By Barbara Falconer Newhall
I’ve never told anyone this story. Not then, in the late 1960s. Not now in this, our open-minded 21st century.
I was too ashamed back in the ’60s. I was in my mid-twenties. I was single and living alone in New York City. And I was too ashamed to tell anyone that my period was late, weeks and weeks late.
I didn’t tell my doctor. I didn’t tell my boss at the magazine where I worked. I didn’t tell my best friend. I didn’t tell my boyfriend – he had moved to another city and was out of the picture. And I certainly didn’t tell my mother.
And, I haven’t told this story to anyone in the life I’m living today, a half century later later. I haven’t told my husband. I haven’t told my children. And I still haven’t told my best friend.
It’s a sad little story, and I was alone in it.
My period was late. It had been weeks since my last one, and I was making frequent trips to the ladies room across the hall from my wood-paneled office in mid-town Manhattan.
I was an assistant editor on a women’s magazine with a readership of millions. I had work to do. But I was making several trips a day to the ladies room across the hall to lift the skirt of my A-line dress, pull down my pantyhose and inspect my underwear for a sign that my worries were over, that I was not pregnant after all.
Too Ashamed to Find Out
Was I pregnant? I was too ashamed to find out for sure.
Things were different back then. A pregnancy test required a visit to the doctor’s office and days or weeks of anguished waiting for the test results to come back.
I did not want to make that trip to the doctor. What if the test came back positive? My doctor would find out that I was pregnant, and he would think less of me. He would send me to an obstetrician, who also would look down on me as a loose and foolish girl – unmarried and pregnant — and expect me to carry the pregnancy to term.
Where, then, to go for help? I could not tell my boss that I was pregnant — though as I look back now, I think she might have been much more sympathetic than I imagined at the time.
I’d Lose My Job
Either way, I was sure the magazine I worked for would not let me come to work unmarried and pregnant. They would fire me or find a way to ease me out of the company.
And, if they did let me go, I saw no legal recourse. Was there even a lawyer out there who would take such a case? Did I have a case? It didn’t matter. I would have been too ashamed to assert it.
No, the way things worked back in those pre-Roe v. Wade days was — you did not put your employer on the spot. You gave notice and you left the premises. Fast. No explanation.
Pregnant and single, I would have to leave New York City as well as my job. I’d go to a faraway state, where no one knew me. Check myself into one of those homes for pregnant women where they keep your story a secret and put your baby up for adoption.
Under this arrangement you were disappeared for the duration of the pregnancy. Friends, coworkers, family — nobody knew where you went or why. You might make up a story, something about visiting a sick aunt in Texas, maybe.
An Long, Unexplained Absence
But how to explain a months-long absence to my good friend Trudy? To my parents? My brothers?
How to explain the six-month lapse in my work history in a future job interview?
I had a plum job as a junior editor at a respected national magazine. I was off to a solid writing career. How to explain to future employers why I’d left my job so abruptly and without explanation?
As for having the baby and keeping it, that was out of the question. Providing for oneself and one’s child is tough enough for single mothers today. It would have been close to impossible for me in 1968.
A Single Mom in the Sixties?
What would be my prospects as an unmarried woman with a baby? I wouldn’t be welcome in the New York magazine world, I was sure of that.
I had earned a secondary teaching certificate in college back in Michigan, but what high school anywhere in the country would hire a woman with a child born out of wedlock?
Tied to a baby, I’d live on the edge of poverty, and I’d be scorned. I’d be shunned by friends, colleagues, employers – and maybe even my family. And so would my baby.
For me, an abortion was the only option.
But abortion was illegal in 1960s America. The Supreme Court’s Roe v. Wade decision was still five years in the future.
My doctor could not legally give me an abortion. Nor could he provide me with the name of someone who would do it illegally. If he did, he could lose his medical license and possibly face criminal charges.
I didn’t want to put my doctor on the spot by even asking him to help me get an abortion.
Unmarried and Pregnant
Such was my fearful, acquiescent, female mentality in the late 1960s. Roe v. Wade and fifty years of legal abortion in the United States were still in the future and, for me, so was the women’s movement.
