'I loved the baby so much... but I just couldn't bring it into an abusive home'

The lack of access to safe and legal abortion in Ireland has created a particularly difficult situation for women experiencing domestic abuse.

Abusive men use coercive tactics to control their partners and ex-partners, including denying women the right to make their own reproductive and sexual choices.

Director of Women’s Aid Margaret Martin says that:

"Women’s Aid has found that rape, sexual assault, and sexual coercion are frequently used as part of a pattern of violent behaviour used by abusive men to control their partners. We also know that women find it difficult to talk about sexual violence in intimate relationships and a lot of the time, women only start to disclose this to us when a level of trust is built up."

Over a period of three years, Meagan's* boyfriend began emotionally abusing her. One night after a family function, he became physically violent.

"A week later on Christmas Eve I did a pregnancy test. I was still black and blue but that was nothing in comparison to the pain of thinking I'd have to face that monster again. I couldn't believe I was pregnant. I knew I had never missed a pill but then remembered I was sick for a week in November. It obviously caused the pill not to work. "I knew I couldn't go through with the pregnancy. I rang my best friend and she booked the (very expensive) flights. I booked the ‘A’. Still, to this day, I can't say the word".

A week before Meagan was due to fly, her house was broken into. The thieves took everything including her passport.

"Ten weeks was late enough. I couldn't allow it go further. I went to my bathroom cabinet and poured every pill in my hand... then my phone rang. It was my best friend who knew someone in the passport office. If she hadn't have called at that second. I'd be dead now".

Meagan says there were 11 other girls and women at Manchester airport, some of whom she had seen at the clinic.

"One girl was 15 and with her mam. Another was a mother who was homeless. Another suffered severe depression and couldn't live without her medicine".

Meagan says that having the abortion was "the hardest thing in the world", but she feels she did the right thing as she would have been stuck with her abusive ex for life if she had his child.

Meagan feels that she should have been able to access the care and support she needed at home.

"I should never have felt so desperate that I wanted to kill myself".

Ciara* was 24 and had been in an abusive relationship for six years before finding out she was pregnant.

"It was an awful relationship. He used to hit me, break all my things, try and choke me and I was so naive and in such a bad place I didn't know how to get out. I had applied for a PhD in the UK and was going to use it as my escape from him".

Ciara had been told by doctors that she would have difficulty conceiving, but she was still careful to take precautions.

"We had always been careful except one night and I had said to my ex I should get the morning after pill and he told me to shut up that my bits didn't work anyways. I started getting symptoms but ignored them and put it down to cramps and didn't think anything was unusual because my period was always late".

A pregnancy test revealed Ciara was pregnant. She told her partner who wanted her to have an abortion.

"I couldn't tell my family or friends but eventually told my best friend. I was around five-and-a-half weeks pregnant. I was so torn. I felt so much love for a baby I never thought I would have and absolute terror because it meant I was stuck with my ex and couldn't get a job to afford the baby. Ultimately, that's what made my decision for me. I loved the baby so much and I couldn't bring it into a home to be treated badly or watch abuse".

Ciara said she had mixed feelings about the abortion right up to the moment she was handed the pills.

"I remember sitting there feeling like every part of me wanted to run down the stairs with my baby and run away but the other part telling me do it to get away from my ex." "The next day we flew back to Ireland, I went to my apartment I shared with my ex. The first thing he asked was if I had bought food for dinner on the way back. I looked at him dead straight and told him I hated him and wanted nothing to do with him. I went upstairs and tried to sleep. "I was in agony, my ex wouldn't go to the shop and get me painkillers. I was rolling around the bed in agony. I bled for about three weeks and still had some symptoms after that. I cried and cried every day".

Ciara says it took her nearly two years to find the strength to leave the man who was abusing her.

"Having to go away made it feel like a dirty shameful secret. You never know what someone is going through and it is never the easy option to have an abortion. Please repeal the 8th so this doesn't have to be repeated".

Women’s Aid says that women experiencing domestic abuse are at risk of sexual violence. Since 2002, Women's Aid has received 2,417 disclosures of rape by current or ex-partners.

Ms Martin says that the disclosures they hear are only "the tip of the iceberg."

"Women using our services tell us that they are beaten during sex; have had sexually explicit images and videos made without their consent; are denied access to family planning; are drugged and raped while unconscious; are sexually assaulted with weapons and are forced to carry out humiliating and painful sexual acts. "Women also tell us that they have been coerced into sex with their abusers friends and/or forced into prostitution. We also hear from women who feel they can’t say no because they fear repercussions from their partner".

Women's Aid is calling on the public to support a yes vote in the upcoming referendum on the removal of the 8th amendment.

"...the 8th Amendment brings additional trauma to women experiencing sexual and domestic violence. Our experience also shows that abusive partners exercise control over women’s freedom of movement and her access to financial resources. These are particularly significant where the option of abortion is only available to women with sufficient economic means and the freedom to travel outside Ireland".

*Meagan and Ciara's names have been changed. Their stories were first published by In Her Shoes and are re-published here with their permission.