Abortion Gang

This tweet-stream is from a friend of mine @KnittingRad (named by permission). She posted it on Sunday 1/22/2012, the 39th anniversary of Roe v. Wade, where she shared publicly for the first time that she’s had an abortion. I asked her permission to share it via the Abortion Gang, and she enthusiastically agreed

I feel strongly that more women’s stories of having abortions need to be told, need to be heard. We need to encourage each other as women to come out of the shadows, out of the shame, and out of the imposed stigma. It’s only by the sharing of our stories and asserting the rightness of those choices (especially when they include abortion) that we begin to dismantle the stigma of abortion.

I’m proud to know @KnittingRad; for this and many other reasons she’s a brave, fierce woman.

Job interviews and dating have a lot in common. They both involve a great deal of verbal and physical posturing, specific outfits and, at least one party wondering how truthful the other was… and if it was a one time encounter. Of course, a job interview is typically focused entirely on trying to land a position, while dating is a series of lengthy dinners and various recreational activities with the rather ambiguous goal of “getting to know each other.”

First dates, at least in my experience, typically cover the basics. Profession, state or town of origin, and a lengthy list of the most interesting hobbies that each participant can rattle off. A recent first date of mine resembled a geography bee as my date angled to impress me with the various places to which he had traveled.

No one wants to appear to be unattractive, either physically or otherwise, while on a date. So, hewing to advice long ingrained in us by our parents and teachers we stay away from topics like religion, doctors and politics. I may know whether the man sitting across from me is the “nice Jewish boy” of my (and my mother’s) dreams based upon stories of a childhood at Camp Ramah or be able to guess based upon a last name ending in “stein” or “witz,” but unless I ask, how will I know how he feels about abortion?

Straddling religion and politics, the A-word, as I privately call it, is at once both intensely personal and wildly inflammatory given the current political environment. There is no easy way to slip it into conversation on a first date. On a second or third date, when we have moved on to feigning enthusiasm for activities like bowling, salsa dancing and traipsing through numerous local tourist attractions, it seems even harder to ask the question. After all, the goal while dating is to show off the most fun, worldly yet not crazy version of ourselves, and while abortion is implicitly linked to sex, there is nothing sexy about it.

Still, I cannot imagine ever hopping into bed with someone without knowing now he feels about abortion and the current laws restricting it.

I’m curious, am I the only one who struggles with how to best ferret out is nugget of information? Would you stop dating an otherwise seemingly normal person if you found out that they were anti-choice?

A friend of mine recently celebrated her 30th birthday. She asked her party guests to give her their words of wisdom for making the most of her 30′s. I recommended that she schedule frequent hot dates with herself, and I gave her some bubble bath and cheap wine to get her started in the right direction. After I gave her this gift, I had to ask myself why I’m not following my own advice.

I think this is a quandry that many of us can relate to. As activists, we’re so busy taking care of other people that it’s often hard to find time to take care of ourselves.

One of my mentors gave me some good advice when I graduated from college. “Take care of yourself,” she said, “or you will burn out and you won’t be able to take care of anyone else.” I followed her advice by treating myself to expensive haircuts, cheap pedicures, and frequent sushi dinners. My budget ain’t what it used to be – so these days my version of treating myself involves a six-pack of cheap beer and a Netflix marathon.

I know I’m not the only one who struggles with self care. If you work at a clinic or an abortion fund, how do you decompress at the end of a shift? Do you have a hard time disconnecting from other people’s emotional baggage like I do, or have you developed a successful strategy for being compassionate and still taking care of your own emotional well being?

On the same note, for those of us with anti-choice family members, how do you handle family gatherings? I have typically tried to avoid discussing health care or politics. But that strategy crapped out on me over the holidays when my mom started asking me why I don’t support adoption over abortion. I walked away from a fight and took a shower to calm down. However, I can’t do that with every confrontation. I’d love to find a few strategies for dealing with anti-choice family confrontations.

How you practice self-care?

