(Sarah Terzo – Substack) Earlier this year, an unknown author published a book called Memoir of a Divorced Man: Lost Innocence, Love, Sex, and Dating in the 1980ss. The author’s story reveals many things about men and abortion, abortion coercion, and a partner’s role in abortion decisions.
Meeting in a Hotel Room
The author’s first personal encounter with abortion took place in a motel room with a woman she calls Barb. He and Barb met at a bar. It was New Year’s Eve. The author is not looking for a relationship. It was a one-night stand.
While they were in bed together, kissing and cuddling, Barb pulled away. She tearfully tells him that she cannot have sex with him. He asked why, and she was reluctant to answer. But he was obviously very upset and disturbed.
Trying to lighten the mood, he jokingly asked her if she was married. It wasn’t, he said.
But he still doesn’t tell her what’s wrong. Finally, he asked her if she wanted to leave. She says she wants to stay, but she can’t have sex because he’s the first man she’s been with since her abortion. “I’m confused,” he said.
A Woman Injured in an Abortion
The author tells Barb that it’s fine – there are things they can do together in bed besides actually having sex.
He said, “I should have said the right words. Barb pulled me even closer… I buried my face in those beautiful t*ts again…”
Although he described a “soft tenderness” for her, after that night, he never saw Barb again.
At the end of the chapter, the author gives this advice to other men: “I have found that many girls will take off their clothes and perform heavy caresses if you assure them that you are not going to all the way.”
He, therefore, was satisfied with the encounter.
An Unplanned Pregnancy
After that, the author dates a girl he calls Wanda.
Wanda is initially reluctant to sleep with him. He says that “For Wanda, making love was just that, making love. He doesn’t understand the recreational aspects of sex.”
According to the author, Wanda was walking the path of “spiritual celibacy” when she met him. He talks her into a sexual relationship, telling her, “To deny our sexuality is to deny that we are human. Sex is the celebration of life.”
These words became ironic when she discovered she was pregnant.
A Textbook “Pro-Choice” Response
Wanda tells the author about her pregnancy over the phone. He asked her, “What do you want to do?” and he responded by asking her what she wanted.
The author says:
What does he mean? This is not my choice. Then thunder clapped, and I knew it was it. I also knew I had to answer quickly, leaving no moment for him to doubt my decision.
“I’ll support your decision, either way,” I said, telling her that I wasn’t ready to be a father, and that I could live with an abortion.
“There’s really no other choice,” he said, and I heard him sigh.
Is that the disappointment in his voice?
By pro-choice standards, his response was perfect. “I’ll support your decision either way,” is the perfect “pro-choice” response. This is exactly how the pro-choice movement teaches men to respond to abortion.
His answer is exactly what the pro-choice movement tells men to say.
However, the couple knows what “I’ll support your decision either way” really means. The author is absolutely unequivocal in what he says. She says she wants an abortion.
The decision was not made by Wanda – it was made by him.
He tells her that he is not responsible for the pregnancy, does not want the baby, and will not be around her to raise the child. That’s the unspoken message beneath the “right” pro-choice words.
This is a case where “it’s your choice” means “it’s your problem.” No support is forthcoming. There is no encouragement to have a baby. The author is not there for her and does not care about her and her son.
Arguing Abortion
Wanda believed she was pregnant with someone but forgave the abortion through her spiritual beliefs. Her baby does not actually die — her child will reincarnate and return to the world in the future.
In this way, he uses unproven, religious teaching to justify taking life from other people and forever denying them a future.
She convinces herself (and tries to convince the author) that experiencing an abortion will lead to spiritual growth:
For Wanda, the “Life Being” we shared in creation was not meant to enter this world. When his time is right, it will live, but his time is wrong.
For him, the experience, for us, is one that will help us grow, an experience that we need to progress in a continuous process of learning and striving for perfection. The pain we feel is a necessary part of this growth process.
I read about the idea that the baby’s soul returns with the next pregnancy in a book that recommends “psychic abortions.” None other than abortionist Leah Torres recommended the book — she of “fetuses can’t scream because I cut their cords first” fame. I wrote an article about it.
The author says that he does not believe in his son’s humanity:
The decision that Wanda and I made was not a decision about a third life, but, rather, a decision about our own life.
Just as the appendix is removed if it becomes destructive to a person’s existence, this ‘new organ’ must be removed if it becomes destructive to the lives it supports.
He admits that this may be how he tries to justify “what I really don’t understand.”
She also contradicted herself by saying, “For the past 9 weeks, Wanda has been carrying my baby. We shared in the creation of a life, a life that is a beautiful part of both of us, but it will never grow beyond what it is.”
The Painful Outcome
Regarding his statement that sex is a celebration of life, the author says, “Those words still hang like a rotting piece of meat in the deepest corner of my mind.”
At home after the abortion, the author watches Wanda cry. She described “her face contorting and her body shaking” as she cried. At this point, the author knows that their relationship is over.
The author is telling the reader, and by extension, himself, “He’ll be fine… We made the right decision.”
We don’t know what happened to Wanda — the author left her, and they lost touch. At least, he didn’t mention it anymore. Apparently, she was left to cope with the abortion herself.
An Expert in Getting Women
The author goes on to describe getting more women into bars. He described lying about himself to women to get them to sleep with him. He gives men advice on pickup lines and ways to talk to women in bars and nightclubs to be sex-specific.
At the end of the book, the author mentions that he is now married, but says nothing about his wife or their relationship. Perhaps his view is different now.
Source: Anonymous Memoir of a Divorced Man: Lost Innocence, Love, Sex, and Dating in the 1980s (2023) Kindle edition, 71, 70, 73
Editor’s Note: This article was published on The Substack by Sarah Terzo and reprinted here with permission.
