Sandra was one of our first clients. She was a student at a state university, and she was also a thoroughly liberated young woman. She wanted to be responsible about her sexual activity, so she visited the health clinic at school to find out about birth control. The medical school associated with her university was recommending a new birth control to their students that was (and still is) advertised to be 99% – 99.5% effective at preventing pregnancy. The trade name of the drug was Norplant®, and it was implanted under the skin. No pills to remember to take and no messy contraceptives to deal with. Sandra said yes to Norplant. Sandra was one of the first women to have ever become pregnant with this type of birth-control.
Sandra came to us for help because she was being pressured to have an abortion. She already knew she was pregnant – she had taken about 5 home pregnancy tests! She had gone back to the university clinic to find out what went wrong, and they were dumbfounded. No one had ever become pregnant, to their knowledge at that time in 1991, with a Norplant device. The doctors put their heads together. They came back to Sandra and made her an offer. “A study of the effects of Norplant® on a fetus could be very valuable. We would be willing to pay for your abortion.”
Sandra didn’t want to be pregnant, but she wasn’t sure she wanted to have an abortion, either. She just wanted to know why her birth control didn’t work. They didn’t have answers to her questions, and that’s when a friend told her about the new pregnancy center in Davie. We had only been open for a short time. Sandra’s friend put her in touch with Dottie and she began to meet with our new Executive Director. Sandra knew she would need help in order to have a baby and continue her education.
As the weeks turned into months, the pressures on Sandra to abort increased. The father of the baby was demanding that she “get rid of it.” The university health care officials continued to pursue Sandra in the name of “research”. On the day that she went in to have the Norplant device removed, she described a bizarre encounter that she had when she got to the clinic to see the doctor.
First, she said that from the moment she walked in the door, everyone seemed to know who she was — almost a celebrity of sorts. People were whispering and talking behind their hands as she waited to be called in. She told Dottie she felt like a celebrity, caught doing something wrong. Then when she met with the doctor, things got stranger still.
At that time, Sandra was not really sensitive about spiritual things. But as she described what happened in the exam room, Dottie understood that they were dealing with serious spiritual warfare. Sandra said the doctor came and stood over her, leaned down, and almost growled in her ear, “Give us this baby. Science needs this baby. You MUST abort.” Then he told her the medical department would pay for the abortion. When she still refused to consent to an abortion, he threw her file on the floor and walked out, slamming the door. Then they made two offers to pay a cash “stipend” – the second one for $10,000.00!
It is a miracle that Sandra did not abort. She was in a difficult place financially, and she kept struggling from day to day, unsure of what to do. But, finally, strengthened by the information and support she received from her counseling sessions with Dottie, Sandra found the courage to tell the faculty at the university to stop calling her, citing laws that Dottie had told her about that prohibit anyone from coercing a woman to have an abortion against her will.
During the months before Gabrielle was born, Dottie was able to talk to Sandra about her faith and Sandra made a commitment to Christ and her life began to change. She was a frequent visitor to the pregnancy center in the early years of Gabrielle’s life, even giving her testimony at our first fundraising banquet (below on left). She joined a local church, got involved with a great support group there, and the visits to Hope weren’t as frequent.
One day, a couple of years after Dottie retired in 2002, I got a call from Sandra. Gabrielle was turning 12 and Sandra knew we had a purity message that we presented to little girls in a tea party format. She wanted to schedule a tea party for Gabrielle’s birthday. I referred her to the appropriate staff member, told her how great it was to hear from her, and how proud I was that she was raising her daughter in the nurture and admonition of the Lord.
Months later, a confused staff member came to me and said, “There’s a woman on the phone who wants to talk to someone who would have known a girl named Sandra who has a daughter named Gabby.” I knew immediately who she was talking about, and I took the call.
“I didn’t know who to talk to, but I thought someone at Hope would want to know that Sandra has died. I don’t have any details about what happened or exactly how she died, other than the fact that it was not foul play. Her little girl is going to go and live with her father.”
The woman who called us was an acquaintance from Sandra’s church, and she knew the story of how Hope had impacted Sandra’s life during those difficult early months of her pregnancy. She knew that we truly cared about Sandra and that we would want to know about her death.
Every now and then I think of Gabrielle and say a prayer for her, wherever she is. I have to trust that her mother’s faith was passed on to her and that she is serving Jesus somewhere today. I’m hoping that somewhere she has a shoebox of old photographs that her mother passed on to her!