I live in a small country town. When by boyfriend and I started having sex we used condoms because I couldn’t go talk about contraception to the GP as everyone at the clinic knew me. That is the thing about small towns, I had a relative who worked in the clinic and it would always get back to my family. I really didn’t want my parents to find out I was sexually active because I knew they wouldn’t approve.

We were really unlucky because one night the condom broke and so the next day I had to go the chemist to try and get the morning after pill. They wouldn’t give it to me and the chemist told me I was too young for it anyway. I was really worried as I didn’t know what else to do.

Eventually, I had to tell my parents and they were angry and disappointed. My mum took me to see a GP in another town, but he wouldn’t refer me for medical termination as I was 9 weeks pregnant and you have to be less than that.

I was so upset, If I could just have accessed the morning after pill I would never have had to go through all this. In the end I had no choice except surgical termination. I had to travel to a larger city and go through the medical process, I felt humiliated and like I had no choice even though I wanted to. I felt really alone and ashamed, even though I’d tried to do the right thing.

This story was a contribution to the Storylines: Her Voice Matters project, a collaboration between Women’s Health Goulburn North East, Women’s Health Loddon Mallee and Murray PHN.