I’m hardly a pro-lifer, but let’s be honest: Folks come to me when they don’t want to get an abortion.

When friends get knocked up unexpectedly-or even quite expectedly-they know I’ll support them whatever their choice. But they’ve got plenty of friends who’ll support their right to terminate. Not so many will support their right to have a baby.

Parenting is a big deal, after all.

When in doubt, abort. That seems to be the conventional wisdom in the circles I travel in, anyway. Fair enough, but there’s always doubt.

Always.

The last time I got pregnant was by insemination. Still, my second thought on seeing that plus sign on the pregnancy test was…kill! It’s panic, it’s mother guilt, it’s fear of letting the kid down, it’s self-protection-weird instinct when you know something is feeding off of you, it’s a passing second thought.

It’s doubt.

That’s all.

My knocked-up friends knock on my door when they doubt that doubt.

They want to hang out with my baby, then. They want to hear the latest about my teenage daughter. They want confirmation from a credible mama-source that, yes, they can do it, no matter their age or income or relationship status. Yes. Rough road sometimes, but yes. They can.

You can.

If motherhood is your true choice, go for it. Don’t say Later, don’t say Someday, don’t say What will my mother/brother/sister think?

A friend recently showed up on my doorstep just like this–doubting the doubt. More than doubting the doubt. She wanted her baby.

She wanted to hold my baby.

She wanted to feel his manageable weight.

She wanted to hear about my teenage daughter.

She wanted to hear “congratulations” instead of “Oh my God! What?”

She wanted to talk to someone who would say, sincerely, “This is very exciting.”

My friend is 35 years old and financially stable–if these things matter to you.

But a few days after she turned up on my doorstep–turned up once in the morning and then again at night–she sent a text message.

I read the lines of her text message and then I read in between the lines and I understood: She’d made an appointment. She’d decided to terminate.

She’d thought better of it. Or, if we are going to be precise, her boyfriend had thought better of it.

And he was a feminist man.

And she was a feminist woman.

And as feminists, I guess, we all have equal say. (Though 50/50 tips for the man, tips for termination).

My friend is 35 years old.

We don’t get endless opportunities to have a kid.

I will support her choice.

Not being a mother isn’t a tragedy–even if it’s something we’ve dreamed of.

Not being a mother isn’t a tragedy.

But sometimes it feels like a tragedy. Sometimes it feels like a seriously jacked-up misogynist-disguised-as-feminist bully-induced tragedy.

I’m just saying.