I know what we say – that it’s fine, it’s good, for us to be uncommitted and casual, it’s the 1970s, we don’t need the old rules. You often say, as you’re leaving, that, ‘You know this is nothing serious, right, darling?’ (And don’t think I haven’t noticed how rarely you bother to use my name, honey.) But I suspect that, when it came to it, you would not like the fact that I was playing that game, too.

John, you’re a lot like a lot of men I know, or know of. You’re all for liberation and being open so long as you’re the one who’s being casual. But you like to think that the women you’re casual with are just waiting for your call. And I don’t think it occurs to you that if you did want to be more than casual, and you wanted us to have stickers with our names across the top of your car windscreen, and meet each other’s families, I would run a mile. We’re trying to make a new world but, man, those old assumptions, about what women want: they cling on. They will not die.

Unwanted foetuses are another matter. I didn’t tell you about it because I didn’t have the time, or inclination, to argue with you about your rights and your desires. Throwing up your guts takes time, and so does going to your doctor and letting him think you’re too fragile for motherhood so he and his colleague will sign you off to get that squatter hoovered out of there.

My body. My abortion.

It wasn’t very nice, but it was better than a rusty coat-hanger and septicaemia, or a punctured uterus. It was better than gin and a hot bath or a well-meaning hairdresser that a sister told me about sluicing me out with bleach on her kitchen table, and hoping no one reports her to the police. It was better than having a kid, for that matter. But up until a decade ago, those would have been the only options I had.

I imagine, John, that you think I’m writing this letter because I want you to come round with flowers, and tell me I am brave, and I didn’t have to do this alone, and you’re here for me. I expect, if you did, you’d feel like a hero.

Well, you’re wrong. (I wish you’d learn, John. I’ve been trying to educate you for years now. I know we have many centuries of patriarchal bullshit to scrape away, but I’ll be honest. I’d hoped we might be making a dent in it at this point. Maybe if you start working on it from your end, we’ll make a new way faster.)