When she saw her son's heartbeat on the screen, she knew 'I'm already a mom'

(Unplanned Stories) At 24 years old, Kendra faced an unplanned pregnancy that completely changed the course of her life. 

Looking back, she says she never could have pictured the life she now leads.

“I didn’t know if I wanted kids,” Kendra says. “[I] certainly could never see myself homeschooling, breastfeeding [and] home birthing children. But that’s the path that I’ve chosen … and I give all the glory to God for that.”

Childhood, faith and early struggles

Kendra knew from an early age what it felt like to stand out. She describes herself as “socially awkward” and often without many friends while growing up in a small town in South Georgia. Church remained a constant through it all, and she gave her life to Christ before she turned 10 years old. 

However, as Kendra entered her teen and young adult years, she says she drifted away from her relationship with God.

“I chased the world more than I chased a relationship with God, and that really affected me, the friends that I chose and the relationships that I chose,” Kendra says.

By high school, she says she was experimenting with cigarettes, drugs and alcohol – choices that would eventually lead her down a “destructive path” as a young adult.

Kendra struggled academically as well. She graduated from high school but eventually left college after a semester or two. 

“I was just destructive,” Kendra says. “I had a lot of anger and resentment for not feeling like I had the family dynamic I wanted [and] not feeling like I had acceptance from my peers.”

A relationship that didn’t work out and its toll on her life

After college, Kendra entered a “long-term, rocky relationship” that led her to Savannah, Georgia. She and her boyfriend lived together with roommates for years. After their final breakup, Kendra continued to live with roommates, who she says were sent by God to support and protect her.

“They were the best people at a time in my life where I was not the best person,” she reflects. “After [we] broke up, I was just back on that destructive path of drinking every day.”

Kendra says she soon landed a job at a bar and found herself drinking before and after work daily, caught in a relentless cycle.

Finding out she was pregnant 

When Kendra was 24 years old, her life took a turn.

During a night out drinking in downtown Savannah, Kendra says she was taken advantage of. 

“I blamed myself for being in that situation,” she says. “I didn’t really consider the consequences.”

In the weeks before discovering her pregnancy, Kendra’s life felt like it was unraveling. She had just lost two jobs at a bar and a restaurant and was struggling to find work. 

Overwhelmed, she called her parents and returned home briefly before moving in with a friend. It was only a couple of weeks later that she began feeling unwell and realized she had missed her period for two months.

“When you’re in that state of mind, you don’t think about responsible things … I took a pregnancy test, and it was positive,” she says.

Although Kendra had always been “staunchly pro-life,” was saved, and grew up in the church, she found herself in a place of deep despair when she discovered her pregnancy.

“I was in such a place at this time that I felt like this is it … like I’m going to choose to go to hell because I’m considering having an abortion,” Kendra recalls. “In my mind, it was either have the baby and restructure [my life], or have an abortion to hide the shame and to hide the mistakes.”

The day abortion became unthinkable

Kendra initially planned to go to an abortion clinic about an hour away from her small town, with a friend driving her there. When they arrived at the building, she says she noticed a Christian license plate on a car and wondered if its owner worked at the clinic.

Terrified, she entered the building only to discover it was not an abortion clinic, but a pregnancy resource center. Kendra says she was met with warmth and kindness instead of judgment. 

Two nurses took Kendra into a room and performed an ultrasound, showing her baby and pointing out the heartbeat.

“The pivotal moment was certainly when I saw his heartbeat,” Kendra recalls. “At that moment, it was like, ‘I’m already a mom, I’m pregnant, there’s a life inside me, and I’m a mom.’ That was the moment that I knew that I could never go through with an abortion.”

She says the center also provided pamphlets about adoption and support for mothers, and a nurse offered to pray with her. When the nurse asked if she could pray for her, Kendra told her “no” because she was still confused and scared. 

“But I told her that she could pray for me afterward, and I have no doubt [that] she did,” Kendra says. “That’s why those [centers] are so close to my heart because I don’t know what would’ve happened if I had actually walked into an abortion clinic.”

After choosing life

Shortly after choosing life for her son, Kendra rededicated her life to God, began attending church again, returned to college, and started a new job — which is where she met her husband, Bob.

Kendra also moved back in with her parents. She was terrified to tell them of her pregnancy, so she invited them to a restaurant and asked her best friend to come along for support. 

“I did not know what their reaction was going to be,” Kendra says. “I was kind of already a failure to them at this point.”

When she finally told them she was pregnant, she says their reaction was nothing like she expected — it was far more supportive than she ever imagined....

Read the entire article at Unplanned Stories.