Uma Thurman reveals abortion she had as teen in powerful essay: 'My darkest secret'
On the heels of Texas' restrictive new law that bans most abortions after six weeks, actress Uma Thurman publicly shared about an abortion she had when she was a teenager.
In an op-ed for The Washington Post, the "Kill Bill" star said the legislation fills her "with great sadness, and something akin to horror."
"I am sharing my own experience," Thurman, 51, said, adding that she felt it was her "responsibility" to speak out and "stand up in their shoes."
"In my late teens, I was accidentally impregnated by a much older man," she disclosed, detailing how she originally wanted to keep the pregnancy until her parents "warned me how difficult it would be to raise a baby as a teen on my own."
"My childish fantasy of motherhood was soundly corrected as I weighed answers to their very precise questions. I was just starting out in my career and didn't have the means to provide a stable home, even for myself," Thurman said. "We decided as a family that I couldn't go through with the pregnancy, and agreed that termination was the right choice. My heart was broken nonetheless."
"There is so much pain in this story. It has been my darkest secret until now," she continued. "The abortion I had as a teenager was the hardest decision of my life, one that caused me anguish then and that saddens me even now, but it was the path to the life full of joy and love that I have experienced. Choosing not to keep that early pregnancy allowed me to grow up and become the mother I wanted and needed to be."
Thurman is the mother of three children: Maya, 23, Levon, 19, and Luna, 9. She shares Maya and Levon with ex-husband Ethan Hawke and Luna with her ex, Arpad Busson.