Hi. I’m a writer here at AbortionGang. I’m also a Christian. Nice to meet you!

It seems that a lot of press around our recent #10forTebow campaign is suggesting that we hate God, or Christians, or Jesus, or faith. This is simply not true.

If you take a second look at Sophia’s original post, you’ll see she never says a single bad thing about Christianity. She may laugh at Tebow’s excessive focus on his faith, but that is entirely about Tebow’s actions, not the religion he follows.

Some people may believe that being antichoice and Christian go hand in hand- to attack one is to attack the other. This also is untrue. Taking a stand against being antichoice is not taking a stand against Christianity.

Christianity has been separated into many different organized religions, and some Christians choose to create their own faith, outside of organized religion. I am not here to say which group or type is a/the True Christian, but I do want to point out that this diversity means there is a diversity of beliefs among Christians related to abortion.

One of the first abortion funds ever established was created by ministers, who were counseling women with problem pregnancies, and seeing the horrible effects of back-alley abortions. These ministers worked together to direct women to medically-safe abortion locations, and eventually they raised the money to fund an abortion clinic in their area. In this way, Christians were some of the first supporters of abortion funding, and keeping women safe.

Christians today continue to support a woman’s right to choose. There are many Christian organizations and denominations that have spoken up for women and their families: Catholics for Choice, Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice, The United Methodist Church, the United Church of Christ, and more.

Christians have a long history of supporting choice, and we will continue to support choice in the future. Being prochoice does not mean one hates God, or is against faith. Donating to an abortion fund as part of the #10forTebow campaign is one more way that Christians can do good in their community and help their fellow human, as God has asked us to. This campaign is for everyone who disagrees with Tebow’s antichoice position, not just atheists or agnostics who disagree with him.

I’ve had a lot of new year’s resolutions. I’ve had some successes: I still take a dance break every week and write letters by hand and many more failures: I still over-caffeinate, overspend, oversnack, and answer many questions with questions (not answers).  After a lot of thinking and reflecting and writing, I’ve realized what I really want to say I’ve done a little better when 2013 rolls around.   In 2012, I resolve to complain less, envision more.

See, I’m good at complaining.  As a social worker, I advocate professionally.  Part of being an educator on sexual violence is talking about injustice and what needs to change.  I agitate for pay, and I like to think for a good cause.  I call “bullshit” on the regular.  I look at my accomplishments as an activist and justify my outlook, even as this behavior breeds negativity and enervates me.  I can see a change made in the life of one of my clients and can go home to come back again tomorrow and kvetch some more.  I can practice self-care and think I’m doing what I need to do to sustain myself, at least in the short-run.  I channel my perfectionism and my outrage and my ire into trying to make the world a little less fucked up, one person or group of people at a time.

A lot of what we do as activists though is respond to attacks, and it can be engaging but also exhausting. I rally against much more than I rally for. I fight back much more than I fight for.  I am often reactive, rarely proactive.  I feel like I did as an awkward middle-schooler playing dodgeball.  I’m balled up in the corner, ball in hand, fending off an onslaught. I’m dodging, not throwing.  My glasses knocked on the ground, my vision obfuscated, focused on doing what we need to do to survive, feeling too overwhelmed to remember that we deserve to thrive.  And because this seemingly endless barrage mirrors the greater injustice those I serve (and let’s be real, I personally) have experienced, I often feel I only have enough energy to mount an admirable defense.  And that’s ridiculous and unsustainable.

I am not in middle school, and I do have some amount of power and control over at least a small piece of the world.  I can lob my own ball. Better yet, I can change the rules.  I can pick my own team. I can look around and see that I’m on a really fierce team already and use that to my advantage.  I know that I can’t play this game this way forever.  Burnout is real, and I don’t want to quit.

