Speaker 1: Hi, everyone, I'm Katie Curic. Our series Abortion the Body
Speaker 1: Politic has wrapped, but we wanted to give the very
Speaker 1: last word to a special group of people, people who
Speaker 1: have had abortions. If we really wanted to see the
Speaker 1: real story of abortion in America and we really wanted
Speaker 1: to see what's actually going on with abortion access, we'd
Speaker 1: be asking the folks who have abortions, what did this
Speaker 1: mean to you? What was this like for you? How
Speaker 1: hard was it? How easy was it for you to
Speaker 1: get your abortion? Kelsey Rhodes is one of the first
Speaker 1: people we spoke to when we were reporting this series.
Speaker 1: She's the interim director of Communications at Physicians for Reproductive Health,
Speaker 1: and she's part of a team that put together guidance
Speaker 1: for journalists who are reporting on abortion, guidance that has
Speaker 1: been integral to this podcast. I think the number one
Speaker 1: tip is to center the lived experience as of folks
Speaker 1: who are actually impacted by abortion bands. So how are
Speaker 1: we sent ring what's going on with patients. How are
Speaker 1: we centering what's going on with the folks who are
Speaker 1: really providing that care and making that care possible. How
Speaker 1: are we listening to the lives that they're leading how
Speaker 1: this has impacted them, how it makes them feel, as
Speaker 1: opposed to centering the folks that are trying to strip
Speaker 1: this away and remove this from communities. Abortion should be
Speaker 1: able to be as public or as private as you want.
Speaker 1: No one should be forced to put their lives on
Speaker 1: display if they don't want to. But we do have
Speaker 1: a lot of amazing abortion storytellers who want to share
Speaker 1: how either life changing or absolutely normal and boring their
Speaker 1: abortion was for them. And that's the that's the case, right.
Speaker 1: This is something that um is a very normal and
Speaker 1: integrated part of a lot of people's lives and a
Speaker 1: lot of people's healthcare. You've heard many first person abortion
Speaker 1: stories throughout this series, but so many more were shared,
Speaker 1: some from seasoned abortion storytellers and others from people share
Speaker 1: for the very first time. Today. Organizations like Shout Your
Speaker 1: Abortion and we Testify help people do this. But the
Speaker 1: tradition of sharing abortion stories publicly started back in nineteen
Speaker 1: sixty nine in New York City. The first so called
Speaker 1: abortion speak out was organized by the socialist feminist group
Speaker 1: the Red Stockings. Naturally, Lauria Steinham was there. I was
Speaker 1: at New York. We had started New York magazine and
Speaker 1: I had a column there called The City Politic. So
Speaker 1: I went to an abortion speak out in a church
Speaker 1: basement somewhere downtown that they were conducting, and for the
Speaker 1: first time I saw I mean, I had not been
Speaker 1: all that secret about having an abortion, but certainly was
Speaker 1: not shouting it out in public. And they were having
Speaker 1: a public hearing, and women were getting up and telling
Speaker 1: their stories of having had to seek an illegal abortion,
Speaker 1: and also praising a doctor in Pennsylvania, I think, who
Speaker 1: had long been performing safe abortions. So it was the
Speaker 1: first time there was in my life that there was
Speaker 1: a public event in which abortion was discussed openly and honestly,
Speaker 1: and it did have a huge impact on me. It
Speaker 1: was one of the reasons basic reasons there came to
Speaker 1: be a feminist move when it was an extension of
Speaker 1: Jane and all of the underground networks. Uh, And it
Speaker 1: was just simply you know that we are equal citizens
Speaker 1: and we have power over our own lives, just as
Speaker 1: men do. Gloria Steinham kicks off our abortion speak out.
Speaker 1: She was twenty two when she had an illegal abortion
Speaker 1: in in nineteen I had graduated from college, I was
Speaker 1: engaged to be married to a very good, nice person,
Speaker 1: but I knew that it would be a big mistake
Speaker 1: for me, especially he was ten years older and more
Speaker 1: settled in his life. So I just fled to to
Speaker 1: London and it was there that I finally realized that
Speaker 1: I was indeed pregnant. I fantasized that I would go
Speaker 1: to Paris. Somehow I thought that Paris was a more
Speaker 1: accepting city. I forgot that it was also Catholic. Anyway, UM,
Speaker 1: I ended by calling up a physician just because he
Speaker 1: was I looked up his name in the phone book
Speaker 1: and he was close to where I was living. And
Speaker 1: I went to him and you know, confirmed that I
Speaker 1: was indeed pregnant, and you know, and it was clear
Speaker 1: to him that I did not want to be so
Speaker 1: he and I dedicated a book to him later because
Speaker 1: of this. He said, UM, if you never promise never
Speaker 1: to tell anyone wants anyone my name one and two,
Speaker 1: if you do what you want to do with your life,
Speaker 1: I will be the first signer because they are required to.
Speaker 1: And he sent me to a woman physician who actually
Speaker 1: did the abortion. So I dedicated a book to him,
Speaker 1: Dr John Sharp, who probably was not alive by then,
Speaker 1: but I wanted to thank him publicly. I sort of thought,
Speaker 1: just because of the culture I had grown up in,
Speaker 1: that perhaps I should feel guilty. So I walked around
Speaker 1: London for a few days trying to make myself guilty,
Speaker 1: and I couldn't. I absolutely could not, because it was
Speaker 1: clear to me that I had taken control. It was
Speaker 1: that it was my body, hello, and that it was
Speaker 1: my life. Uh. You know. I was helped in that
Speaker 1: by the doctor I went to, and then by the
Speaker 1: woman doctor he sent me to to perform the origin,
Speaker 1: because they were themselves very guilt free. But I was
Speaker 1: not helped in that by the culture of the nineteen
Speaker 1: fifties and I and I hope that that is over.
Speaker 1: I hope that women understand that we have a right
Speaker 1: and even a duty to control our own physical selves,
Speaker 1: that there is no democracy without that. My name is
Speaker 1: Renee Bracey Sherman, I used to her pronouns, and I
Speaker 1: am the founder and executive director of We Testify, which
Speaker 1: is an organization dedicate to the leadership and representation of
Speaker 1: people who have abortions. I had an abortion when I
Speaker 1: was nineteen. I was in a relationship with a guy
Speaker 1: who my parents couldn't stand and he was just we
Speaker 1: were in love, but it was a really toxic relationship.
Speaker 1: And the abortion itself was um actually quite wonderful. I
Speaker 1: remember being in the room and they explained to me
Speaker 1: everything that was going to happen. And the nurse she
Speaker 1: was this um tall white woman with dark black hair.
Speaker 1: She had a beret on and and um a shirt
Speaker 1: with a scrub top with long sleeves and a really
Speaker 1: long skirt and um a star of David. And so
Speaker 1: where I grew up there's a lot of Orthodox and
Speaker 1: also Hasidic Jews, and so UM. I remember feeling at
Speaker 1: first a little confronted because I was I felt like,
Speaker 1: you know, when you talk about an abortion, it's religious
Speaker 1: people don't support abortion, and then finding out that other
Speaker 1: faiths do, and actually Christianity really says nothing about it
Speaker 1: until the eight hundreds, and that that Judaism does support abortion.
Speaker 1: And so to see her there was really at first
Speaker 1: it was like drawing, but also reassuring when I learned
Speaker 1: so much more right and she held my hand through
Speaker 1: the procedure, and I remember laying back and looking on
Speaker 1: the ceiling and there were kind of the pulled out
Speaker 1: pages from the National Geographic just take to the ceiling
Speaker 1: and they were all of butterflies. And to this day,
Speaker 1: I mean, I'm sitting in my office right now and
Speaker 1: I'm looking at I have a butterfly on my um
Speaker 1: computer monitor, and I've butterflies on the wall and hanging.
Speaker 1: Because it did feel like this moment of transformation that
Speaker 1: was beautiful and that I felt really loved and supported,
Speaker 1: and she held my hand to the whole thing, and
Speaker 1: you know, she was just so wonderful. I don't know
Speaker 1: her name, but um, you know, and even in the
Speaker 1: recovery room she just sat there with me. I just
Speaker 1: remember feeling at peace and and you know, there's so
Speaker 1: many studies that say what is the most common feeling
Speaker 1: that people have after abortion, and it is relief and
Speaker 1: then of course a lot of other things, and there's
Speaker 1: mixed emotions. Like for me, there was sadness, not at
Speaker 1: all about the abortion, um, but just that I knew
Speaker 1: that after that that relationship was ending and that I
Speaker 1: would need to continue on with a different path in
Speaker 1: my life and letting go of a lot of things.
Speaker 1: And so UM, I'm really proud of myself and proud
Speaker 1: of nineteen year old Renee who was able to get
Speaker 1: herself to that clinic, um and get herself on a
Speaker 1: track to where I am right now, you know. And
Speaker 1: I later did tell my family. UM. I told my
Speaker 1: mom first, and she cried because she was so sad
Speaker 1: that she couldn't have been there to support me. Um.