Unmarried and pregnant, I needed an abortion and I was all alone. How to get one? The boyfriend was out of the picture. And even if he weren’t, I didn’t think he would know how to find me a safe, backstreet abortion.
I did have some acquaintances I thought might have that kind of sub rosa connection. I didn’t know them well, but they were my only hope.
Paralyzed, I did nothing.
Finally, on a ski weekend up in Vermont, my period arrived suddenly, painfully and bloodily.
I was not pregnant.
Or, more likely, I was not pregnant anymore.
A Miscarriage?
Looking back now, I suspect that I had a miscarriage, so common in the early months of pregnancy. But at the time, up at that ski lodge, I opted for denial.
“Whew. My period was really late,” I told myself. “These strange symptoms I’m having? Probably just the flu.”
Back in my apartment in New York, I did not call my doctor to check things out. Did I need medical attention? Was the miscarriage complete? Did I need a D&C? Was my future fertility at risk?
I didn’t know, and I didn’t want to find out. I didn’t want to talk about this with anyone, not even my doctor.
Unmarried and pregnant. It was my secret then. And it’s been my secret until now.
Why reveal it now? Because it is history. And because history has a way of repeating itself if you don’t watch out.
If you think this story might be helpful to someone, I hope you will share it with them.
Thoughts on a person who has made all the difference for women in the U.S. at “RBG — Glorious, Notorious and Old.” And here’s how things turned out for me — “Lucky Me. I Married Jon Newhall.”
Barbara: Elegant writing! Thank you for telling your story.
Thanks, Susan!
Barb,
You have described so clearly your fear and uncertainty in the face of a possible pregnancy. All of us intuitively knew that being unmarried and pregnant would change our life — and change others’ opinion of us.. And then, as now, the boyfriend was freed from any responsibility. Why should a woman’s reputation suffer from an unintended pregnancy? Why should the woman be blamed? The same victimization of women surfaces over and over in current and continuing instances of sexual abuse. Every time a woman brings forth an accusation against a man people say “Why didn’t she say anything before?” Or, “She is just looking for money”.
I am so glad that you brought this forward now. I like to think it will remind all of us to be open and generous and forgiving.
Thanks, Callie. I do think that American society has changed noticeably in one way since the first half of the 20th century: there is less shame and secrecy around being single and pregnant. I used the term “unmarried” intentionally in my headline — unmarried and pregnant was the expression that was used in those days. Unmarried had a negative, judgmental connotation to it. Today it’s more common to hear the term “single woman” or “single mother.”
Thank you for sharing your story…..I just pray that some common sense will prevail and that Roe v. Wade is not overturned. I think of the attitudes of our time, back then, and the thinking of today. We, as women, should have control over our bodies, not the control dictated by others. It is our choice, no one else’s. My mother use to say that if men could get pregnant, and the couple shared the responsibility of alternating who would have the babies….there would be 2 children in the family, the first carried by the father, the second carried by the mother and that would be it.
My next thought is that if there is no legal abortion, all those who have opposed legal abortion are placed on a national register, so that when an unwanted child is born, an adoptive parent is picked from the register to cover pregnancy and birthing cost and to raise the child. There needs to be legislation to insure that the birth mother does not lose her job because of said pregnancy.
Whew! Got that off my chest.
Thanks, Connie! Glad you got that off your chest!
So brave and thank you. I hope this message is heard by all young people and their parents too. They need to assure their children of their forever love and support, no matter what. I’m confident my mom would have moved the earth for me, yet we never discussed these issues.
So true. So much was not talked about in those days — between generations and among friends. I imagine it’s still true to an extent today. Since posting this piece, I have heard many stories from high school and college friends that I never knew about.
So moving, Barbara. It puts in context just how stressful even the possibility of an unwanted pregnancy was in the early 60s.
Thank you, Mark.
Brava! It wasn’t just your experience you relate so beautifully and courageously, Barb. Every girl suffered – knowingly or not, sexually active or not — from the low-grade, ever-simmering terror of this happening to us. And some parents of girls (mine at least) shaped their daughter’s upbringing by their abiding fear that it would happen to them (the parents’ hopes themselves).
