The Confirmation of Amy Coney Barrett
I was a girl without a choice
In the spring of 1970, a couple of months before my baby was due, I sat at my desk in my bedroom late into the night and wrote two suicide notes, one to my boyfriend and one to my parents. I folded the letters into tight, flat squares small enough to fit in the palm of my hand. The next morning at school I stood on tiptoe in front of my locker, stretching my arm across the top shelf, and slipped them into the crevice against the locker’s back wall. Only the edges of the bright pink paper were visible. I hoped that afterwards, someone would find them.
As improbable as it sounds, I got pregnant during my first sexual encounter. Also improbably, I kept my pregnancy a secret from everyone. Sex, birth control, and abortion were all taboo subjects in my small, Catholic town — and once I discovered that I was pregnant, I felt there was no one I could ask for help. Instead, I employed intense denial and made two radically different plans that could extract me from my predicament.
The gas station at the edge of town doubled as a bus depot. I’d memorized the schedule and would buy myself a last-minute ticket. I’d board the bus without luggage, without anything that might provide a clue to my identity. When I arrived in Chicago, I’d find my way back to the church where my high school chorus…
