When I made the choice to become a parent, it wasn’t because I had the resources, support, or financial security that I needed to provide for a child. In fact, because of societal pressure toward pregnant people—a stigma that implies if we don’t continue our pregnancies then we are bad or irresponsible—it didn’t feel like a choice I made at all.

Pregnancy is a crash course on strategic thinking and decision-making. I know this because I am a mom who has previously had an abortion. Both were parenting decisions that I, fortunately, got to make for myself.