The other day I happened upon Seattle based abortion clinic Feminist Women’s Health Center’s site. I browsed through their site and almost felt pretty good learning about all the different forms of birth control and abortions one can buy at this clinic. The site has the typical smiling, ethnically diverse women on their front page.
I decide to hit the “abortion” section and I happened upon the “Personal Experience” page. My favorite, is how the Header says “Many Voices, Many Choices” yet all of the voices and choices are only ONE–ABORTION. Now, one would THINK that at an abortion clinic would post “My abortion was the best thing I have ever done in my life.” Interestingly enough, the clinic doesn’t. As a matter of fact, this web page could honestly be a page for “My abortion devastated me!” There are common themes: 1)Coercion into abortion is evidently normal. Parents, husbands, boyfriends who tell women they better abort or else. 2) The feeling that they had “no choice.” So much for “pro-choice.” People who choose abortion choose it with despair.
Here are only a few snippets of stories; there are 500 in all.
Samantha’s story on page 2:
It’s just, going through the abortion, was hard for me. It was maybe one of the worst things I have ever experienced. Not so much the procedure itself, but that hurt feeling I felt inside for so long afterwards, the guilt. It’s something that I never again thought I would have to experience, but now I’m afraid I have to. It’s my only choice really. I don’t want to tell my boyfriend about it though, if at all possible. I know that I will have to, but I’m just not sure how he will react, I don’t want him to get angry. I don’t need anymore stress in my life right now.
Natalie’s story (boyfriend coerced her), pg 1:
First question he asked: Are you sure I’m the father? He paid for half of the abortion and the medicines; he went with me to the clinic and waited 3 hours for me. During the first week he was calling me quite often to see if I was doing all right and of course he quit such abnormal behavior on the second week. He gave the line that he liked me a lot but he was confused blah,blah… He just dumped me for someone who is better looking than me and who has more money and I find out that he was supportive because he was making sure I wasn’t taking his money (what a big skunk – $130). He did this after we went to the clinic and they told me everything was “OK.”
Emma’s story:
I remember facing this decision during each of my last four pregnancies, it was during the early weeks of the fourth pregnancy, when my husband (then of 8 years), and I made our choice. Even so, 8 years later, and it still eats at me. It has caused me to have onsets of depression, and took away from my self-image as a mother to the three children we already had. I’m not sure if I didn’t even resent my husband afterwards for pressuring me into having an abortion and am positive that the emotions after the abortion lead to some of the reasons we divorced.
Barbara’s story (her husband coerced her into an abortion):
Immediately after the procedure I was taken to a small room with several beds close together. There lay several woman who had just had the same procedures performed. I can remember wanting to get the hell out of there because everyone was crying. There was no one in there to console any of us. We were just another number in their daily routine. My baby would have been born in April of 94. I remember that day because my brother also has a child the same exact age as mine would have been.
Now, some may accuse me of selecting the ones who regret their abortions, but honest to God, I have read most of the testimonies and all I see is despair, hopelessness, regret, resignation. Even the ones who say how it was a good decision for them, say it like this:
Annie’s story, pg1:
I also thank God I live in a country that gives me that options. I am not looking forward to the protesters that I have been warned about but I am prepared, I have made my peace with myself and God and that is what is important to me.
Annie, why do you have to “make peace with God?” When I had my appendix taken out, I didn’t have any moral agonizing. I didn’t have to even ask God what His opinion was.
Kiki’s story, pg 9:
Abortion is never easy. I was 33. Involved with a man from the depths of hell. Now I can’t have children. But I would do it all over again if I was still involved with that man. I am now married to a wonderful man. Who knows about the abortion. He’s very supportive.
She didn’t CHOOSE abortion because it was a good thing. No, she “chose” abortion because her alternative was worse than killing her own child. Note how she talks about the “man from the depths of hell.”
These are NOT happy women. The abortion clinic knows full well that these women are going to forever be wounded by their “decision” yet they only encourage them to do it! And “help” them along.
Sometimes anecdotes are more powerful than data, and in this case they are.
What MZ said.
I’ve often found the abortion-related posts on PostSecret to be heart-rending as well, though one never knows how many of those are legitimate.
Even if having an abortion is the most wonderful experience there is, it’s still immoral. Therefore, the point of this post is somewhat lost on me.
Among the saddest things I have ever read.
You know, arewak, there is a lot more to the Way of Christ than moral principle. If Jesus Christ the Word could empty Himself and take on our pitiful state, would it be too much to ask you to show a little sympathy for poor lost sinners?
No Daniel, didn’t mean it that way. Its just seems like the post is reaching for one more reason to show that abortion is evil and I’m saying that its not very productive. However, unlike our resident ‘pro-lifers’ who use abortion as a crutch for voting in degenerates, I think that we cannot depend on supreme court justices to fight this evil. The fight will be won at the grassroots by motivated and well-meaning folks (that’s all of us)through prayer vigils, education, adoptions,counseling, etc. I guess to any extent the above post does any of these, I stand corrected.
Arewak, the goal was to counteract the frequent claim by pro-choice and the abortion industry that abortion is “no big deal.” From PP’s site on abortion: “Some women experience anger, regret, guilt, or sadness for a short time. ” That is NOT what these letters show.
Who said ANYTHING about the Supreme Court?
And I DO believe that these letters are a form of education. They cut through the hype created by those who want abortion on demand. Did you check out the site? All they show are happy smiling women on their page. On the letters section, why aren’t they showing women crying, devastated, or lonely? They don’t and they should.
Thank you rcm for bearing witness once again, damingly out of the cyber-mouths of those who cheer abortion to the rafters, that for those undergoing it it it is often hell, and that again and again the constant is absent male s**** who run away when the time comes for decisions. If only the Church could make it more clear in her anti-abortion witness that the blame falls equally, if not more, on the men who run away as much as the women who are left behind to walk the valley of the shadow of death without the Lord there to guide them.
Anathema to the abortionist.
Anathema to the executioner.
Anathema to the warmonger.
Anathema to the devotee of realpolitik.
Anathema to the worshipper of the Kali-free market.
Anathema to all who art a sustainer of poverty.
Anaethema to all enemies of life.
Maranatha Jesu, come and cast Death and Hades and all their servants into the lake of fire.
The right to choose is the ultimate triumph of freemarket principles.
Why are we not congratulating this organization for avoiding stereotypical representations and for giving women a forum to share their experiences of abortion from a wide variety of perspectives?
The stories of anguish that Radical Catholic Mom cites did not slip in against the intentions of the Women’s Health Center. The stated purpose of this section of their website is to share stories to promote understanding and healing — all kinds of stories from women with very different perspectives on abortion. Barbara’s story, which RCM discusses, is in fact clearly and unambiguously pro-life. In short, the Women’s Health Center deserves credit for NOT suppressing stories that complicate or that frankly disagree with a simplistic pro-choice line.
That said, I spent some time reading these stories and I do think they are more diverse than RCM suggests. For example, Kathleen asserts she has never felt regret. Ann tells a harrowing story of being raped by her boyfriend in Pre-Roe days and the agony of bearing the child that kept her connected to an incredibly abusive man.
Radical Catholic Mom and several other commentors are correct that irresponsible or abusive men are the common theme in most of these stories. That suggests that the real solution to the abortion problem is going to be empowering women. Empowerment begins with really listening to women’s experiences and not just trying to shoehorn them into our position on abortion rights. Seems like the Feminist Women’s Health Center has gone a long way toward doing this. Have we?
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