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This is why I can't be silent

By on January 27, 2017
planned

By Crystal Andrus Morissette

Viewer Discretion Advised:

When I 16 or 17, living on my own, I went to Planned Parenthood. I was becoming sexually active and I didn’t want to get pregnant. I had little contact with anyone in my family, and I’d already gone through excessive sexual abuse by a few different men–mom’s boyfriend, and a relative of the boyfriend. I was also stranger raped at 14–dragged behind a bush one night. I had no one to tell. No one to go to. No one who cared.

The truth is, I had always planned to wait until marriage to have sex. It wasn’t even a question. Maintaining your virginity was expected. But that was stolen from me.

The trouble with sexual abuse, along with being raised as a ‘born-again Christian’, was that I was now ‘tainted goods.’ In my mind, I was shameful, broken, and tarnished. A bad girl. Used and abused.

There was such a level of disdain for anything ‘bad’ in my family — bad marks in school, bad behavior, bad habits, bad choices, even bad language was a no-no (my mother once washed my mouth out with soap for coming home in grade two and repeating a phrase I’d heard at school: “tough titty”) — not to mention, no one in my family ever talked about their pain or problems so there was no forum or safe place to ever confide anything. Secrets were meant to be secrets.

In fact, you were better to lie than tell the truth in my family. The truth was irrelevant. How we ‘appeared’ was what mattered most. And appearing beautiful, perfect, and happy was our number one mandate.

Looking back, why should it surprise me that my boyfriend was 24? I was 16. I didn’t even really like him but I had no one else. And the truth is, I didn’t feel like I had the choice to not date him. He’d pressured me hard for sex and I felt I now had to make it work. I was that disempowered. I needed someone. Anyone. He was there.

yepBut before Planned Parenthood would provide me with ‘support’, they wanted me to have a full ‘medical check-up’, including a pap smear.

That is when I discovered I had the HPV virus and the early signs of Cervical Cancer. I was in shock and terrified. But rather than tell my family doctor about the sexual abuse when he suggested that my ‘condition’ often happens to girls who have sex at a young age, I shamefully sat completely quiet. I never asked any questions. Sadly, my doctor never asked me any questions either. The entire appointment lasted no more than 10 minutes. Shameful.

How did my family doctor miss the mark so badly??? I was 16-years-old with early signs of cervical cancer and an STD, with no family support . . . and I made that clear, and my ‘health advocate’ didn’t ask me any questions…..

I had absolutely no one in my life to turn to. I was literally homeless at that point….

I would take the city bus alone to the hospital for treatments that went on for a few years. My cervix was stubborn. Cauterizing. Cryotherapy. You name it. My cervix would not stop turning against me.

Oh, the shame shame shame every time I went to the hospital. Alone. Feet in those stirrups. A male doctor. You have no idea of the pain I suffered inside.

Thank God in Canada we have health insurance. What would I have done otherwise? I would have NEVER had a pap smear at 16 or 17 (whatever age I was) as a homeless kid. I also wouldn’t have been able to afford birth control.

PLANNED PARENTHOOD saved my life. And it is not just about abortion. Thank God, I’ve never been faced with that dilemma.

To all those who are so resistant to grant women full rights over her own body, I wonder if perhaps you have not faced these kinds of horrid circumstances.

Regardless, I promise you that education, support, PLANNING for PARENTHOOD, and all the other incredible things that PLANNED PARENTHOOD DOES, is a wonderful, important, mandatory institution that should not be de-funded. We cannot go backwards. Please people… please.

https://www.plannedparenthood.org or Call 1-800-230-PLAN
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perfectCrystal Andrus Morissette is a best-selling author and the founder of this magazine, SimplyWoman.com, as well as The S.W.A.T. Institute (Simply Woman Accredited Trainer)–an Empowerment Coach Certification school, exclusively for women.

From life as a homeless teen to coaching A-List celebrities, from having abs of steel and the Miss Galaxy to weighing over 200 pounds after having babies, Emotional Age and Communication Expert Crystal Andrus Morissette is a worldwide leader in the field of self-discovery and personal transformation.

A media darling, she has been featured numerous times on Oprah.com, the New York Post, Fox TV, the Daily Mail, CBS Radio, CTV, CityTV, Global TV, Slice TV, the Globe and Mail, and the Toronto Star. Crystal is the author of four best-selling books, including her latest release entitled, “The Emotional Edge: Discover Your Inner Age, Ignite Your Hidden Strengths and Reroute Misdirected Fear to Live Your Fullest.” She is also certified in nutrition and sports medicine.

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