That’s why your story strikes such a chord with women readers. You’ve reminded us of how strongly our vulnerability served as a frame around girls’ lives — even more intensely than it still does today. Open discussion of gender differences in socialization more often spoke — then as now — of preparation for divergent social roles, at least in my experience.
But the terror you experienced and now describe so well deeply etched the split in thinking and feeling and becoming that made girls girls and boys boys.
Yes. There was (is) that fear of “getting pregnant out of wedlock.” But I’m now remembering another fear that haunted and still haunts women — the fear a woman has of her marriage ending in divorce and of being left without a source of adequate income. I remember my parents insisting that I get a teaching certificate, which I did, so that I would have “something to fall back on in case something happened to my husband.” They expected I would marry and my husband would be the breadwinner. A topic for another day!
Barb, You were very brave to post this sad story. The photographs made it particularly moving. There are many similar sad stories that will not be told. Some day we may be able to tell stories of how we survived in a pandemic.
Thank you, Bruce. But will you and I survive this pandemic? We have packed on lots of years, so we are firmly in that “vulnerable” group. Well, it’s been a great ride!
Barbara, thanks so much for sharing this story. I realize how hard it must have been for you. But, you’re right, we need stories like this more than ever. I know if I were a young woman I’d have a hard time being able to visualize how different things were just a few decades ago. And you were one of the lucky ones who didn’t end up with a back alley abortion. Not only was it simply a brutal, inhumane system, but many a woman died or had their insides so traumatized they weren’t able to have babies later when they wanted them and were able to properly care for them. That, too, is heartbreaking.
Thank you, Lisa!
Barb,
I’m sorry about what you experienced. We lived in a very different time and I think that many people felt guilt and shame just for being human. While our attitudes about premarital sex and pregnancy have changed, one thing has remained the same. Young boys and men continue to walk away from their part of the responsibility. I can’t imagine leaving someone to handle something like this on their own. I am very sorry that you had to deal with this by yourself. Thank you for sharing your story.
Thank you, Joe. It means a lot to hear this from a high school classmate. So true — the guilt we feel just for being human. Well said!
Oh Barb, this story made me sad. I remember well several of our classmates who got pregnant in high school and I still liked them. One had an abortion, the other went away for 6 months, came back and graduated.
This made me want to hug you. How hard it must have been to keep the happy face all that time so no one would suspect. When you think about how open the kids are today concerning their sex lives. Times have certainly changed.
Thank you for telling these stories. Of course, I had no idea at the time that our classmates were going through these terrible experiences. All that secrecy — I think today’s young women might find it difficult to imagine what it was like before Roe v. Wade, and before the open-mindedness we all take for granted these days. That’s why I felt the need to tell this story.
Thank you for writing this, Barbara. Opening up about something you’ve never shared took courage but it will educate many. You’re right that young women now need to become aware of how it was not so very long ago. We need to work to keep things from going backward.
I appreciate this.
That’s one of the reasons I wrote this. I wondered whether my daughter and her generation could imagine what things were like for women before Roe v Wade, but also before the womens movement of the 1960s and ’70s and all the rights that RBG fought for.
Barb,
I so admire your courage in telling your very private story. It parallels, I’m sure many of our own, to some degree. I know it resonates with me. During the 60s and beyond, I was a social worker with Los Angeles County, working with Dependant Children of the Court. Also with Families. There were many instances of either mothers becoming pregnant and not being able to financially or emotionally able to care for another child or teenagers who became pregnant and were in placement and totally unable to care for a child. The choices were limited to putting their child up for adoption or keeping the baby. Most opted for adoption. An extremely heart rending choice.
When Roe was passed, everyone breathed a great sigh of relief. I forgot to mention that we social workers were forbidden to discuss contraception with our clients. It was a difficult time for women and girls.
I really don’t want to go back to those days.
Whoa! You couldn’t mention contraception? It seems there might be a lot more at stake here than just a womans right to a safe abortion. There is also the availability of affordable contraception.