Speaker 1: My dad was very like, I mean, it is your
Speaker 1: body or decision and got glad we didn't have that
Speaker 1: boyfriend in our lives for eighteen years, and I was like, yeah,
Speaker 1: that's true. Um. And then it wasn't until four years
Speaker 1: later that my mom finally told me that my life
Speaker 1: was made possible because she had an abortion before me.
Speaker 1: And I think I had told her when she told
Speaker 1: me this, like, I wish you had told me that
Speaker 1: earlier because I then would have gone to you when
Speaker 1: I had my abortion because I thought you were perfect.
Speaker 1: I didn't know you even dated anyone before Dad. I
Speaker 1: I thought every you did everything right and that I
Speaker 1: was just the funk up. And she was like, no,
Speaker 1: not at all, Like I'm so proud of you. And
Speaker 1: so this is why I share my story, and this
Speaker 1: is why we talk about it, because I think we
Speaker 1: forget to talk to the people in our families and
Speaker 1: our lives. We are afraid they're going to judge us,
Speaker 1: but the reality is that they're going to love us.
Speaker 1: That's why we say everyone loves someone who's had an abortion,
Speaker 1: and I it's brought me and my mother so much closer.
Speaker 1: My name is Jalen far Munson, and I'm the development
Speaker 1: and communications manager at fun Texas Choice. My first abortion,
Speaker 1: I was about twenty years old, and that wasn't I
Speaker 1: would say, a really pivotal moment for me. I just
Speaker 1: felt like at that time it made a lot of sense.
Speaker 1: I was in college. I didn't want to have a
Speaker 1: child with the person that you know was the father,
Speaker 1: and so I decided, okay, like that's it was an
Speaker 1: easy decision for me. And I was living in Maryland
Speaker 1: at that time, where access to abortion um is pretty
Speaker 1: it's a lot easier than in Texas obviously, But then
Speaker 1: this time around it was different because I was twenty
Speaker 1: nine and I do want children. Having children and something
Speaker 1: that I do want, and so when my partner and
Speaker 1: I had to have that really difficult conversation, we hadn't
Speaker 1: known each other very long, and so we're kind of
Speaker 1: sitting here like, okay, we do really like each other,
Speaker 1: and we do really want this relationship to go forward,
Speaker 1: but we don't feel prepared to bring another person when
Speaker 1: we barely know each other. Um, And so that was
Speaker 1: very difficult. But I found out I was pregnant a
Speaker 1: week before SP eight went into effect, and so while
Speaker 1: navigating our romantic relationship, we also had to navigate this
Speaker 1: new law. And so when I found out, I booked
Speaker 1: an appointment going to college's office and I went in
Speaker 1: and they told me, you know, unfortunately, we can't terminate
Speaker 1: the pregnancy for you. We don't do that here. Um.
Speaker 1: They gave me the name of a doctor on a
Speaker 1: sticky note and was like, you know, call this this
Speaker 1: doctor essentially, and so I called that clinic and I
Speaker 1: made that first appointment, and unfortunately, in Texas there's a
Speaker 1: mandatory waiting period of twenty four hours, so they were
Speaker 1: able to get me that first appointment, which was a
Speaker 1: few days before September one. But they told me, honestly,
Speaker 1: you know, we may not be able to see you
Speaker 1: for the second appointment if the law goes into effect
Speaker 1: on September one and you're far enough a long at
Speaker 1: we're not able to help you. So I decided to
Speaker 1: go to the appointment anyway, um, and just like kind
Speaker 1: of risk it. And so when I got there, I
Speaker 1: just remember walking in and seeing so many people there.
Speaker 1: So we're still in the pandemic, and there's at least
Speaker 1: fifty people in that waiting room, and so that alone
Speaker 1: gave me anxiety. They called us by numbers. They didn't
Speaker 1: call us by names, because that's how many people they
Speaker 1: have to see in a day that I guess using
Speaker 1: names it's just probably not efficient, which I understand, but
Speaker 1: it didn't make me feel good. And so after sitting
Speaker 1: there for a while, you know, I just didn't feel
Speaker 1: good about what I was doing or just where I was.
Speaker 1: I just felt like I didn't have enough time to
Speaker 1: really think. And so I left the clinic and said,
Speaker 1: you know what, you've had an abortion in Maryland. You
Speaker 1: know what the Maryland experiences like. Just go back home
Speaker 1: to Maryland. So I called the Planned Parenthood in Maryland
Speaker 1: and made another appointment, and then they asked me if
Speaker 1: I needed financial assistance, and I said yes, And so
Speaker 1: I called some of the funds that they put on
Speaker 1: you know, the list for me, and the first fund
Speaker 1: that called me back was fun Texas Choice, and I cannot,
Speaker 1: like I get emotional kind of thinking about this moment
Speaker 1: because my co worker, this person is my coworker now.
Speaker 1: But I just remember like hearing their voice on the
Speaker 1: end of the other on the other end of the phone,
Speaker 1: and it was like the nicest, sweetest voice I've ever
Speaker 1: heard in my entire life. Um, and it just felt
Speaker 1: so good to talk to somebody who it was just
Speaker 1: so empathetic and like non judgmental, um and helpful during
Speaker 1: that time. And I think that people really underestimate like
Speaker 1: just how far like kindness can go, because I felt
Speaker 1: like nobody was very kind to me up until that point.
Speaker 1: You know, I know they were trying their best, but
Speaker 1: like it just made me feel like I knew I
Speaker 1: was making the right decision and like somebody cared enough
Speaker 1: to go out of their way to get me where
Speaker 1: I needed to be. And so she told me, you know,
Speaker 1: it's it was like labor Day weekend. So she said,
Speaker 1: you know, um, you may not hear from me for
Speaker 1: the west of the rest of the weekend, but I
Speaker 1: just want you to trust me and just know, but
Speaker 1: I will get you where you need to be. And
Speaker 1: I said, Okay, I don't know this person but I'm
Speaker 1: gonna just you know, put my faith in them. And
Speaker 1: I sat in my room and I watched um the
Speaker 1: whole first season of Britain in like a day. UM.
Speaker 1: And then that Tuesday morning, she called me and she said, UM,
Speaker 1: I have a flight for you. I have a hotel
Speaker 1: for you. This is where you need to go. And
Speaker 1: they got me where I needed to be. And I
Speaker 1: will forever be grateful for that, um, because like, I
Speaker 1: think that's the nicest thing that anybody's ever done for
Speaker 1: me in my entire life, like a complete stranger. UM.
Speaker 1: But it may me very sad because I just don't
Speaker 1: believe that people should have to do that, Like I
Speaker 1: don't think that people should have to depend on the
Speaker 1: kindness of strangers in a country like hours to access healthcare.
Speaker 1: My name is Merl gold Day. I am currently seventy
Speaker 1: years old. I became active sexually active in my teens
Speaker 1: in high school much too um, my dismay, I guess
Speaker 1: much UM. I became pregnant in high school in nineteen
Speaker 1: sixty nine. I gave that child up for adoption. In
Speaker 1: the late seventies. I was married, but I was living
Speaker 1: in Israel at the time, and after we've been there
Speaker 1: for a few months. I began to see that my UM,
Speaker 1: my husband. He is never physically abusive, but he was
Speaker 1: extremely controlling, and I began to realize this was not
Speaker 1: maybe the marriage I wanted to be in. But I
Speaker 1: got pregnant. UM and in Israel, as in many countries,
Speaker 1: there was debate over the legality of abortion. However, UM
Speaker 1: Israel has always had universal health care, and surprisingly UM,
Speaker 1: you could get an abortion. However, you had to go
Speaker 1: sit in front of a committee who decided whether or
Speaker 1: not your your reasons were worthy. UM. I found that
Speaker 1: I was pregnant. I was probably nine days past my period.
Speaker 1: I mean it was really quick when I realized something
Speaker 1: was wrong or whatever, and I immediately applied for an abortion.
Speaker 1: I had to go sit in a little teeny room
Speaker 1: with about five professionals who had questions for me as
Speaker 1: to why I wanted this abortion. Now I will tell
Speaker 1: you that, UM, there was I've been sitting in a hallway.
Speaker 1: Other women were sitting there. We were getting called in
Speaker 1: one by one, and when I walked into the room,
Speaker 1: there was a stack of charts, like you know, a
Speaker 1: bunch of charts on one side, and then there were
Speaker 1: like one or two charts over to another side. I
Speaker 1: didn't know which side was which, what was going on,
Speaker 1: But they asked me a bunch of questions. They felt
Speaker 1: that I had legitimate concerns for um the outcome of
Speaker 1: my marriage, and that this probably was not a good
Speaker 1: time for me to start a family. And they agreed
Speaker 1: to allow me to have an abortion. And they tossed
Speaker 1: my chart on the high bile, so apparently making an
Speaker 1: assumption here that that seemed to be the more common thing.
