When I was a teenager growing up in Portugal, I used to joke with my friends that pregnancy is like cancer—if you don't treat it right away, it has no cure. Underneath the sarcasm was a serious truth: I already knew I didn’t want children. I had seen enough of this world to understand how cruel people can be, especially toward the most vulnerable. I couldn't imagine bringing a child into a world that exploits innocence and protects power.
At the age of 20, during a chaotic and repressive time in Portugal, I became pregnant. Abortion was illegal then. But I was clear: I would not be forced into motherhood. I had an illegal abortion. It saved my life—not just physically, but emotionally and spiritually. Today, abortion is legal in Portugal, and I am grateful that young women no longer have to go underground like I did to reclaim body autonomy.
In 2013, CNN invited women to share their abortion stories on their website. They announced that the most popular stories—those with the most comments and shares—would be selected for a live show. It was clear they were hoping to amplify stories of women who regretted their abortions, to quietly promote a pro-life agenda. But my story, A Life-Saving Experience, didn’t fit their script. It rose to the top—garnering the most attention and the most heartfelt, insightful comments from readers who resonated with my clarity and strength.
And then... CNN deleted everything.
First, they erased all the comments—hundreds of voices that dared to speak the truth in a society built on shame and hypocrisy. Later, they deleted the entire collection of abortion stories. Silenced. Erased. Buried. Like so many truths that threaten the emotional blindfolds of the powerful.
Thankfully, I had a gut feeling this might happen. I saved the comments and republished them on my blog in a post titled CNN Deleted All the Comments on the Abortion Stories on Their Site. And you can still read the original story, A Life-Saving Experience, where I share the truth the media tried to erase.
As Alice Miller wrote:
"Rather than take the risk, they prefer to forgo information that might be of life-death importance for coming generations... Clearly, the prospect of confronting one’s own personal history is an alarming experience... At every attempt to share the new discoveries I made with the public, I ran up against the most determined resistance on the part of the media... All too often, the media buttress the wall of silence against which all those who have begun to confront their own childhood rebound.”
CNN didn’t want to confront the truth. They wanted regret. They wanted shame. They wanted to reinforce the old lie that women don’t know what’s best for their own bodies and lives. But I knew. I know. And no amount of digital erasure will ever silence the truth.
Thank you for sharing this raw, courageous, and deeply important story, Sylvie. You lived through something so many women are forced to endure in silence—and you spoke up with clarity, conviction, and compassion. What CNN did is unforgivable but not surprising. Like so many mainstream institutions, they pretend to seek truth but censor anything that doesn’t fit their predetermined narrative. As Alice Miller said: “The fear of facts is stilled by a fascination with intellectual terms and abstractions aimed at concealing and masking the truth.”
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