Spiritual Injury

Spiritual injury is not about religion. It is about the spiritual conflict abortion can throw you into even if you hadn't thought of yourself as a spiritual person.  In my clients' experience, spiritual injury is the seemingly unfixable separation of themselves from what is "most essential to their sense of self." This can be God, or it can be a less defined sense of their own goodness.

Some women feel this separation as an inability to participate in the life of their church.  Many Catholic women I have seen have felt unable to go to confession or receive communion/reconciliation after an abortion.  For years, Manuela felt that God was punishing her for having had an abortion.

Non-religious women suffering spiritual injury may feel they can't connect in a meaningful way with the most important people in their lives, or with essential and valued aspects of themselves.  June became disconnected from her sense of herself as a caring, nurturing woman.