Speaker 1: They gave me a number to call. I called the number,
Speaker 1: I made an appointment, I went in, I had the
Speaker 1: procedure done, went home that evening, and that was that.
Speaker 1: And when I was sitting around with my friends UM
Speaker 1: in Israel's just sitting around a table, and I was upset.
Speaker 1: I was distressed about the situation. I'm sitting around a
Speaker 1: table with three other women, two of whom had also
Speaker 1: had abortions at some point. And now we're talking at Israel.
Speaker 1: We're all we all happened to be Jewish. Sitting at
Speaker 1: the table, Um, everybody had their reasons, whatever they were,
Speaker 1: they were their own personal reasons. And uh, it was
Speaker 1: a lot more common than I knew that I knew about.
Speaker 1: It's so beyond me to think about judging someone of
Speaker 1: her reasons for wanting to do whatever it is. I
Speaker 1: just said, you have to do what's right for you
Speaker 1: at that time. My name is Mel. I am in
Speaker 1: my early forties. I had an abortion in my early twenties,
Speaker 1: and this is my abortion story. So I joined the
Speaker 1: Navy when I was nineteen years old. I completely surprised
Speaker 1: my family and my friends. Um, they did not see
Speaker 1: that for me in my future. And I went to
Speaker 1: a school. Um that's generally what happens in the in
Speaker 1: the military. They'll put you in a trade or a
Speaker 1: or a profession. Went to schooling for a couple of
Speaker 1: months and then went to my first duty station, which
Speaker 1: happened to be on an aircraft carrier in the late
Speaker 1: nineties and Chips Company company of about three thousand sailors.
Speaker 1: I was one of about three women on that ship.
Speaker 1: So you can kind of do the math and see
Speaker 1: the um statistics, the data, the ratio of men to
Speaker 1: men to women. And then this is not a story
Speaker 1: about sexual harassment. For um. The other challenge as I
Speaker 1: faced on board ship, that's for another story and for
Speaker 1: another segment. I did have some great times. It wasn't
Speaker 1: all bad. So anyway, I was kind of having my
Speaker 1: fun and probably reckless if I was to definitely look
Speaker 1: back on that. And then I met a man who
Speaker 1: was ten years older than me. So by that time
Speaker 1: I was about twenty one. He was thirty one and married,
Speaker 1: and he had four children, two women. He was the pursuer.
Speaker 1: But that doesn't matter. I was. I was of age
Speaker 1: and could make my own decisions, you know, to the
Speaker 1: best of my abilities and so forth. So in the
Speaker 1: maturity level, I suppose, But on the ship, at least
Speaker 1: in the late nineties, for females, there was not a
Speaker 1: whole lot of birth control options. And I say that,
Speaker 1: you know, isn't a pill um. You know, they would
Speaker 1: have like two options to choose from if those didn't
Speaker 1: meet your health requirements, right, Like, I don't feel good
Speaker 1: on this one. I don't feel good on this one. Well,
Speaker 1: you're kind of pardon vulgarity of your sl a little bit. Right. So,
Speaker 1: while I was actively deployed overseas and I don't remember
Speaker 1: what country, it occurred to me that I had missed
Speaker 1: the period um I found out, you know, I thought
Speaker 1: I was pregnant. I had to go to if anybody's
Speaker 1: traveled overseas lave pharmacia, you know, most of them are
Speaker 1: called something close to that, trying to find a UM
Speaker 1: and and then trying to describe in a country you
Speaker 1: don't speak their language. What what a pregnancy test wouldn't
Speaker 1: could look like? Right? You know? Like this is what
Speaker 1: I need. So anyway, I was pregnant. I went and
Speaker 1: talked to one of the doctors on board ship and
Speaker 1: I just told him that, um, I was pregnant and
Speaker 1: what my options were. And I specifically asked if I
Speaker 1: had to tell who the father was. He said, no,
Speaker 1: you don't. What I hadn't talked about is the fact
Speaker 1: that this older man was much senior to me. He
Speaker 1: obviously had a lot more to lose than I did.
Speaker 1: I was very much a junior airman and he was
Speaker 1: is um, you know, way way higher than me as
Speaker 1: far as ranking. And then he also had his family,
Speaker 1: right um, And I was just by myself. So so
Speaker 1: I say all that is when I got pregnant, my
Speaker 1: chain of command obviously got involved. And I will never
Speaker 1: forget I was called before the OH five, which is
Speaker 1: not a not a colonel or a captain in the Navy.
Speaker 1: It was just one step below them. Here I am little,
Speaker 1: oh me junior, junior person, called in front of them
Speaker 1: by myself, no lawyer, no representation, nobody with me. And
Speaker 1: he demanded to know who the father of my child was.
Speaker 1: And I looked at that man, scared witless and told him,
Speaker 1: it's with it's it's my right to tell you. I'm
Speaker 1: not telling you who much the father of my child is.
Speaker 1: So that's my That's what I was facing with work,
Speaker 1: with my career at the time. At home, I called
Speaker 1: my mom. You know, um, I wasn't raised that any
Speaker 1: of this was acceptable, I guess, you know. But I
Speaker 1: told my mom was going on, just to kind of
Speaker 1: thinking maybe I would have a soft place fall. And
Speaker 1: my mother, in no uncertain terms, told me that, um,
Speaker 1: I would always be welcome to her own in her
Speaker 1: home because I was her daughter, but my bastard child
Speaker 1: would never be welcomed, wouldn't be welcomed across the threshold
Speaker 1: of the door. So okay, well that's not going to
Speaker 1: be a support system. It was very much a trying
Speaker 1: time at that point, what with the Navy trying to
Speaker 1: figure out who is my child's father. Just it was
Speaker 1: very scary and I felt very alone and isolated with
Speaker 1: hardly anybody to turn to who had my best interests mine.
Speaker 1: So i'll he was against it, but went along with
Speaker 1: my choice to have an abortion. So, um, I'm pretty
Speaker 1: sure I went through Planned Parents and this is before
Speaker 1: cell phones obviously and stuff, so it was like what
Speaker 1: white pages of trying to find a local Planned Parents
Speaker 1: with a clinic. We were in Virginia and by the
Speaker 1: time I went to all this had happened. And I
Speaker 1: went to the clinic to get quite of how long
Speaker 1: I was and if I was a candidate for it
Speaker 1: in portioned. Um, I was too far along by Virginia loss.
Speaker 1: So that's a shock, I think, thinking you were going
Speaker 1: to get help for your situation and you know that
Speaker 1: you can't get it today. So I go home and
Speaker 1: I tell my boyfriend at the time, I also made
Speaker 1: the phone call toy my mom because weirdly, I think
Speaker 1: I was maybe thinking that, you know, maybe it was
Speaker 1: a second chance. That I'm not a super religious person,
Speaker 1: but perhaps God was given me a second chance or
Speaker 1: telling me a different, telling me to do something different.
Speaker 1: I don't know, but my mom was still very much
Speaker 1: not supportive and mean, and you know so the clinic
Speaker 1: had very kindly given me some options with going out
Speaker 1: of state. So the closest one was going to be
Speaker 1: a drive up to Maryland, which had some different um
Speaker 1: laws for abortion. How for long you could be or
Speaker 1: you couldn't be, so ultimately made the decision to go
Speaker 1: to Maryland. It was very expensive, the amount of money
Speaker 1: I maked in the military, it was um. It was
Speaker 1: quite cumbersome, and obviously with no place to turn. I
Speaker 1: think my I remember correctly, my boyfriend at the time
Speaker 1: helped but um with the payment. But I don't remember
Speaker 1: a whole lot of the procedure itself. Everyone was kind,
Speaker 1: I don't remember that. I do remember her at the
Speaker 1: clinics of one of them, there were protesters, so that's
Speaker 1: always that was not fun. But the point of why
Speaker 1: I'm discussing my abortion story today and why I feel
Speaker 1: it's so important. If I was to go back and
Speaker 1: ask twenty one year old me if I would do
Speaker 1: the same thing over again, I don't know what my
Speaker 1: answer would be, but what I can tell you is
Speaker 1: that I am please, just punched and so glad I
Speaker 1: had options that I had an opportunity to make those decisions,
Speaker 1: and it's my body and it's my choice to make
Speaker 1: those decisions. I firmly believe in that. Um. I wish
Speaker 1: I could have made that decision wholeheartedly and of a
Speaker 1: whole heart, without the military telling me something, without my
Speaker 1: mom playing into it, and it was just me making
Speaker 1: the decisions for myself. But what I can say is,
Speaker 1: for where I am in my career, I'm not sorry
Speaker 1: I made the decision. I'm not sorry that. I don't
Speaker 1: think I would have made a great mom at that
Speaker 1: time time either. Um, with everything going on I was,
Speaker 1: I could not have been the mother that I am
Speaker 1: to day. So that is why I choose to share
Speaker 1: my story today. After the break, Busy Phillips shares her
Speaker 1: abortion story. Busy Phillips is an actor and activist, but
Speaker 1: when she had an abortion, she was just a teenager
Speaker 1: growing up in Arizona. I was fifty and it's very
Speaker 1: much in love with this young boy who was sixteen. Um, yeah,
Speaker 1: he was my my boyfriend, like my first boyfriend, and
Speaker 1: I just was so in love with him. And I
Speaker 1: grew up. I was raised Catholic, and uh god, I
Speaker 1: had so much shame around every part of being a
Speaker 1: woman that was so internalized. I didn't even know what
Speaker 1: I hid in my period. I didn't tell I have
Speaker 1: an older sister. I just stole her tampons and figured
Speaker 1: it out. Seriously, I didn't tell my mom for months
Speaker 1: that I had gotten my period because I was so
Speaker 1: embarrassed by just my humanity. And yeah, it was like,
Speaker 1: you know, as seen out of a movie, right like Juno,
Speaker 1: except I get the abortion. Um, It's like the lines
Speaker 1: were positive as soon as I the p hit the stick.
