Why I Chose Child Abuse over Abortion

I didn’t say to someone when I was in my mother’s womb, “I know if I’m born I’ll get abused – I choose abuse over abortion.” I didn’t say that because unborn children can’t speak for themselves.

Had I known every heartbreak in my life before I was born, I would still have chosen life over abortion.

Let’s pretend a moderator had interviewed me in the womb.

Moderator: “If you are born, you will face years of sexual abuse from your father. He will start raping you when you are eleven. He will get you pregnant twice, then heat up your mother’s knitting needles and perform two backwoods, medically unsupervised abortions to hide his crime. You will nearly die both times and it will take you weeks to recover. You will miss a lot of school and fail math. He will beat you up, stomp on you, throw things at you and threaten to kill you if you tell anyone. You can avoid all that by being aborted now.”

Me: “There will be some good days and good times. I want to live.”

Moderator: “It won’t be easy even when you escape abuse. You’ll be homeless with no money. You will live under a bridge in the back of a truck. Even on the coldest days of winter, you will wash yourself and your clothes in the river. You will be miserable.”

Me: “I will find ways to cope and become a stronger person because of hardship. I want to live.”

Moderator: “You will have a son. You will spend more than seven years as a single parent, working two and three jobs to make ends meet. One time you’ll be so tired after working all night, getting your son off to school, then going back to work at 11:30 a.m., that you drive your truck to a shopping center parking lot, let your son go visit the toy shop, lock the doors and sleep in the cab in freezing weather. You hate being cold.”

Me: “I want to live.”

Moderator: “You will be heartbroken because your son is chronically ill and doctors don’t know what’s wrong. Seeking medical help, you will drive over Donner Summit in the winter in a truck with no defroster. As you drive over the mountain, you will be constantly scraping ice off the outside, then the inside of the windshield so you can see. The truck will break down and you will be two years without your own transportation.”

Me: “I will love my son. I want to live.”

Moderator: “You will want to be a writer. You will spend 40 years sending out manuscripts and getting rejections back. Working two and three jobs at a time, you won’t have opportunity to research the market. Many times, you won’t have enough money for postage to send out your books. You will get so frustrated that you feel like slamming your head against a concrete wall.”

Me: “I want to live.”

Moderator: “More tragedies. All on the same day, your mother dies and you can’t plan to attend her funeral because your husband is sent home from the hospital to die; your sheepdog dies, and your truck catches on fire in downtown San Antonio.”

Me: “I want to live.”

Moderator: “You will get scammed out of your property by a drug-addicted con, and a pastor you trusted. You will live in an open-ended garden center with no indoor plumbing and no kitchen or bathroom facilities. You will take cold water showers with the garden hose. In the winter, you will put up hay bales and wrap up your little living area in plastic to keep out the cold – it’s all you can afford. Wildlife will share the garden center with you – even wasps and scorpions. You will eat one meal a day and survive on granola bars the rest of the time. The legal system will fail you, and you will be broke and homeless again.”

Me: “I want to live. I might be broke, I might be homeless – but I will never be poor.”

Because I lived, I taught in Christian schools in two different states and remain in contact with some of my former students who claim I had a positive influence in their lives.

Because I lived, I worked on newspapers in three different states, writing stories that uplifted and helped others.

Because I lived, I was honored by God with the most awesomely wonderful son any mother could ever have, the late Marine Corps Major Luke Gaines Parker. Even after his Nov. 17, 2013 plane crash, Luke continues to bless others with the writing, memories, and Christian example he left behind. Because Luke lived, he leaves behind daughter Dulcinea, who makes the world a better place. All that was possible because – first of all – I lived.

Because I lived, I am now married to a marvelous husband, Reverend Alan T McKean, the author of time travel-adventure books The Scent of Time, The Scent of Home and the soon-to-be-released The Scent of Eternity. Because I lived, we live in the lovely Black Isle of Scotland, working together in his ministry.

Because I was abused, not aborted, I have written six “inspirational,” “life-changing” books, which include the pro-life adventure-romance, Love’s Beating Heart – a book which readers say helped them choose life and adoption for their unborn instead of abortion.

Child abuse is unforgivable. It should never happen. Abortion is ultimate child abuse – it tortures the child, then murders him or her.

What about you? Life hasn’t been easy. Would you have chosen abortion over life?

http://www.amazon.com/Stephanie-Parker-McKean/e/B00BOX90OO/ref=ntt_dp_epwbk_0

Taking the Bridge to Nowhere to the Loch Ness Monster

When I was in the fifth grade, I read about the Loch Ness Monster in our SRA Reading Program. I informed all my friends that when I grew up I was going to Scotland to search for the Loch Ness Monster.

Prophetic boast? Because here I was some fifty years later taking a tour of Loch Ness and waiting for Nessie to appear. I had a present for her. Such a mysterious creature, I felt, would love reading my mystery-romance-suspense Bridge to Nowhere, published by Sunpenny. Just in case her reading tastes were not what I expected, I took along a typed copy of my pro-life, adventure-romance Love’s Beating Heart (electronically published) and my husband’s two time travel-adventure books The Scent of Time and The Scent of Home.

Yes, I understand that Nessie lives in a 755-foot deep lake which contains more fresh water than all the lakes in England and Wales combined. But she’s been in there a long time. Surely she needs some place to get out of that cold water and I’m envisioning a cozy little cave carved into the rock sides of the lake where she can rest, read, relax – and enjoy all the non-monster pursuits that her heart desires. She has often been spotted around Urquhart Castle, which reportedly sits on a rock shelf with deep water underneath. Strange claims have been made of 30-foot eels frightening divers away when they searched around the castle.

Not everyone believes in Nessie. She was mentioned back in the 7th Century. Legend states that Saint Columba rescued a swimmer under attack by ordering the monster away in the name of Jesus. Since then, there have been more than 1,000 sightings, the most recent of which began in 1933. The evidence for Nessie’s existence is anecdotal with disputed photos and sonar readings. Many of the sonar studies have recorded creatures of up to 30-feet long and more than five-feet wide following boats at great speed and depth. Sound recordings have monitored strange clicks, knocks and swishing noises.

Famed monster hunter Jeremy Wade looked for Nessie without success, but noted that with so much evidence having been accumulated over so many years – something strange lived in Loch Ness. His best surmise was that a rare Greenland shark chased salmon into the loch from the North Sea.

Back to my own personal search for the Loch Ness Monster. I can’t claim to have seen Nessie. So I didn’t get to give her a copy of Bridge to Nowhere or any of the other books. However, I did discover something that gives me hope for future searches. Loch Ness is so huge and deep with so much water – that she could easily be real. There is simply no reason to assume that Nessie is a hoax. So you are welcome to go online and buy my books or even private message me for a signed copy – but I’m keeping Nessie’s copy for next time I get to search for her. She doesn’t know me yet, but I feel we share a special connection. She’ll want to meet me.

Some people search for God with all the inconclusive results that professional Nessie hunters have accumulated. Not only do they mock and scorn Christians, they attempt to push an atheist agenda hard enough that Christians and their faith in God will decline like the Nessie sightings of recent years. How sad. The evidence for God’s existence is all around these non-believers, pulsing with every beat of their heart and borne on the wings of the wind. Nessie might not have popped up on my monster-hunting expedition, but God’s awesome majesty reflected from sky to waves and bounced off the mountains, trees, flowers and wildlife along the shore. God made it all. It’s His perfect creation. And Nessie, if she does exist, is a mysterious creation of God. Mysteries belong to God. Perhaps that’s why I enjoy writing them so much!

See you soon, Nessie! I’m keeping your books for you!