I Choose The Child

Standing over the ledge of my mother’s house, for over a month I had contemplated ending my life. I couldn’t bear living without my soul mate. My pregnancy kept me from jumping off that ledge and was the reason I left my husband.

After living a fairy tale marriage for four years, everything changed when I got pregnant. My husband started spending time away from home and hardly talked to me. Since we lived in the Middle East and he was Arabic, I assumed he was planning to add a second wife as tradition allows men to have up to four wives.

One day when he was at home, I gently reached out to hold his hand. His quick withdrawal from me was something I couldn’t bear. I ran upstairs crying. He ran after me and tried to console me. I begged him to tell me what was going on and he said, “I can’t because if I do you will leave me.” I told him I needed to know and when he told me, I couldn’t believe it.

He was shooting up speedballs, a combination of cocaine and heroin. He showed me how he had hidden the drugs all over our home in places I would never look or couldn’t reach. I asked him to enter a drug rehab but he refused because of his family’s status. I then asked him to quit cold turkey and he tried. I couldn’t handle seeing him in pain and eventually agreed to allow him to continue his usage.

Then one day when we were getting ready to go out to dinner with friends, I realized I had to make the most difficult choice of my life. As his friend told him we needed to go because I was hungry, he said as he was shooting up “Not yet, Mary can wait.” I realized I had to choose between the life of my unborn child and the love of my life.

I chose my son. I learned that I could not love anyone before loving myself and most importantly before God. And as my friend so eloquently put it, “Sometimes God places two people together to unite their DNA for the greater good.” Every time I look at my son, I know I made the right decision. And I know God had a purpose for me so he ensured my own survival.