Speaker 1: A friend of mine I didn't even have I mean, obviously,
Speaker 1: I was fifteen. A friend of mine drove me and
Speaker 1: another girl from our class who also thought she was
Speaker 1: pregnant to planned parenthood, and we both were. I didn't know.
Speaker 1: I don't know what the laws were then. I knew
Speaker 1: that that planned parenthood I went to couldn't make an
Speaker 1: appointment for me. They could only offer information, and I
Speaker 1: was responsible for making an appointment, coming up with the
Speaker 1: three hundred and fifty dollars to pay for it. And
Speaker 1: he said that he would get the money that he
Speaker 1: had it. I mean, he had a job. So I thought, okay,
Speaker 1: well that makes sense. We can we can do I
Speaker 1: can do this by myself. I'm gonna do this by myself.
Speaker 1: My friend said that she would skip school with me
Speaker 1: and we could go and do it. I had gone
Speaker 1: to my boyfriend's house that after the afternoon after school,
Speaker 1: and his parents had found out because he tried to
Speaker 1: withdraw that money from his checking account and he told
Speaker 1: them and I he was like, you have to come
Speaker 1: talk to my parents. And I was like, absolutely no,
Speaker 1: I'm not doing that, and he was like, I promise you.
Speaker 1: They were like not mad, Like he was like, I
Speaker 1: promise you, They're not mad. They just want to talk
Speaker 1: to you. And after school he went over there and
Speaker 1: his mother was in like their bedroom, they're like the
Speaker 1: primary bedroom. Swee. I just remember it so clearly, Like,
Speaker 1: you know, how do you have those like visceral memories.
Speaker 1: Like they had shades, um wooden shades, because in Arizona,
Speaker 1: you know a lot of people have shades for energy
Speaker 1: efficiency or whatever. But they were really they were closed,
Speaker 1: like she didn't have them open. It was just really
Speaker 1: dark and sort of foreboding and they closed the door.
Speaker 1: And yes, she just really let me know what she
Speaker 1: how how disappointed she was in me like that I
Speaker 1: had like she wasn't going to let this happen. I
Speaker 1: wasn't getting an abortion. There's no say something like you will, well,
Speaker 1: young lady, you've gotten yourself. You've gotten yourself insince. It's
Speaker 1: quite a situation. Yeah, I did, really, And did you say, um,
Speaker 1: your son had a little something to do with myself?
Speaker 1: I did this, yeah, like one of those fishes. She
Speaker 1: was saying to me things that because of my religious
Speaker 1: like knowledge and going to church and our Catholicism and
Speaker 1: our family, I had always heard about abortion and about sex,
Speaker 1: which is why I never talked about it, which is
Speaker 1: why I got pregnant. And I got home, I went
Speaker 1: to bed and it liked I don't know. The middle
Speaker 1: of the night, my mom woke me up. It was
Speaker 1: like busy, wake up, and she said, your dad read
Speaker 1: your diary while you're out tonight. Is it true? We
Speaker 1: need to know if it's true. And I I was like, yes,
Speaker 1: it's true. And I go back to bed, and then
Speaker 1: my mom was like, now you have to you have
Speaker 1: to come and took me into their bedroom. My dad
Speaker 1: was sitting there already, and I like sat down on
Speaker 1: the bed next to him and put my head on
Speaker 1: his shoulder and I started crying and I just was like,
Speaker 1: I'm so sorry, I'm really sorry, and he was like,
Speaker 1: I love you so much. And then the three of
Speaker 1: us like laid in their bed, you know, like a
Speaker 1: thing I hadn't done since I was like baby, and
Speaker 1: my mother's like, well, I'll call doctor Eckert in the
Speaker 1: morning and I'm going to find the person that we're
Speaker 1: going to take you to. You're getting You're not going
Speaker 1: to a clinic, you were going to a private, getting
Speaker 1: you a private You're going to be knocked out. I
Speaker 1: was like okay, well, okay, okay, okay, And it was
Speaker 1: just never my mom. My parents were Catholic, Catholic school right.
Speaker 1: My mom went to Jesuit University there Catholics, And it
Speaker 1: was never a question. My mother was like, this is
Speaker 1: what we're doing. I love the story of your mom
Speaker 1: finding out that your boyfriend's mom should you out basically
Speaker 1: and embarrassed you and made you feel ashamed. And she
Speaker 1: called her and basically was having none of it. What
Speaker 1: did she say to her? I mean, she was like
Speaker 1: she locked herself in her home office. It's like the
Speaker 1: door not sound proof, and she was like yelling and
Speaker 1: she said, you know, like you have no right to
Speaker 1: talk to my child that way. If you ever come
Speaker 1: near her again or say a word to her again,
Speaker 1: it will be over my dead body, like you you will. Yeah,
Speaker 1: she really went for it. She like came so hard
Speaker 1: out in to protect me. That it was it was.
Speaker 1: It floored me because I had, Oh God, because I
Speaker 1: had underestimated my mother. Which kids do you underestimate your
Speaker 1: parents always? You know, I see my own kids do
Speaker 1: it constantly. What you can handle, what you can hold.
Speaker 1: And I think about these kids now, like both kids
Speaker 1: who are going to be facing pregnancy crises or just
Speaker 1: the mental health crisis that's happening with kids, and it's
Speaker 1: like kids hold onto this stuff because they underestimate. They
Speaker 1: don't think you can. They don't want to hurt you.
Speaker 1: All they want is for you to love them. And
Speaker 1: I didn't realize that, like I didn't really understand unconditional love.
Speaker 1: My name is Tera Mailman. My pronouns are they and
Speaker 1: he um. I usually used say them um. I am
Speaker 1: the chief research analysts for Reproaction. I am from the
Speaker 1: foothills of the Appalachian Mountains in Georgia. I grew up
Speaker 1: in an extremely Catholic household. I went to a private
Speaker 1: Christian school. Uh. My only the only attempt I got
Speaker 1: at sex, said, was a book called Walking Through Puberty
Speaker 1: with God. Um, so the I knew nothing. The only
Speaker 1: like actual helpful information I got about sex came from
Speaker 1: a girl in my grade who went to a public
Speaker 1: school previously, and who told me about condoms. So when
Speaker 1: I went off from my tiny little hometown and my
Speaker 1: school of a hundred people to the largest public university
Speaker 1: in the state of Georgia, all I had was information
Speaker 1: about condoms. And several years, having gone to the March
Speaker 1: for Life in Atlanta, like a lot of people who
Speaker 1: leave their homes very quickly left religion behind and left
Speaker 1: the strict abstinence only education behind UM and started having
Speaker 1: casual sex like people do when they go to college. UM,
Speaker 1: And all I had was this information about condoms, and
Speaker 1: for years it were just fine. UM, had no problems.
Speaker 1: My senior year of college, I was living off campus
Speaker 1: with a friend of mine and had just gotten out
Speaker 1: of a pretty pretty rough relationship and decided since I
Speaker 1: was getting ready to go to grad school the next
Speaker 1: year and knew I was going to have to really
Speaker 1: buckle down. I just kind of wanted to have fun
Speaker 1: my last year of college. So I decided I was
Speaker 1: just going to have a couple of friends with benefits
Speaker 1: that I could see every so often, who I knew
Speaker 1: well and got along with and felt like I could trust.
Speaker 1: One of them was this guy named Travis. And when
Speaker 1: Travis and I met, he seemed like your average nice guy.