I let myself off the hook because I sometimes see my current paradigm as the only one that will ever exist.  I get self righteous.  Forces seemingly beyond my control (bigotry, violence, oppression) seem way too gargantuan when I have fires to fight right in front of my face.  I am deciding, despite my good intentions, to at least partially believe that change is impossible on a grander scale and that all we can do is keep helping individual people not have to face these injustices alone.  I can justify this as better than ignoring the problem, but I know I need a reframe.  Despite my privileges, I choose to push back rather than push forward.  I dwell in bullshit rather than in possibility.

So, for 2012, I resolve to create, to brainstorm, to envision, to bring together, to build, to facilitate conversation, to ask what if.  I resolve to not only deflect dodgeballs but to figure out how to inch toward a world where the rules are different.  I resolve to take time every day to imagine the world I want to live in five, ten, twenty years from now, the world I want for my children, the world I want for my grandchildren (should my children choose to have children). I resolve to start there and work backwards to today and to do the creative rather than defensive work I need to do to help us get there.  I resolve to, as my mentor has always said to me, use my powers for good.  I will use my power, regardless of how limited in scope, to move beyond fighting back.

We deserve sustainable movements. We deserve to be able to come together, empowered to articulate our own futures.  If we don’t come together to create our future, who will?  Even though there are days I still feel like it, I am not in middle school. And I am not last-picked in dodgeball. We are in this together, and we have the skills.  What do you want to see, and how can we work together to get there?

You may have learned recently that Michelle Duggar was pregnant for the 20th time. You may have also learned that she recently miscarried a baby girl at 19 weeks who the family has named Jubilee Shalom Duggar. You may have read about the funeral service that they held for Jubilee, or you may have seen these photos (trigger warning: fetus photos) of little Jubilee’s hands and feet being held, gently and carefully, by Michelle.

The Duggar family, specifically Michelle and her daughters, get a lot of flack for the lifestyle choices they’ve made (or, in the case of her daughters, will make) from the general populous. Michelle is derogatorily referred to as “Clown-Car-Uterus” (I kid you not, see the comments here, but only if you feel like losing your faith in humanity), and other people feel content to interpret Michelle’s recent miscarriage as a “sign from God” that the Duggars need to stop having children (contrary to Michelle’s belief that “God giveth, so he shall also taketh away”).

While I, personally, had a negative, visceral reaction to the photos that the family displayed at the funeral service, I don’t want to diminish their grieving. If these photos had not been sold to a tabloid (really, TMZ? shame on you), then no one outside of family and friends would have seen them. They would have remained mementos to mark the passing of a sibling and daughter. And how can anyone disrespect their choice of how to grieve? What I find to be unconscionable was that someone close to the family made money off of their misfortune by selling these to a tabloid.

And I fear how these photos will be used going forward. Anti-choice propaganda is rife with these sorts of images. Some, caring and gentle, like Michelle’s memorial photos, others, bloody and violent. I fear that these photos will go viral and will be used to further a message that I find to be so damaging to women in our society. I fear that someone, somewhere is going to see these triggering images, and feel pain or shame or guilt over her own miscarriage or abortion. I fear the a woman who is looking at her life and considering her choices is going to feel shamed into a choice she doesn’t want to make by these images. I worry about the harm that this image can, and likely will, do.

As someone who has suffered a miscarriage, I can empathize with Michelle and the Duggars need to grieve. I also feel that, as a pro-choice population, we need to support Michelle’s right to choose to continue to get pregnant.

