In the world, as estimated by the World Health Organization (WHO), there are approximately forty to fifty million abortions performed each calendar year. So then, this would presuppose that all these women undergoing abortions, would then, if abortion was a proximate cause of mental harm, be suffering quite a bit, worldwide, year after year after year. Not only that, but abortion has been legal for a considerable amount of time, so if abortion did really create mental harm for women, this would then be clear and obvious to those doing such a survey or research of the same.
The fact of the matter is rather obvious, that abortion does not cause mental harm; and if there is to be mental harm, such would be more frequently seen not in those having undergone a successful abortion, but rather it would be those that desired to have an abortion, but were denied access to such. In other words, it is the lack of women having good and fair access to abortion, that creates for them, more trouble, then for all those others that were able to secure an abortion without any undue trouble. Of course, there are always going to be exceptions to this general rule, but the reality is, that those seeking an abortion, are typically quite serious and clearheaded about accomplishing what they came in to so do.
None of this means that it's necessarily wrong for well-meaning outsiders to want to make the case to individual women, that a fetus, given enough time, becomes a child; but in fairness to all those that are contemplating an abortion, it is, after all, their physical body, and in this modern age, those of age, should be provided with the fair opportunity to make their own personal choice in regards to their body, and thereby their reproductive choice.
The main problem with so many of those that are anti-abortion, is not that they care for human life, or not that they care for the potential of human life contained with a given woman's uterus; but rather their main error is they make it their point, to basically come across as if they are personally on a crusade. There are, alas, many things one could have a crusade about, some of which are probably good, and some of which, are probably bad. What the anti-abortion activists seem to get so wrong, is that they believe that they have the right to control the sovereign body of another – of which they claim they are doing this for the best of reasons – in order to defend the life of the unborn; not seeming to realize that in order to do that, they must supersede the volition of another person's sovereignty.
In life, people have all sorts of regrets, and undoubtedly, for those that seek and thereby receive an abortion they have already weighed their options and the consequences, so of, in their mind – so then, to believe that they then have emotional regrets about the decision so made, isn't supported by the evidence, which clearly shows that when placed in an unenviable position of personal difficulty, women are going to make the decision that makes the most sense for them, and they are, just fine with that.