The Price of Silence
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When Francine married Rick Rivers, she did it without telling him her terrible secret.
They had known each other since fifth grade, but lost touch while attending different colleges. Later, Rick went into the Marine Corps. During those years, Francine got involved with a man and became pregnant. Frightened, and feeling she couldn't tell her parents, she did what was supposed to solve the problem, though it wasn't legal at the time: She had an abortion. Then she tried to get on with her life as if it had never happened.
Francine began to correspond with Rick while he was in Vietnam, and they married in 1969, a year after he came home. "Before we got married," he says, "we talked about honesty. We were going to base our marriage on truth." He told Francine about his not-so-sterling past, but she couldn't bring herself to tell Rick about the abortion.
"I was convinced Rick wouldn't marry me [if he knew]," Francine explains. "I'd grown up in a Christian home. Killing your own child ranked in my mind as the worst sin. I was ashamed into my bones. Since I thought God couldn't accept me anymore, I certainly didn't think a man could, either. So I convinced myself that I should have the right to reach out for happiness."
And the Riverses were happy, in many ways, those first few years. But even while she enjoyed the growing love and trust in her marriage, Francine couldn't forget the abortion. Sudden fits of grief would descend on her. The possibility of starting a family brought feelings of extreme guilt and unworthiness.
No longer willing to live a lie, she decided she could trust Rick with her secret. So after two years of marriage, Francine confessed. "I told him in the dark—literally," she recalls. "We were at my parents' house, lying in bed. I said, 'There's something I never told you.'"
Rick was stunned. "I'd known Francine practically all my life," he says, "and she was the most moral girl I knew. But what hurt most was that she didn't trust me from the beginning. I had always been honest [with her]. I think she told me at her folks' house because she figured if I walked out, at least she'd have a place to stay."
A Terrible Knowledge
After Francine's confession, the Riverses' relationship changed. "You can't drop that kind of bombshell and expect to go on the same," Rick says.
"People are not like God," Francine adds. "The Lord hears our confession, forgives and forgets. Rick couldn't forget."
When they had disagreements common to any marriage, Rick would sometimes use his knowledge against her: Who are you to tell me how to run my life? Look what you've done. Francine would bitterly wish she had never handed him this weapon.
"There were other things going on that contributed to the stress of that time," she says. "But when he'd throw the past back at me, he proved what I'd felt all along—that he couldn't be trusted with the truth. I wondered if he really loved me, now that he knew."
Originally published in: Marriage Partnership, 1997, Winter
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Average User Rating:
Trisha
I had an abortion because i feared what everyone would think. I eventually broke off the r/ship which hurt so badly especially knowing that no one else knew of the dark secret.I am now engaged to a wonderful man and about 6 months into our now 2 yr r/ship i decided to tell him what i had done at the risk of loosing him. I decided to do it early enough so that he had time to change his mind. He took it so well and held me as i cried(he is the only one i have ever told), we have never discussed it again and now i hope when we want a baby i wont have problems, though the procedure was done well and follow up was also done but i fear that God may punish me.My fiance was shocked that anyone would allow another person to undergo an abortion- that was his only reaction. Sometimes i wonder whether i should ask him whether it worries him because he loves kids and the last thing i would want to do is deprive him of a child but only time will tell.
sina
All i know is that conscience is an open wound,only the truth can heal it.
kemi
I thank God for Francine. I have read many of her books including The Atonement Child. You were very brave to come out in the open to talk about your past. You also have a wonderful husband. God bless you both.
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