But we can also be cognizant of how the Duggars narrative affects the pro-choice narrative, skewing it in one direction. Michelle is likable and accessible, and she makes the Duggars, as a whole, an easier sell. She discusses her faith and her choices in a very non-defensive, calm manner. She carefully chooses her words and her actions, and she sets a very high standard for other Christian women. And all of this would be well and good if it was reflective of the reality of Christian women. Sadly, the reality for other women can differ drastically from the world the Duggars live in. Not all Christian families can afford, both literally and figuratively, for “God to bless them” so frequently. Jim Bob, Michelle’s husband, is a successful realtor and investor, and they supplement their income with royalties from their reality show (which is not acknowledged by the Duggar family on their website). When questioned about money, they reply that they live frugally. While that is likely true, it doesn’t provide a full picture. Similarly, when asked about her pregnancy difficulties, Michelle replies that, while practice certainly helps, her recent weight loss of 40 lbs has been the most helpful thing. No mention of her struggles with preeclampsia with Josie, born at 25 weeks, and certainly no mention of her most recent miscarriage. And finally, the narrative of the Quiverfull Christian is significantly downplayed on the show. They rarely discuss the dangers of multiparity to Michelle’s health, but when forced to respond, Michelle easily answers by saying that she would give her life for her not-yet-born child. And this may seem like the obvious answer to anti-choice people, but what if a mother wants to be alive to parent her other children? What if the father figure is no longer present? What happens to those already-born children if their mother dies for her pregnancy? The Duggars are lucky enough to have Jim Bob, and the support of their community, family and friends. Not all Christian women are so lucky.

Simply put, the Duggars are not reflective of a typical Christian family, nor are their choices reflective of the options available to most women. However, their choice to have more children is theirs and theirs alone. We can stop supporting tabloids that buy these images; we can stop watching the Duggars show; but we cannot tell Michelle and Jim Bob how and when to reproduce.

I generally don’t acknowledge the haters, the violent threats, and anger in emails and responses to the pro-choice articles and blog posts I have written over the years, but today I feel compelled to respond with a reminder to everyone in the movement, sympathizers and the anti-choice readers: abortion saves lives. Furthermore, threats over email, in comment threads, or to my face won’t make me back down. Pro-choice advocacy isn’t going anywhere, not now, not after so many battles have been won and lost.

A friend of mine just informed me that she and her husband have decided to begin trying for a baby. How amazing for them, and such a happy time, too, because they have both chosen the time that’s right for their family to have a child. Their decision has come after much deliberation, planning, and consideration- probably how it should be for all parents. But as we all know, this isn’t how many children come into this world.

Many pregnancies are unplanned, mine was, and I know first hand the internal and external struggle to make my (emphasis on that word, readers) choice: abortion, adoption, or parent. Ultimately, I chose to stay pregnant and now have the most wonderful seven year old boy. But what if I had another child between his birth and now? Would I still be in college? What would our standard of living be? Do I want to travel? Birth control and abortion have allowed me not to fret about those very real questions. My life is better and consequently, so is my son’s, because I have the option to pursue my goals, dreams, aspirations, and express myself sexually (if I so choose) without having to fear becoming pregnant, and knowing that if by some stroke of bad luck, I became pregnant I would not have to remain if I did not so choose.

That’s the beauty of reproductive freedom: we women don’t have to have our uteri and fallopian tubes chained up in anti-choicer’s dogma. And I think ultimately that’s what drives a lot of the anti-choice vitriol. Because we women dare to imagine a world where our bodies are ours alone, where the organs inside of us don’t dictate what decisions we can make in our lives, where morality is not universal and based upon that same organ.

My life today, the ability to sit here and type this post is a direct result of the advances made by pro-choice advocates throughout the years – before and after Roe v. Wade. Some may say the rights of the cells that could potentially implant themselves inside an organ I was born with but did not ask for are more important than my own, I say no they’re not. Some may feel that because our morals and beliefs do not align I am evil, a murderer, or some other vile thing, I say the work I do and those on this site saves lives of women.

Too many lives are at stake, women’s freedom and quality of life are at risk. And it is that very fact that means this movement, our cause, despite threats will not go away.

Yesterday, the US Department of Health and Human Services announced that they are blocking Plan B from being sold on pharmacy shelves to whoever needs it. This goes against FDA recommendations to remove all restrictions to accessing Plan B, including lifting age restrictions and requiring Plan B to be sold on pharmacy shelves instead of behind-the-counter.

Plan B One-Step is a brand of morning after pill, which works the same way as birth control pills to prevent pregnancy. It’s more effective the earlier it’s taken, but can be taken up to 72 hours after sex. Plan B cannot terminate a pregnancy- -it is not an abortion pill. Plan B is currently available over the counter to people 17 years old and older. Anyone under 17 must go to the doctor and get a prescription before they can get Plan B.