Speaker 1: We started hanging out, and then he started getting a
Speaker 1: little clingy, trying to invite me on vacations with his family.
Speaker 1: After less than a month, started showing up at my
Speaker 1: apartment un announced and started following me to my classes,
Speaker 1: and so I sat him down and I told him again.
Speaker 1: I was like, these are my boundaries. He apologized and
Speaker 1: said he understood, So I decided to give him a
Speaker 1: second chance. Fast forward a little bit and my period
Speaker 1: was a little bit late. I wasn't too worried, but
Speaker 1: it was in the back of my mind when I
Speaker 1: went to meet up with one of my partners that night.
Speaker 1: He had come over to my place and I had
Speaker 1: gone to use the restroom, and when I came out,
Speaker 1: there were a bunch of open condom wrappers on the bed,
Speaker 1: and he looked at me and he said Kara, all
Speaker 1: of these condoms have holes in them. So apparently what
Speaker 1: had happened is when I had had that talk with
Speaker 1: Travis to try and re established boundaries and give him
Speaker 1: a second chance, he didn't take it very well and
Speaker 1: decided to try to baby trapped me, essentially into forming
Speaker 1: a relationship with him. I was absolutely terrified, But despite
Speaker 1: of all my anti abortion upbringing and the years I
Speaker 1: had spent thinking I was very anti abortion, I knew
Speaker 1: immediately that an abortion was what I wanted. There was
Speaker 1: no question of me giving birth, There was no question
Speaker 1: of me raising a child like I had already decided
Speaker 1: how I wanted my life to look, and it did
Speaker 1: not include having the child of a man who sabotaged
Speaker 1: my former birth in troll. So I turned to the
Speaker 1: Internet and tried to find the closest abortion clinic. Despite
Speaker 1: this being the largest public university in the state, the
Speaker 1: nearest clinic was over an hour and a half away,
Speaker 1: and so I changed my search to how to induce
Speaker 1: a miscarriage at home. I didn't put abortion um and
Speaker 1: looking back, uh the opposition researcher part of me is
Speaker 1: very proud of past me for somehow knowing that like,
Speaker 1: you don't want to directly search for how to sealth
Speaker 1: manage an abortion UM in the state of Georgia on
Speaker 1: an unsecure browser, UM that is not the move UM.
Speaker 1: And I got a bunch of results. UM. Some of
Speaker 1: them were more disturbing and graphic than others. I don't
Speaker 1: necessarily want to go into the details of all of
Speaker 1: them because I don't want to encourage other people to
Speaker 1: you try these methods. But I tried all of them UM,
Speaker 1: including a combination of different herbs for a herbal abortion,
Speaker 1: and about probably a week went by and nothing had happened,
Speaker 1: and I was so scared that I wasn't going to
Speaker 1: be able to end this pregnancy. And then one day
Speaker 1: about the end of that week, I guess the herbal
Speaker 1: regimen finally kicked in and my abortion started. I because
Speaker 1: I had searched for this information and was using a
Speaker 1: number of like questionable methods, I didn't exactly know what
Speaker 1: to expect, So again I was I was a little scared.
Speaker 1: I had still this intense sense of shame because of
Speaker 1: my upbringing, and so instead of telling anyone what was happening,
Speaker 1: I just sent a cryptic text to a friend and
Speaker 1: I was like, if you don't hear from me every hour, uh,
Speaker 1: please come to my apartment. The door is unlocked. I
Speaker 1: might need to go to the hospital because I just
Speaker 1: didn't know what to expect and I wanted to make
Speaker 1: sure I had like a contingency plan it. For me,
Speaker 1: it basically felt like a heavy period, like maybe a
Speaker 1: little heavier than my usual period, which is not saying
Speaker 1: a whole lot, because my period isn't absurd, but uh,
Speaker 1: it lasted about forty eight hours, and then it was done.
Speaker 1: I wasn't pregnant anymore, and the next year I was
Speaker 1: able to go off to grad school. If I could
Speaker 1: go back and tell myself anything, I would tell myself
Speaker 1: about abortion pills because there are so many clinics that
Speaker 1: are willing to help people access abortion pills, and with
Speaker 1: abortion pills, there is a very clear idea of what
Speaker 1: to expect. UM and that's part of what drew me
Speaker 1: to reproaction actually is our self Managed Abortion with Pills campaign,
Speaker 1: because we have very clearly, like taken all of the
Speaker 1: information provided by organizations like the World Health Organization on
Speaker 1: self managed abortion with pills and made them easily accessible
Speaker 1: to anyone who needs them. UM Yeah, that's my abortion story.
Speaker 1: My name's Lauretta Ross and I'm an associate professor at
Speaker 1: Smith College in Northampton, Massachusetts. I was one of the
Speaker 1: twelve black women who created the Theory and Practice of
Speaker 1: Reproductive Justice in June of n So I didn't answer
Speaker 1: the work as an abortion rights activist, even though I
Speaker 1: had an abortion at age sixteen. But when I had
Speaker 1: my abortion in nineteen seventy, it was not the difficult
Speaker 1: thing in the world to do because Washington, d c.
Speaker 1: Had legalized abortion three years before we wade, so I
Speaker 1: was they had done it in the summer before my
Speaker 1: first year of college, so I was lucky to be
Speaker 1: in that sweet spot. And my boyfriend was in his
Speaker 1: first year of law school the same time I was
Speaker 1: in my first year of undergrad and so he was
Speaker 1: more than willing to pay for the abortion and to
Speaker 1: reserve our futures right. And I was on than willing
Speaker 1: to have one because I already had a child. I
Speaker 1: had no romantic illusions about what parenting looked like, and
Speaker 1: so I didn't have any legal problems. I didn't have
Speaker 1: any finance uh financial problems. My obstacles were familiar. My
Speaker 1: mother would not sign the consent for because I was
Speaker 1: only sixteen and I needed parental consent because you had
Speaker 1: to be eighteen. And so my mother and I of
Speaker 1: going back and forth back and forth. Her devout Christian
Speaker 1: self thought that I, since I had had sex again
Speaker 1: outside of marriage, in her opinion, I should just drop
Speaker 1: out of college, come home and have my babies and
Speaker 1: stay home and you know, do what she did when
Speaker 1: she got pregnant with kids. And I chose a different
Speaker 1: path for myself. So my big sister, Carol, who's who
Speaker 1: was nine years older than me, forged my mother's signature
Speaker 1: on the consent for him, and so I ended up
Speaker 1: having a fairly late term abortion because of the back
Speaker 1: and forth with between me and my mom. Turns out
Speaker 1: I've been pregnant with twins and so the thought of
Speaker 1: having three babies is sixteen horrified me. So I was
Speaker 1: actually very happy that I've had an abortion. My name
Speaker 1: is Alyssa. I'm a twenty three year old black queer
Speaker 1: person who lives in Chicago and I currently am an educator.
Speaker 1: So I got my abortion during the pandemics of December.
Speaker 1: I had to move home um and live with my parents.
Speaker 1: So at the time I was like, you know what,
Speaker 1: I should just go and tender and see what's see
Speaker 1: what's out there. So at the time I had met
Speaker 1: um my ex boyfriend at the time, and he was,
Speaker 1: you know, older than me, he was more experienced than me.
Speaker 1: Um he definitely you know, took advantage of kind of
Speaker 1: just like how little I knew. Um. So we had
Speaker 1: met in like November, and by December I found out
Speaker 1: I was pregnant. Um So. He had come from a
Speaker 1: religious background, which is which was weird because I'm not
Speaker 1: religious at all. So I kind of don't even know
Speaker 1: how he clicked, but came from a religious background. And
Speaker 1: when I had told him that I was pregnant, he
Speaker 1: was kind of like, Okay, we'll go get an abortion,
Speaker 1: like it was going to be so easy, like one
Speaker 1: two thrade right. And at this time I was living
Speaker 1: in Maryland, um but specifically southern Maryland in a very
Speaker 1: very small town, um so, about an hour and fifteen
Speaker 1: from d C. And about an hour and a half
Speaker 1: from Baltimore. UM So I was like, okay, literally, what
Speaker 1: do what do I do? Now? Right? I you know,
Speaker 1: would I literally just googled like playing parent hood abortion
Speaker 1: And then I was like well, what are they even
Speaker 1: gonna do. I didn't even know there's like different types
Speaker 1: of abortion. I didn't want to tell my um my family.
Speaker 1: There it's so stigmatized, and you know, all communities, but
Speaker 1: especially like the black community, it's seen as like dirty
Speaker 1: or you know, you're moving too fast, right, They really
Speaker 1: want to They always want to stigmatize Black girls sexually.
Speaker 1: So when it comes to accessing abortion, it's like we
Speaker 1: can't win. Right. When we're team, parents were looked bad upon,
Speaker 1: and then when we're accessing abortion, it's it's looked upon.
