me that I never know what my child could become,” the visually impaired mother told Sunday Observer.

“When I did my first ultrasound and I heard the child’s heartbeat, I broke down because I was saying, ‘This is what I was going to do and there is a heartbeat?’ “ she recounted.

She said it was at that moment she knew her decision to abort her child was not because she wanted to do it, but because she felt like she had no other choice.

“I was being chastised and beaten down by friends who I thought would have been there for me; I was beaten down to the point where I was thinking of suicide. And after meeting up with the Friends for Life team, telling them what I was going through, and praying about my situation, they helped me to get counselling and get everything that I needed,” she said.

She then decided to carry her child to term. On August 3, 2024, at 11:18 am, she welcomed a beautiful baby girl who she no longer considers a burden, but a blessing.

“My daughter is alive and she’s a blessing,” the mother of two told Sunday Observer.

Now, she advocates for the development of more organisations geared towards helping women in crisis pregnancies, adamant that a little support is enough to change some women’s minds.

“I feel good about my decision, and I am happy to share my story because there are other people out there who I think would love somebody to be by their side to support them, and they don’t have it. If they did, they might decide not to abort their babies,” she reasoned, adding that more organisations like Friends for Life are needed in Jamaica.

According to Caribbean Policy Research Institute’s research on abortion in Jamaica, published in 2023, up to 22,000 abortions are performed on the island per year.

Women’s Centre of Jamaica Foundation, Women Inc, and Pregnancy Resource Centre of Jamaica are a few organisations from which women in crisis pregnancies can seek help.