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I was not a believer nor was my girlfriend. I joined the Air Force after high school and while serving in Alaska, I met Jesus Christ as my Savior and Lord. Several years later I met my wife, Kim, who is a believer. After we were married in 1981, we immediately got pregnant.

Unfortunately for my wife, our pregnancy was not good news to me. I was upset and turned what should have been a joyous occasion into a sad and hurtful experience. I could not understand why I was reacting this way. My son, James, was born. There was an immediate strangeness between my new son and I. I had trouble bonding with him.

Up to this point in our married life, Kim was involved in Crisis Pregnancy Centers wherever we lived. When she was pregnant with our second child, I first shared with her my high school abortion experience. She was very supportive.

While in my last year of college my second son, Mark, was born. I thought that I was more open to having the second child. I tried to make up to my wife for the hurt that I had caused her during our first pregnancy. My wife has informed me that the second child was, also, a struggle for me and that it was not a joyous occasion either.

After graduation from college we moved to Georgia, where I got a job. Kim wanted to try to have a daughter. I just could not handle the thought of having another child and blamed the indecision on our economic uncertainty.

In 1989, I got a good job. Kim saw this as a solution to our economic situation and wanted a third child. I put Kim through an emotional roller-coaster. One week I was for trying to have a child, the next week I would change my mind. She noticed that whenever the discussion came around to children, I became very cold and reserved to the point that I was someone that she did not know. It scared her.

Kim and I have a wonderful marriage. The only dark part of our relationship is discussion of having children. It was the only wedge in our relationship. It continued to hurt my wife and we did not know how to change.

One day when my oldest son was seven and my youngest son was four, Kim said she was going to a dinner sponsored by the Crisis Pregnancy Center. We had just been through another roller-coaster experience concerning the elusive third child. It was a quiet but hurtful experience.

I hated myself for hurting my wife. I did not understand why having a child could cause such hard feelings in me. Kim came back from the dinner and said, "I know what is wrong. I just heard a nurse from Nurses For Life, and she discussed Post-Abortion Syndrome. You have all the symptoms of the syndrome! I don't know how you have lived with this all these years."

After I read the pamphlet on PAS, I was stunned to see that I could suffer from an abortion as the father of the child. I felt in a small way that the burden on my back had been made lighter now that I had named it. I felt hope that the Lord Jesus would heal me.

We did have our third child, a daughter in 1991, and she has become the symbol of my healing. Having Samantha was a joyous experience.

In the twenty-four years since that abortion, I never met nor spoke to any other male who had been through an abortion. I have been a Christian since 1977, and I have never met another Christian male even in my church experience that has admitted to an abortion.

Then about three years ago I was invited by the director of the Crisis Pregnancy Center to join a Bible study with two other post-abortive men. I was elated, but I was a bit uncertain because I did not know what to expect. It meant that I would publicly discuss my experience with men that had also been through an abortion and I would have to become vulnerable. I went to the study and it was a wonderful experience. It was a special time of healing and encouragement. We were all Christians, and married with children.

Since that time I have worked on my relationship with my first-born son to improve our bonding and to seek a closer relationship. I have a markedly different relationship with my second and third children. I have an easier time with Mark and Samantha. But with James there always seems to be something invisible between us. There is no hostility nor are any of them problem children, it's just an uncomfortable sense. I am in prayer about the situation as are my wife and my father-in-law. Dad is a retired minister and is a prayer warrior. I have claimed victory and desire true reconciliation with my son. I have not told him of my abortion experience but plan to when he is an adult.

Think of all the abortions that have occurred in America. Every one involved a male. PAS will impact that male in some way. It hit me in the form of alcohol and drug abuse for many years prior to my salvation. The negative impact continued long into my marriage until my wife cared enough to try to help me figure out what was going on inside of me.

We need reconciliation in our homes, between husbands and wives, between fathers and sons, between fathers and daughters. I must have true reconciliation in my home before I can be reconciled with my fellow man.

Attending a Post Abortion Bible Study could be instrumental in bringing healing and reconciliation in the home. It could be a way to bring the many closet post-abortive men out into the open where their voice can be heard in a unified way. These men may feel totally alone in their pain. They have no one to encourage them. Many of the men in this situation do not even know what they are suffering from or that they have a way out of this terrible experience. We must share with them the healing power of Jesus Christ through the scriptures.

While the above is a true story, some names and details have been changed. If you are (or know of) a man who would benefit from a post-abortion Bible study, call the Assist CPC office at 703-354-7272 and let us know of your interest.