My mother died after a long illness in 1970, my father in 1974, when I was 30. I had been suffering from clinical depression even before that.

At my usual women’s health appointment the doctor insisted on removing my IUD. I eased my loneliness and pain with more than one man, and I got pregnant. I don’t even remember the names of those two men, I’m sorry to say, but abortion was newly legal, and I was lucky enough to be able to afford one. Yes, I had an abortion, and I’ve never regretted it.