Speaker 1: It is like that's something you don't talk about. Um.
Speaker 1: I didn't know a bunch about abortion funds, but I
Speaker 1: had called Planned Parenthood because I was like, oh, I
Speaker 1: needed an abortion, but I don't have money, and they
Speaker 1: were like, you can contact an abortion fund near you.
Speaker 1: So I contacted an abortion fund and you know, they're
Speaker 1: very small staff, small volunteers. So I waited about a
Speaker 1: week for somebody to call me back, and then yeah,
Speaker 1: and then I was told that you know, abortion funds
Speaker 1: only give the funds to like indie clinics and not
Speaker 1: playing parenthood. And you know, the day I had set
Speaker 1: for my abortion, I couldn't change because at the time,
Speaker 1: my ex boyfriend was like, well, this is the only
Speaker 1: day I can take off work. And I had checked
Speaker 1: every indie clinic around me to see if I could, um,
Speaker 1: you know, get an appointment on the date specifically was
Speaker 1: December fourteen, and it was like the day before or after.
Speaker 1: And I was like on the phone begging him like, well,
Speaker 1: if we want some funds to cover it, we have
Speaker 1: to switch the clinic, so can you just take off work? Right?
Speaker 1: He was acting like it was such a big inconvenience
Speaker 1: to him, but I'm like, a baby would be a
Speaker 1: more inconvenience. You're life, um so he was, actually it
Speaker 1: was such a big inconvenience and I so, I, you know,
Speaker 1: totally abortion fund. I was like, you know what, it's okay,
Speaker 1: I will I will figure out the fund somewhere else,
Speaker 1: but like, thank you for your time, um, so that
Speaker 1: I could keep my appointment. And I didn't really know.
Speaker 1: Um so the only time the only place I could
Speaker 1: get my surgical abortion was in Baltimore, so that was
Speaker 1: about an hour and a half away. Um. They told
Speaker 1: me not to drive myself because they have sedation options available,
Speaker 1: and I didn't know much about the medication abortion, but
Speaker 1: when I was googling it, it sounded super painful. And
Speaker 1: now as like a self managed abortion trainer. UM, I
Speaker 1: know that like if I had an abortion do LA,
Speaker 1: I would have been able to have it at home.
Speaker 1: But so the only place I could get it was Baltimore,
Speaker 1: about an hour and a half away, and he was
Speaker 1: going to take me there because uber prices were so expensive.
Speaker 1: So we get there and it was COVID, so only
Speaker 1: one person was allowed in. I couldn't have a support
Speaker 1: for son and um when it came time to paying
Speaker 1: for it, he was like, we'll just put it on
Speaker 1: your credit card. You could pay it back later, and
Speaker 1: I was like, okay, Like I need some support right now.
Speaker 1: I felt like I was lacking support in all in
Speaker 1: all kind of places in my life, and it was
Speaker 1: it was a hard time for me, like even I've
Speaker 1: always been in repro spaces, but I still didn't know
Speaker 1: like what an abortion doula was, what support looked like
Speaker 1: for myself or others. So I got to the abortion
Speaker 1: clinic and I was able to have my surgical abortion,
Speaker 1: and you know, the healing after was was rocky. I
Speaker 1: I saw going into it since I've always been really
Speaker 1: pro abortion that I wouldn't have any like emotional feeling after.
Speaker 1: But you know, I learned that all of these stories
Speaker 1: are not linear, right, Like, It's okay if I was
Speaker 1: emotional after that doesn't that doesn't make me any less
Speaker 1: pro abortion. Um, And I think abortion it was an
Speaker 1: easy thing for me to choose, but I still was,
Speaker 1: you know, really emotional after it, and I wanted the
Speaker 1: support of the people around me. But I had to
Speaker 1: desigmatize abortion within myself to be able to have those
Speaker 1: conversations with with the people in my life. And I
Speaker 1: was still I was still internally like stigmatizing it because
Speaker 1: I didn't want to talk about it. I didn't want
Speaker 1: people to think I was dirty. I didn't want people
Speaker 1: to think I was, you know, a bad person. Um.
Speaker 1: It was so easy to kind of like internalize all
Speaker 1: of the things we hear about people who access abortion.
Speaker 1: So after after I got my abortion, you know, I
Speaker 1: was on medication, a little sedated, and I had an
Speaker 1: hour and a half car right back with my ex,
Speaker 1: who at the time was just super like shitty and
Speaker 1: emotionally abusive. So I felt like a lot of things
Speaker 1: could have been different if I had access, if I
Speaker 1: had access to transportation myself, and you know, living in
Speaker 1: a rural place, I don't know, well, you know, we
Speaker 1: didn't have public transportation. I had no way to get
Speaker 1: there unless I took an hour and a half uber
Speaker 1: there and back. So, you know, I think about when
Speaker 1: we have these conversations about rov Wade, right like row
Speaker 1: is the floor, there are already so many communities and
Speaker 1: places that are living and that are living or um
Speaker 1: have lived in a place where there is no access
Speaker 1: right now. And even if they do have a clinic
Speaker 1: that's open, you know, appointment times, transportation, and I really
Speaker 1: feel because it would have made my abortion experience so
Speaker 1: much better if I had more access. My name is Ruth.
Speaker 1: I'm in my mid fifties, and I'm going to share
Speaker 1: my abortion story. When I was about twenty two, I
Speaker 1: found out that I was pregnant and I was dating somebody,
Speaker 1: and we both knew that it was not practical or
Speaker 1: desired for us to have a child together. Both were
Speaker 1: just starting off in a career. We were not serious,
Speaker 1: and I was very very grateful that I was able
Speaker 1: to go to plan parenthood and they were understandable. I
Speaker 1: had a meeting with somebody before which there was a
Speaker 1: requirement to make sure that you wanted to have the procedure.
Speaker 1: And I had the procedure and I was not uncomfortable.
Speaker 1: I felt supported and I felt no stigma. But I
Speaker 1: did not talk about it with people. Only one or
Speaker 1: two people knew about it. And I went on with
Speaker 1: my romantic life and my life and eventually got married
Speaker 1: and had a child. And sometimes I think about how
Speaker 1: old that child might be. It's a it's it's a
Speaker 1: little daunting, but I have no regrets about the choice
Speaker 1: that I made for myself and my body. More from
Speaker 1: our abortion speak out right after this. Hi, my name
Speaker 1: is Pam. UM. I had my abortion fifty years ago
Speaker 1: last month, which would have been UM. So. The way
Speaker 1: it started was, I had this boyfriend in high school.
Speaker 1: Our whole senior year, we dated and about pronged time
Speaker 1: we got sexual and and we were pretty clueless about
Speaker 1: birth control, babies, pregnantcy all that, no second education. UM,
Speaker 1: we didn't have much choice of birth control, the only condoms,
Speaker 1: and it was fine for a while. UM I got
Speaker 1: shipped off to college in August kind of suddenly, and
Speaker 1: then there was a draft. UM the word Vietnam was
Speaker 1: going on, and his d number was pulled. It was six,
Speaker 1: so he was going to go, and so he joined
Speaker 1: the Marine Corps. So he was supposed to be inducted
Speaker 1: at the end of January. Now, so we've decided to
Speaker 1: go when weekend and get a hotel and say goodbye
Speaker 1: it properly. And that's when it happened. He was specied.
Speaker 1: He went to the induction center in the January and
Speaker 1: they sent him back home, thank god. Uh they said, no,
Speaker 1: we're gonna take you about five weeks from now instead. Well,
Speaker 1: and that's the five weeks I needed him home because
Speaker 1: I found out I was pregnant, and just he and
Speaker 1: I were the only ones that ever knew. Uh, there
Speaker 1: was nobody to turn to, certainly not my parents. Uh.
Speaker 1: There I grew up a kind of a I hate
Speaker 1: to say it, but a household. Yeah, where there was
Speaker 1: everything was a crisis, even when it wasn't a lot
Speaker 1: of yelling, some hittings of shaking, you know, that kind
Speaker 1: of thing. So I wasn't gonna ever tell them. In fact,
Speaker 1: they died having never known anything about this. Um. So
Speaker 1: these five weeks of high anxiety, you know, trying to financers. Um.
Speaker 1: I talked to people at a place called Birthright, uh,
Speaker 1: which I guess you would call it crisis pregnancy center.
Speaker 1: So they had a place to pick a live. They
Speaker 1: would take you in and dormitory like place, and you
Speaker 1: give birth and they would put it up for adoption.
Speaker 1: And I thought about that. Uh my boyfriend wanted to
Speaker 1: get married hat the baby, and I'm like, no, we're
Speaker 1: not doing that. We may get married some day and babies,
Speaker 1: but not now. Um. So I heard finally about a
Speaker 1: free health clinic. So, yeah, you're this, you know, six
Speaker 1: seven weeks pregnant, and what do you want to do
Speaker 1: about it? And I said, well, I'd like to get
Speaker 1: an abortion. Abortion wasn't legal here. I'm in Kansas. Um.
