'I knew my answer about kids would end us. I said it anyway.'

At 32, Ashlee Bunney found herself standing in her bathroom staring at a piece of plastic. The two lines on the pregnancy test felt less like a question and more like a statement.

It was positive.

And it was a situation Ashlee hadn't prepared for. Not really.

What she did know was that she'd never wanted kids "enough." Not in her heart, not in her life, not in this situation.

"It was never going to be this perfect nuclear family situation," she told Mamamia.

With that clarity, she decided to have an abortion.

Wrapped up in the support of her friends, Ashlee knew she had made the right decision. What she couldn't have known was it was a choice that would, years later, give her the strength to face the hardest goodbye of her life.

Listen to 'The third wheel that's ruining my relationship' on Mamamia Out Loud. Post continues below.

The procedure was a weight off Ashlee's shoulders.

"I just knew that I had made the right decision for me and this potential child as well," she said.

In the days and weeks that followed, she felt calm. She genuinely believed she had processed the choice and moved on.

"I don't feel like I pushed any kind of grief down," she recalled.

But a year later, her body told a different story.

Ashlee found herself battling sleepless nights and felt like a "zombie", dragging herself through days with nothing that seemed to work.

A conversation with her friend helped her realise it had been a year since her abortion, and she began to wonder: "What was my body trying to tell me?"

She describes the period that followed as a "big self-development, eat, pray, love journey."

Image: Instagram/ashleebunney.

Ashlee sought help from psychologists and psychotherapists and was eventually diagnosed with high-functioning anxiety.

She came to realise her body had been "keeping score" even if her mind hadn't.

Through her exploration, Ashlee realised her anxiety wasn't about the abortion itself, but about what it represented: a hard-won, clear decision to make her life look a certain way.

"You made this really strong decision to make sure that your life looks a certain way, but you're still holding yourself back," she said.

"You're not going for what you really want in life, you're still not chasing your dreams."

So Ashlee took action in her life. She studied to become a wedding celebrant and launched her own business. She healed herself, and in doing so, created a life she truly wanted.

Watch: A woman shares her decision to be child-free. Post continues below.

Ashlee finally felt like she was building the life she was always meant to live. And, as if right on cue, he walked into her life. The kind of man who was kind, funny and someone she could genuinely see a future with.

"I was finally settled within myself. I'd finally done the thing and was going after what I wanted," she said.

"And then that's when someone amazing was free to come into my life, and I was evolved and available enough to see him and accept him."

They met through a matchmaking agency and hit it off on the first date. Things were a slow burn rather than instant chemistry — just how Ashlee preferred.

"We had a lot in common," Ashlee recalled.

Kids were a topic they brought up from the very beginning.

"I've always had this theory that it would be meeting someone with whom I could see myself having a family with that might spark that in me either way," Ashlee said.

He shared a similar view — not a firm 'yes', but he knew it was something he wanted on his radar. They were on the same page, for now.

After almost two years together, they went on a holiday, but something was different. A quiet clarity was settling inside of Ashlee. The answer she had been waiting for was here.

"I wasn't like 100 per cent absolutely not never, but I definitely wasn't anywhere near a yes," she said.

She realised she needed to make a choice — not just for him, but for herself.

"I probably could have been lingering in limbo about it forever, but sometimes you've just got to make that choice and sit with it and then see how it lands," she said.

Image: Instagram/ashleebunney.

The decision felt right. It felt settled.

When they got back from their trip, Ashlee told him.

"I'm not still not 100 per cent either way, but if I have to make a call today, it's a no," she said.

"It's just nowhere near enough of a f*** yes. So, it's a f*** no."

Her partner wasn't surprised. They had spoken about it just months before, but he needed time to think.

"He went and spoke to a therapist… she said that he lit up like a Christmas tree when he was speaking about having a family. So I guess that was his body telling him what was true for him," she said.

It was a devastating end to a loving relationship, but they both knew it was the only way forward. As Ashlee puts it, "Kids are not a compromise."

"We are not compatible in this really, really important fundamental way," she said.

The choice to split was hard, but the idea they might grow to resent each other if one of them had to compromise was harder.

Ashlee's experience has led her to a powerful belief: we need to listen to our bodies.

'"For me, having children was heavy and being child-free was light," she said.

She believes it's time for women, especially, to stand in their power with these decisions.

"The more we talk about it… the easier it's going to be for everyone to accept that abortion is and being child-free is normal. And women having bodily autonomy and making their own decisions that's true for them, regardless of society's beliefs or expectations or patterns, that's the most important thing."

Feature image: Instagram/ashleebunney.