Came here to tell pretty much this exact same story. Thank God my mother was pro-choice.
I know my late mother was pro-choice from discussing the issue with her.
Thank god my mother was pro-choice. An abortion saved her life before I was born.
My 20 year old son told me recently that he’s glad he knows I’m pro-choice, because he knows I chose to have him and that means he didn’t make my life hard, I did. (I was pregnant with him at 17.) Which sounds weird, but was actually beautiful in the moment, and quite a breakthrough for a young man who feels responsible for everything on the planet.
It isn’t that different from “Thank god your mother was straight.” Imagine what the reaction would be to that one. 
I have a question for all of you, and anyone else who cares to weigh in. Like these women, I had an abortion - two, in fact - so that I could finish college, have a career, and be in a good position to be a mother when I was ready. And I’m so very glad I did. I wouldn’t have ever met, much less married, my husband, and my wonderful son wouldn’t even exist. I’ve considered whether I should tell him about this someday. I will certainly tell him, when the time is right, that I’m pro-choice. I want him to know that although abortion is never, in my opinion, a good thing to do, sometimes it’s the right thing to do. And I’m sure my words will have a lot more impact if he knows they’re not just in theory, but also in practice. I worry, though, about exactly what that impact will be.
So my question is this: when, and how, did you find out about your mom’s abortion(s)? (And for Procrustus, have you told your kids?) How did you feel about it at the time? Did you consider what your mom’s life would have been like if she hadn’t had the abortion(s)? Did you ever think, “Sure, she’s glad I’m here now, but if she hadn’t had the abortion, she would have loved that other kid just as much, and I would never have been born!”? Because that’s true, of course. I know when I was a kid, I had an existential wig-out along those lines when I found out that not only had my parents dated other people, my dad had been married before! “But… if he’d had kids with that other woman… ::gasp!::” So I can only imagine how a kid might feel about the idea that there was actually another kid in the making.
Maybe I could start off the conversation by sticking one of these on the back of his tricycle…
And I wish there were a way we could selectively display bumper stickers only in response to other stickers. Because otherwise, people might get a wrong impression or two when they saw this on my car:
I know about my mom’s rape because she told me she was raped.
I’m a pro choice and a mom. You know what I hope that means to my kids? I hope it means that they’re here because I wanted them here. Not because of an ideology or an accident or because of religion or morality or the force of law or because the birth control failed. They exist because I made a conscious and voluntary choice to deliberately bring them into the world.
If that’s not an act of love I can’t imagine what else is.
This is where I would draw the line. I’m just going to the post office to buy some stamps. I don’t want to have to walk around somebody having an abortion in the lobby.
I’d go a step further and make up t-shirts that say “Thank god your mother got laid.” I imagine I could sell thousands of them at pro-life rallies.
I found out when I was writing a personal essay about my parents’ wedding for a college class. I was taken aback, but not overly so. I was more thrown by finding out that I was conceived before my parents got married–which, in retrospect, should have been obvious to anyone who can do basic arithmetic. :smack:
Hey, I’m not paying an extra cent in taxes so they can put in fancy-shmancy exam rooms!
That’s my view; I’m not sure how “your mother never loved you” wins people over to your cause.
Thank god my parents had unprotected sex. In fact, if your* 16 year old daughter did the same thing she could have a beautiful baby too which would be just as grateful for it’s life. Shouldn’t you be encouraging her to get out more often?
*(generic pro-life you)
Duh, I assumed they’d do it back in the sorting room.
Do please try to make it clear to your daughter. I was unplanned, inconvenient and very ill-timed, but because my mother was anti-abortion, I was forced to grow up poor with a mother who lost interest in me after I grew out of the “cute baby” phase and a father that resented me until the day I left, on my 18th birthday. It sounds like your daughter should already know she was wanted, but do make sure of it! 
I know my mom was pro-life because she told me.
I wonder how many pro life people were born of pro choice people?
For females: How many pro life have had an abortion?
How many pro life use contraception?
Why do pro life people not demand abstaining from intercourse as the only way to prevent pregnancy?
Is giving children up for adoption for ANY reason acceptable to pro life people? (rape victims, any sort of birth defect, economic, etc.?
Generally, the anti-abortion folks are not really concerned with what happens to the child once it is born.
Unless it’s being born to, say, a lesbian who was raped but is living with a female partner, in which case the baby should be immediately adopted out to a “real” family. (This was an anecdote mentioned in another abortion thread, can’t remember which one.)
Ah yes, that’s true! My bad. 