Speaker 1: It was legal in New York City or state probably
Speaker 1: and Washington, d C. So I was terrified to go
Speaker 1: to New York City, you know. So I just Washington.
Speaker 1: So they gave me an eight hundred numbered called the
Speaker 1: clinic in Washington. Well not a clinic like you think
Speaker 1: of now, but office in an office building with the doctor. Um.
Speaker 1: So I've made an appointment. I called the airlines. I've
Speaker 1: got a plane ticket. Uh. The problem was money. We
Speaker 1: didn't have much money. The procedure was a hundred and
Speaker 1: fifty dollars. The whole trip with the plane ticket stay
Speaker 1: at a hotel one night was four hundred fifty dollars,
Speaker 1: and that was a month's pay for a marine private
Speaker 1: um in those days. So made all the arrangements and
Speaker 1: on Friday, March three, he flew to the West Coast
Speaker 1: to go to boot camp. And on Monday, Um March six,
Speaker 1: I flew to theast coasts to fix the future for us.
Speaker 1: My real problem was getting to the airport from where
Speaker 1: I was at college. Uh, nobody had a car much.
Speaker 1: There wasn't a bus or anything I could take. So
Speaker 1: my sweet mates boyfriend had a car and he said
Speaker 1: for ten dollars he would take me to the airport
Speaker 1: and come back the next night and get me. The
Speaker 1: problem was I was at my parents house to the
Speaker 1: weekend trying to find a way to the airport because
Speaker 1: they lived it's closer to the airport, and I couldn't.
Speaker 1: So my dad drives me back to college and then
Speaker 1: I get in the car with this boyfriend, her boyfriend
Speaker 1: and go right back you know where I came from.
Speaker 1: And I had missed my FLFE. So the UM ticket
Speaker 1: it tendant said, oh, that is the problem. We'll put
Speaker 1: you on this flight to Baltimore. And I'm like, what
Speaker 1: good is that going to do me? She said, well,
Speaker 1: Baltimore is real close to Washington and uh. And I'm
Speaker 1: like okay, So I flew to Baltimore. UM. So now
Speaker 1: it's like when we get off the plane, it's got
Speaker 1: to be midnight, so and the airport's like closed down.
Speaker 1: There's nobody there, and so I follow the other passengers
Speaker 1: out to this to this bus. Uh, and it says Washington,
Speaker 1: do you see on it? And everybody gets there are
Speaker 1: a lot of people get on this bus. So I
Speaker 1: get on the bus and we drive down to Washington
Speaker 1: and we're downtown and they just let everybody out. And
Speaker 1: so it's, you know, one o'clock in the morning, carrying
Speaker 1: a lot of money hash and everybody just disappears, you know,
Speaker 1: and there were no cabs around. I was totally terrified.
Speaker 1: So I saw a security guard in a building, uh,
Speaker 1: through the glass, and I went over there and just
Speaker 1: banged on the glass until he finally came and opened
Speaker 1: the door. God bless him, And I said, I was
Speaker 1: just let out here. I don't know where I am.
Speaker 1: I need to get to this romantic inn or whatever
Speaker 1: it was. Could you get a cab for me called
Speaker 1: come one at east kind of you know. But he
Speaker 1: did finally, and the cab came took me to the hotel.
Speaker 1: That that was a bit of an expense I hadn't
Speaker 1: counting on. So I stayed like five hours at the hotel.
Speaker 1: It's time to go to the doctor. So I get
Speaker 1: another a cab. I go over there. Uh, I go
Speaker 1: upstairs to the office. It was very nice. There were
Speaker 1: other young ladies there. Uh. They they took us back
Speaker 1: in a little group to do our ucation. Uh. Finally
Speaker 1: I got some education. They had models there. They explained,
Speaker 1: you know, how you get pregnant and what happened. Does
Speaker 1: anybody way changed their mind? And then they explained birth
Speaker 1: control methods and you got to choose one and they
Speaker 1: sit you home with it. Uh so that was great.
Speaker 1: And then the time came for the procedure. I still
Speaker 1: have no idea what's going to happen. I don't know
Speaker 1: how you what an abortion entails. And um so there's
Speaker 1: another gal comes and takes me to the procedure room
Speaker 1: and you didn't change into a gown or anything. He
Speaker 1: took off your slacks. I put my boots back on
Speaker 1: to hold my feet, Mistrus, they said. And so it's
Speaker 1: just very casual. And the doctor keep said, he was
Speaker 1: very nice. He explained everything that was happen good. I
Speaker 1: happened right before he did it, so that they picked
Speaker 1: up the vacuum thing. By the time they turned it off,
Speaker 1: I was about to beg them to turn it up.
Speaker 1: It hurts so bad, but I didn't care. I wanted
Speaker 1: out at this mess. Uh did they just uh scraping?
Speaker 1: And he said, I think I've got it and took
Speaker 1: me out to lay on the couch. And I had
Speaker 1: to leave at three o'clock to the airport. So they
Speaker 1: said at two o'clock the bleeding wasn't too bad, I
Speaker 1: could go. I got a cab to the airport, took
Speaker 1: my flight straight back to Kiasa City from Washington. Uh.
Speaker 1: The sweet mate's boyfriend picked me up. Uh took me
Speaker 1: back to school. Oh. The last day, they did, when
Speaker 1: you walk out the doors, give you a peak postcard
Speaker 1: and they've written an hundred number on it and they
Speaker 1: taped it dime to it. They said, if you have
Speaker 1: any problems, Paul, and they explained, you know, if you
Speaker 1: bleed this much, you take your temperature all the time.
Speaker 1: And well, so I went back. Now, I haven't had
Speaker 1: anything to eat since Sunday at noon till Monday night,
Speaker 1: and the cafeteria is closed, so I had some stacks
Speaker 1: or something. And then the next day I got up,
Speaker 1: went about my business like nothing I happened. But Wednesday
Speaker 1: morning I woke up with a fever and I called
Speaker 1: the eight hundred number and they said, you got an infection.
Speaker 1: So they called the pharmacy in the city where the
Speaker 1: college was and got me some banbiotics. I had a
Speaker 1: probably me to pay for that. I mean, there's just
Speaker 1: so many extra here. So I that was clear to
Speaker 1: that that was not a big deal. I wrote him
Speaker 1: a letter a boot camp, told him it went okay.
Speaker 1: They were gonna be okay. The next time I saw
Speaker 1: him was in June, when he got a break after bigcamp,
Speaker 1: before he was sick somewhere else. He came home and
Speaker 1: and then I didn't. I only saw one more time
Speaker 1: in the next three years because he was stationed overseas,
Speaker 1: and when he came home for good, he was not
Speaker 1: the boy I had given the Marine Corps he had
Speaker 1: PTSD uh he was he got violent. If I had
Speaker 1: been there with a two year old, it doesn't bear
Speaker 1: thinking about. So it's really good that we did what
Speaker 1: we did. I've never had any regrets for a minute.
Speaker 1: Um M, that's that's it. My name is Victoria Amada.
Speaker 1: I am twenty three years old and I am from
Speaker 1: the southwest side of Chicago. I had an abortion when
Speaker 1: I was twenty years old. I was in my third
Speaker 1: year of college. Um. It all really happened really fast. UM.
Speaker 1: I knew since before I even took the pregnancy tests.
Speaker 1: I had a very strong feeling that I was pregnant,
Speaker 1: and I knew exactly what I wanted to do even
Speaker 1: before I saw that the pregnancy test was positive. UM.
Speaker 1: I remember being really scared or just confused on what
Speaker 1: my next steps were gonna be. UM. I had reached
Speaker 1: out to a friend because I heard that she um
Speaker 1: also had an abortion, So I was like, well, I
Speaker 1: need you know someone to help me out. UM. And
Speaker 1: when I had reached out to her, she was the
Speaker 1: one that helped me UM make the appointment, and she
Speaker 1: basically told me what her experience was like, and she
Speaker 1: told me that everything was gonna be okay. So I
Speaker 1: went to a plant Parenthood. UM. I remember that they
Speaker 1: had called me like the day before the appointment just
Speaker 1: to remind me everything that I needed to do, Like
Speaker 1: I was gonna go under um anaesthesia, so I wasn't
Speaker 1: able to like eat the whole night before. UM. They
Speaker 1: basically went over the process. They told me to bring
Speaker 1: like a big Max the dad. They basically told me
Speaker 1: everything that I needed UM. They also told me that
Speaker 1: I needed to have someone there to drive me UM.
Speaker 1: And they told me that it was basically going to
Speaker 1: be an all date thing. I feel like during that time,
Speaker 1: everything happened so fast and you just kind of feel
Speaker 1: like you're getting all of this information and at least
Speaker 1: for me, I just wanted it to be over with.
