--- title: Wife of an Anti-Abortion Politician Discusses Her Abortion description: Stephanie Chatfield revealed her own experience with abortion in an open letter after receiving anonymous threats to out her story. canonical: https://time.com/4347949/lee-chatfield-wife-abortion/ author: TIME article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2016-05-25T19:18:31.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-04-13T09:02:35.362Z og:title: The Wife of an Anti-Abortion Politician Talks About Her Abortion og:description: And shut down the person who threatened to out her private experience og:url: https://time.com/4347949/lee-chatfield-wife-abortion/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt8114ce91b36a65e8/69888cb50a4a22dd199c9022/woman-back-lit-silhouette.jpg?branch=production&width=3840&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 675 og:image:alt: Young woman in silhouette. og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: The Wife of an Anti-Abortion Politician Talks About Her Abortion twitter:description: And shut down the person who threatened to out her private experience twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt8114ce91b36a65e8/69888cb50a4a22dd199c9022/woman-back-lit-silhouette.jpg?branch=production&width=3840&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # The Wife of an Anti-Abortion Politician Shared Her Abortion Story by [Jessie Van Amburg](/author/jessie-van-amburg/) ## Jessie Van Amburg May 25, 2016 7:18 PM CUT  Young woman in silhouette. Young woman in silhouette.Tim Robberts—Getty Images by [Jessie Van Amburg](/author/jessie-van-amburg/) ## Jessie Van Amburg May 25, 2016 7:18 PM CUT Stephanie Chatfield, the wife of Michigan state representative Lee Chatfield, took to her husband’s [Facebook page](https://www.facebook.com/voteleechatfield/posts/470804093117881 "undefined") May 20 to share some very personal news. She revealed to her husband’s supporters that she had obtained an abortion as a teenager. According to her open letter, Chatfield was allegedly raped at a party in high school. After finding out that she was pregnant, she decided to get an abortion—the “worst” decision of her life. “It’s haunted me. It’s made me weep,” she said in the emotional letter. “I knew that what I did was wrong at the time, but I never imagined the weight and guilt that I would carry as a consequence.” She was too ashamed to tell anyone and says only later did she eventually find forgiveness in God. Chatfield decided to discuss her abortion publicly for the first time after she says an unnamed person threatened to out her secret. “Your desire to see this story go public emboldened me to do something that I should have done years ago,” she wrote. Her husband, a Republican member of the Michigan State Senate, recently co-sponsored a bill [criminalizing certain abortion practices](https://www.legislature.mi.gov/documents/2015-2016/billanalysis/House/pdf/2015-HLA-4833-63768C0D.pdf "undefined"). [_Follow Motto on Facebook._](https://www.facebook.com/mottoworkplaylive/ "undefined") According to one study[, 95% of women](http://time.com/3956781/women-abortion-regret-reproductive-health/ "undefined") who receive abortions do not regret them. But it is not uncommon to hear abortion stories from anti-abortion advocates.”It’s a choice that I deeply regret, that deeply hurt me,” said Texas lawmaker [Molly White](http://time.com/hardest-speech/ "undefined") about her own abortion. Former presidential candidate [Carly Fiorina](https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/carly-fiorina-slips-two-new-words-in-a-rarely-told-tale-planned-parenthood/2015/10/27/b3703dc6-7c24-11e5-afce-2afd1d3eb896%5Fstory.html "undefined") discussed accompanying a college friend to Planned Parenthood for an abortion, citing her friend’s enduring “emotional scars” from the experience. Chatfield had a message in her letter for fellow anti-abortion activists: “Be against abortion—yes, but let’s continue being proactive and looking for young girls and women who are hurting, suffering and confused so we can offer them assistance.” ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/4347949/lee-chatfield-wife-abortion/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/4347949/lee-chatfield-wife-abortion/"},"headline":"The Wife of an Anti-Abortion Politician Shared Her Abortion Story","datePublished":"2016-05-25T19:18:31.000Z","dateModified":"2026-04-13T09:02:35.362Z","description":"And shut down the anonymous person who threatened to out her private experience","url":"https://time.com/4347949/lee-chatfield-wife-abortion/","keywords":["motto","News"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt8114ce91b36a65e8/69888cb50a4a22dd199c9022/woman-back-lit-silhouette.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Jessie Van Amburg","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/jessie-van-amburg/"}],"articleSection":"","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt8114ce91b36a65e8/69888cb50a4a22dd199c9022/woman-back-lit-silhouette.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"Young woman in silhouette.","caption":"","creditText":"Tim Robberts—Getty Images","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/tag/motto/","name":"motto"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/4347949/lee-chatfield-wife-abortion/","name":"The Wife of an Anti-Abortion Politician Shared Her Abortion Story"}}]}] ```