“Should we have women who have miscarried babies and women who have aborted babies in the same Bible study group for healing, recovery and restoration?”

For the woman who has miscarried, her inner dialogue about this loss is filled with varied feelings and thoughts: tremendous loss, regret, sadness, and possibly some guilt as she might believe she caused the loss of her child. It can also distance her from her spouse or boyfriend. He may have been a part of the actual miscarriage experience, or at the hospital if a D&C was performed. He is/was also concerned for her health and after-care but may feel like he should not ask about it. His thinking being – “It didn’t happen to me.” Then there’s the issue of telling people who might have just learned of the pregnancy – “We lost our baby.” Both of them are experiencing the loss of a “hoped for baby,” but often, not in sync with one another.

For the woman who has aborted a baby, her inner dialogue of thoughts and feelings is varied, too: It might be a mixture of loss and tremendous guilt (“How could I do this to my own flesh and blood, … to another human being?”). After the abortion she might feel incredible relief, but it was an unsettling kind of relief. The loss of this child has brought distance into a relationship that has also experienced the loss with her (spouse, boyfriend, or parents). They may have even participated in the death of the child (financially, emotionally with support, transportation, post-abortion care). This participation can bring guilt and the possibility of further separation in their relationship.

The loss is so painful in both women’s lives that turning away from God is likely – a  distancing in her Heavenly Father’s relationship, and a further widening of separation that may already be there.

My own story is that I miscarried three children and have also experienced powerful relationship with women who had aborted theirs – all in a Bible Study for women with pregnancy loss by miscarriage and abortion. In the simplest way – every woman in my group had “lost” their child(ren), and we were all grieving their passing, along with what was missing without their presence in our lives. We were all in pain and needed outside help to grieve and heal. Many of our thoughts and feelings of loss seemed to echo back and forth into our stories.

In our opening session of No Longer Bound, every member tells their personal story of the loss of their child(ren). It was an extremely moving experience for all of us. I sat in a room with 7 other women (all strangers), and we began to bond over the sharing of the loss of our collective child(ren) through our abortions and miscarriages. We cried and the tissues piled up on our laps and on the floor. In that first meeting I became aware of how similar, rather than different, I was to the other seven women who had abortion stories (1 woman had miscarried one of her children).