Diary of an Unborn Child - the speech contest prose that shocked me as a fourth grader and taught me something awful existed in the world; called abortion

Back in the 1980's I attended a school that educated grades first through eighth.  One of the things the 7th and 8th graders got to do every Spring was take part in a regional speech contest.  Before the contest they would practice by visiting the different classrooms and reading their speeches to the younger kids in order to grow comfortable and hone their poetry and prose.  Although they could choose readings of their own choice, I later learned and saw that every year when the speech contest was done their speeches, stapled on colored construction paper, were tossed into a box and put on a shelf for the next years kids to go through if they wished.

Because of the box being saved, there were a couple speeches we 'little ones' heard year after year - others were brand new.  We 'littles' in 2nd, 3rd, 5th, 6th graders would ooh and ahh and discuss them afterwards and call 'dibs' on the ones we wanted to read when we were finally able to take part in 7th and 8th grade! 

A few still come to mind after all these years...  mostly in bits and pieces but others, I can recall almost the whole thing. 

The Little Matchbox Girl  (loved it the first two years I heard it but oh, how that one was over done! I wanted nothing to do with it nor to hear it any more by the time we were in 4th or 5th!)

Belinda and the Dragon (I still remember the name of the girl I first heard read this one!  I won't give her last name away online but Dee, I still recall watching you stand in the front of the class and read this...  I had never heard it before that but not only did I choose this as one of my readings when I went to speech contest, but it's one I found at our local library years later and went on to read to my own children when they were small).

"I'm writing this down so you'll know how it feels to be pushed and pushed until you can't take it anymore!  I've been swimming for seven years in competition.  There's a meet every weekend in the summer and once a week in the winter......"  I don't remember the name of this one, but I remember a good portion of the lines.  I recall the names of 2 classmates who chose this as their reading when it was finally 'our' time to choose readings.

And finally...  getting to the point of this post!!!  (Yes, for the record I am having my 5th cup of coffee today so I'm blaming it on the coffee talking again....)


I think I first heard a girl named Theresa read this to the class when I was in 4th grade.  I was happily listening, picturing her words playing out as images in my mind of a happy little baby... and then, the last line.  What?!  What!?  I was so confused, shocked and sad.  I almost wanted to cry.  I didn't understand abortion back then, didn't understand that last line...  I wasn't alone.  Silence followed her reading and then slowly, we clapped as we had to clap for all the older students who were reading to us.

This prose became the hot topic of 4th, 5th and 6th graders alike.  Whispered explanations, shock, sadness.  We were midwestern kids from a small town in the heartland in the mid-80's.  Killing an unborn baby was unbelievable to us... unheard of.  Babies were to be gushed over and loved and cherished! 

And that was (I think) the first time I learned about what abortion was - explained to us by the 'older kids' and forever being burned into my memory was this reading, which thankfully, I was able to find online.












DECEMBER 28: Today my mother killed me.


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