Plan B is extremely safe, and as the FDA’s approval has shown, there is no reason for it to be locked away. A report released this month makes this clear, stating that “no deaths or serious complications have been causally links to emergency contraceptive. According to the U.S. Medical Eligibility Criteria for Contraceptive Use, there are no situations in which the risks of using [emergency contraceptive pills] outweigh the benefits.” Compare that to the 450 deaths from liver failure in 2004 due to an overdose of acetaminophen,the drug found in Tylenol. And yet walk into any pharmacy and you’ll find Tylenol available over the counter.

Although it’s clear that Plan B is safe for women and girls of all ages, HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius overruled the FDA’s medically-based, scientifically accurate decision. In her very brief memorandum, Secretary Sebelius claims to worry about the 10% of girls who begin ovulating by 11.1 years old. Yet she doesn’t seem to suggest a problem of health, but instead “significant cognitive and behavioral differences between older adolescent girls and the youngest girls of reproductive age.” It seems that she is suggesting that young teens would not understand how to use Plan B, or that they would not act in a mature enough manner for Plan B.

This attitude is extremely condescending. No one fears that teenagers, even young teenagers, will not know how to use or will misuse Tylenol or Benadryl or Aleve, and thus should not have access to them. Even more damning is that condoms ARE available on the shelves. If we can trust people of any age to buy condoms, why can’t we trust them to buy Plan B? I am willing to bet that anyone 12, 13, or 14 years old who is going into a drugstore to buy Plan B is buying it because they need it. Young teens can’t drive and often don’t have large disposable incomes, so many would be purchasing Plan B with the help of their parents, older sibling, or friend. And if you don’t live in a city with easy public transportation, it takes a lot of effort for someone under the legal driving age to get to a drugstore without their parent’s knowledge; this is not something you’d do on a dare.

Young teenagers know about sex. They see it in our media, they hear about it in school (despite abstinence-only efforts) and they learn about it from their parents or friends. Plan B is a time sensitive medicine that is used after something has gone wrong. Whether that something is rape, a broken condom, or drunken, unprotected sex is important, but not so important as to block access to Plan B. If we’re worried about the “cognitive and behavioral differences” of young teens, we need to work on putting comprehensive sex education into schools, not taking away access to a safe medication.

It’s hard to understand how the Secretary thought there was good reason to contradict the FDA, especially when many clinicians, members of Congress, reproductive rights advocates and healthcare professionals saw no evidence to prevent Plan B from being over-the-counter. In fact, the effort to make emergency contraception available to all people of reproductive age started six years ago. In 2005, Susan Wood resigned from the FDA because of delays in approving Plan B over the counter. Today, she’s quoted in the Washington Post, saying:

“There is no rationale that can justify HHS reaching in and overturning the FDA on the decision about this safe and effective contraception. I never thought I’d see this happen again.”

Cross-posted from RH Reality Check, by both Steph Herold and Susan Yanow.

Last week, a 20-year-old woman in New York City was arrested on charges of “self-induced abortion” and faces first-degree misdemeanor charges.  Initial news reports indicate that she intentionally caused the miscarriage/abortion of her 24-week fetus.  The woman disposed of the fetus in what was probably the only way she could think of: wrapped in plastic bags and placed in the trash receptacle of her apartment building.

The prosecution of this woman echoes similar cases in Idaho, Massachusetts and South Carolina.  In spite of ever-increasing restrictions, abortion is legal through the second-trimester throughout the United States, although it is inaccessible to many women.  Yet if women safely end their pregnancies without medical supervision, they face criminal penalties.

The key word here is “safely.” There are many misconceptions about what happens during a non-surgical abortion.  In fact, abortion with medications (such as misoprostol alone or in combination with mifepristone) causes a miscarriage.  The symptoms of abortion with medicines in the first trimester are exactly the same as a miscarriage, and as safe.  Rarely do women who have a miscarriage need medical attention; the same is true for women having a medication abortion.

