Could I have gotten away from J3?

To inaugurate this blog: How Deadmoney stacked off with J3s.

So I was up last night until I called off about 250$ with J3 of spades. I would rather have folded that. It was 1/2 nl holdem and I straddled. There was a raise to 12$ so I was getting decent odds on the preflop call (8:68ish). On the flop of 9s 8s 7c I had a flush draw and a gutshot.

Against the 2 guys I was getting roughly 2:1 on the call, it cost me about three calls totaling 230$ to reach the showdown. They had a set of 8s and 10-9s in clubs respectively. I called, the set of 8s won as he deserved to.

My first ever pokerstove (I'm a late bloomer) gave my equity at 31%. It was pretty much an even money decision in hindsight when I knew what they had. No image could be gained since I was going to leave soon anyway.

However I 'm not proud of it. I need to make money, not justify even money bets after the fact. I also think that if I spread out their ranges to include larger flush draws then it becomes a much worse call. But actually it would be the calls because the betting was staggered and each individual bet seemingly offered good pot odds. There I go justifying again.