From the “Motherlode” blog at NYTimes.com:

Once I came to the decision to terminate the pregnancy, so much of the guilt and sadness I’d been feeling melted away. I felt happy for the first time since finding out and I feel like my family is supportive of my decision. I’m focusing on the child I’ll have in a few years from now with someone I feel safe with and supported by. The life of that child will be infinitely better than this one and, sometimes, I wonder if such a miserable, lonely woman could even have a healthy child. There’s more to being a good birth mother than avoiding alcohol and eating right and I just don’t know if I have it. I’m a responsible girl but maybe that means knowing when you’ve put too much on yourself and it won’t work out.
In some ways, I feel like I’ve given up. I didn’t want to go down without a fight, I wanted to be a tough mother who braved the world for her child. But maybe that’s the truly selfish decision, to expect my baby to understand why there’s no father and no money and no time to spend with mom. How could I raise a confident child under those circumstances? I know it’s been done but I want to do better — that’s the future I envision for myself.
I owe a lot of that to your readers. They asked questions and pointed out arguments I never considered. They were honest, sometimes harsh, but always considerate. The one thing I realized, when I pulled all the comments together, was that a baby is too precious and wonderful to not plan for — I owe the children I have a better head start.
If I get my degree then maybe the path it will take me on will lead me to work on women’s issues. Maybe one day I’ll make a million dollars and start a scholarship program for pregnant graduate students. I can’t believe that nothing good can come of this, I know I’ll do something right one of these days.