In the second trimester, the risks of a complication after a miscarriage, whether occurring spontaneously or provoked by medicines, is somewhat higher.  However, it is notable that the woman in New York City, like the women prosecuted in three other states, was in the second trimester and did not require any kind of medical intervention after her abortion.  We have to ask then – is the outcry when women choose to self-induce truly driven by the need to protect the health and safety of the woman?  Or is this another example of over-regulation because of the politics of abortion?

The choice to self-induce an abortion in New York City raises important questions.  The most recent prosecution of a woman for making this choice was in Idaho, in the spring of this year.  Jeanne McCormack was between 20 and 24 weeks pregnant, obtained medicines over the Internet and ended her pregnancy.  She was charged under an Idaho law that forbids abortions unless performed by an Idaho physician, and the original charges carried a possible five-year prison term.  Ms. McCormack, a low-income mother of three, said she ordered the medicines because the closest abortion provider was in Utah, and she had no money for travel or for the procedure.

Women in New York City have much better access to abortion care than Ms. McCormack did.  New York State allows state Medicaid funds to cover abortion services, and there are a number of clinics in New York City that provide abortion care through 24 weeks.  New York also does not have the restrictions, such as waiting periods and parental consent, that are insurmountable barriers for women in many other states.  So why would a woman in New York City decide to end her pregnancy by herself?

We don’t have details about why this particular woman chose this method.  Is it possible that the relentless headlines about new abortion restrictions across most states have confused some women, who may think that these laws are national?  Or is the (successful) effort by anti-abortion forces to stigmatize abortion effective enough that some women feel too much shame and fear to seek medical care when faced with an unwanted pregnancy? Or did this woman have no trusted health care provider who could direct her to a clinic?

Ultimately, it doesn’t matter what her reasons were for self-inducing an abortion. Not every woman wants clinicians involved in her health care, especially if she feels that she can take care of it herself. We each have different ways of dealing with our bodies, our sexuality, and our health care.

We do not have enough information to guess whether or not this woman fell through the gaps in the social support and health net, or made a conscious choice to end her pregnancy in a way that she felt most comfortable.  But why is self-treating an unwanted pregnancy a crime?

We certainly should do everything possible to provide excellent information to women about services and fight to keep abortion care widely available and accessible.  But if a woman decides that the best thing for her to do is to self-induce an abortion, she should have access to the best information available on how to do this safely (ie with medicines, NOT herbs) and know where to go in case of a complication.  Criminalizing her choices does not protect her health. If we believe that women have the right to control their fertility, then we must also trust women with the right to choose the methods that make the most sense for them.

Endnote: There are no scientific studies that identify any herbs as effective for ending a pregnancy, and some herbs are dangerous.  There are numerous studies documenting the efficacy and safety of mifepristone plus misoprostol, and misoprostol alone, for ending a pregnancy.

For more information on self-induction, see these studies:

- Self-induction of abortion among women in the United States

- How commonly do US abortion patients report attempts to self-induce?

- Re-emergence of self-induced abortions

- Misoprostol and attempted self-induction of abortion

- The knowledge, acceptability, and use of misoprostol for self-induced medical abortion in an urban US population  

Despite moments of pessimism and consternation over the years coping with the never-ending nonsense of anti-choice folks’ actions and propaganda, I’ve always been predominantly optimistic that legality of and access to abortion will remain sure and firm in this country. It’s always seemed a sure bet that eventually the antique notion that abortion is some terrible thing that should be outlawed would head the way of the dodo. But more and more these days I feel an unshakeable pessimism sinking into my bones, where my spans of optimism are now the exception rather than the rule.

And THAT is what’s given me a bad case of the grim-pessimisms these days, because if the most hyperbolic, highly- mock-able anti-choice propaganda is working on us liberal-minded folks – we’re in more trouble than I thought.