Speaker 1: Remember that it took a while because there was a
Speaker 1: lot of people UM in the clinic during that time
Speaker 1: that I went, and I remember it was just a
Speaker 1: lot of like like little steps UM. It was getting
Speaker 1: the paperwork done and then getting an ultrasound UM. And
Speaker 1: what I really liked is that Parenthood or like the
Speaker 1: people that were there were very nice to me about
Speaker 1: when we know during the ultrasound, they said, well, you know,
Speaker 1: we won't give you a picture if you don't want one,
Speaker 1: Like if you don't want to know how many weeks
Speaker 1: you are, we won't tell you. And then after that
Speaker 1: it was like a lot of life blood work tests
Speaker 1: from what I remember, and then it was just waiting,
Speaker 1: like waiting um for the doctor. And especially because I
Speaker 1: did a surgical one, the process was very quick. When
Speaker 1: I remember, I was you know, I remember just lay
Speaker 1: down there and like the next five minutes I was
Speaker 1: like in the recovery room. So everything, I guess the
Speaker 1: actual procedure was very fast, but the steps leading up
Speaker 1: to the procedure was very slow, and I was just,
Speaker 1: you know, I just wanted it to be over with.
Speaker 1: I think one of the hardest parts of my abortion
Speaker 1: was feeling like I wasn't supported um and and this
Speaker 1: is just coming from a very religious background, where you know,
Speaker 1: abortion is something that you should be ashamed about, at
Speaker 1: least this is what I was taught ever since, like
Speaker 1: a young age. UM. So I felt like I couldn't
Speaker 1: go to my parents or my cousin or anybody else. Um. Luckily,
Speaker 1: my sister was very supportive um and but because of
Speaker 1: the way I grew up, I felt like I couldn't
Speaker 1: even tell my friends UM and and I think that
Speaker 1: was just like the hardest part of it was the
Speaker 1: feeling that like internalized shame when I knew there was
Speaker 1: nothing to be ashamed about. I do share my abortion story. UM.
Speaker 1: I think that recently I started to be more comfortable
Speaker 1: with sharing it. Before I would tell like my friends, UM,
Speaker 1: I started to tell my friends more about what happened
Speaker 1: and you know, me having an abortion. And I felt
Speaker 1: like once I started sharing my abortion story, more people
Speaker 1: came up to me and like would tell me, oh,
Speaker 1: I had an abortion too, or even my friends whenever
Speaker 1: they have a pregnant be scared, like they come to
Speaker 1: me or And I think that there's something very powerful
Speaker 1: about that that people I feel like they could trust
Speaker 1: me with, you know, like the pregnancy scares and their
Speaker 1: abortions stories. And I wish that I would have spoken
Speaker 1: about it sooner, because I wouldn't have felt so long
Speaker 1: if I would have just shared my story sooner. I
Speaker 1: consider my abortion the greatest act of self love that
Speaker 1: I did. UM. Because of that, I was able to
Speaker 1: choose me, like I chose my life, like I chose mychools. Um.
Speaker 1: Because of that, I was able to graduate college. And
Speaker 1: because of my abortion, I studied abroad and because of that,
Speaker 1: I found real supportive friends. And you know, I found, um,
Speaker 1: you know, people who will love me because I know
Speaker 1: that because I unapologetically say that I had an abortion.
Speaker 1: And the reason why I get so emotional is it's
Speaker 1: just thinking back at the day that I got my
Speaker 1: abortion to now and like wishing I could go back
Speaker 1: and hugged myself and um and tell myself that that
Speaker 1: it's okay to have an abortion. And that's what I
Speaker 1: want every wants to know. When we come back, we'll
Speaker 1: hear from Congresswoman Promila Jaya Paul. Congresswoman Promella Gia Paul's
Speaker 1: abortion journey ironically began when she became a parent. I
Speaker 1: have to start with the birth of my first child
Speaker 1: because it is it is essential to it. I had
Speaker 1: already had a baby and UM, my daughter, Kashika, who
Speaker 1: is trans um, was born at one pound fourteen ounces.
Speaker 1: She was um twenty six and a half weeks at
Speaker 1: the time. She was the size of a tiny squash.
Speaker 1: She fit into the palm of my hand. And she
Speaker 1: was born in India and she was in the n
Speaker 1: I c U for a couple of months. We didn't
Speaker 1: know if she would live or die. She shouldn't really,
Speaker 1: by all medical accounts, be here today, UM, but she
Speaker 1: she went through numerous blood transfusions she um you know,
Speaker 1: I think it was maybe seven or eight. She would
Speaker 1: stop breathing regularly. She literally she none of her organs
Speaker 1: could function. So it was a extremely stressful time. We
Speaker 1: didn't know whether or not she would make it. And UM,
Speaker 1: I also at the same time was supposed to be
Speaker 1: back in the United States to keep my green card permanent,
Speaker 1: and because I was not going to leave her side,
Speaker 1: my green card expired, and UM, they the United States
Speaker 1: government told me that I couldn't come back. So it
Speaker 1: was a series of things, and we finally came back
Speaker 1: to the United States three months into her birth because
Speaker 1: she had hydro and cephalitisly had water in a brain,
Speaker 1: and we finally realized that we had to get her
Speaker 1: back to the United States. I was able to resolve
Speaker 1: my immigration issues. We came back to the country, and
Speaker 1: it still took a very long time, and she had seizures,
Speaker 1: all kinds of things, and I really struggled. Katie. UM,
Speaker 1: and you know. This was one of the hard parts
Speaker 1: about talking about this was not just the birth and
Speaker 1: the experience of the birth, but what it does to us.
Speaker 1: And I went through postpartum depression. I went through post
Speaker 1: traumatic stress disorder. I contemplated suicide at one point, and
Speaker 1: I finally sought help. And I was also going through
Speaker 1: a divorce, my marriage suffered, and um. All of that
Speaker 1: was happening all at the same time, and I determined
Speaker 1: that I was not I wanted to have more children,
Speaker 1: but I was not ready to have more children. I
Speaker 1: met a wonderful man. I took my contraception religiously. I
Speaker 1: was on the pill, I had backup methods. I did
Speaker 1: everything I thought I needed to be doing, and I
Speaker 1: got pregnant, and I realized that there was no possible
Speaker 1: way that I could go through with the pregnancy because
Speaker 1: I was still emotionally trying to become well myself, and
Speaker 1: I was also still trying to take care of my daughter,
Speaker 1: who was still very sick and still had a lot
Speaker 1: of issues. And I just realized that there was no
Speaker 1: way the doctors could not guarantee. They said to me,
Speaker 1: we have no guarantee that your life will not be
Speaker 1: in the same danger as it was last time. They
Speaker 1: had told me, by the way in my first pregnancy
Speaker 1: that I could potentially die there was they put it
Speaker 1: at a sixty forty chance. Um, and I decided to
Speaker 1: go ahead, but I you know, I couldn't go through
Speaker 1: that again with Kashika. And to this day it is
Speaker 1: hard to talk about, but UM, I think it brings
Speaker 1: about the really critical pieces of what you go through.
Speaker 1: And I was lucky, Katie because I live in a
Speaker 1: state where abortion is legal. We put it to the
Speaker 1: voters and the voters said, yes, abortion should be legal.
Speaker 1: And so I had an amazing abortion doctor who I'm
Speaker 1: still in touch with, who was compassionate and I have
Speaker 1: I had a wonderful partner who did everything he needed
Speaker 1: to do to support me to make the decision. But
Speaker 1: it was my decision and it could only have been
Speaker 1: my decision. My name is Carly and I'm twenty five
Speaker 1: year old living in Charleston, South Carolina. I was in
Speaker 1: a not so um good relationship and UM started getting
Speaker 1: really sick, like I cook for a living and like
Speaker 1: these normal styles started to like make me nauseous and said,
Speaker 1: obviously it took a test in front I was pregnant.
Speaker 1: I knew immediately that I was not ready. I was
Speaker 1: in no situation to have a child, and made an
Speaker 1: appoint with Plan Parenthood. And it took a while. I
Speaker 1: almost missed the UM twelve week mark down here, um
Speaker 1: because of how backed up, but it is there's only
Speaker 1: one clinic in my area that um, you know, manages
Speaker 1: abortion here and so I was able to get in
Speaker 1: and I had to do the actual procedure itself, not
Speaker 1: the pill, and um it was super traumatizing and the
Speaker 1: front staff was very very nice to me, like you know,
Speaker 1: they were doing the bestday camp. But I felt like
Speaker 1: the doctor who was performing in like he it's almost
Speaker 1: like I would say, he was like he didn't like
Speaker 1: doing it, but he was like not very common, like
Speaker 1: it was just a very like almost hoss olevery tense
Speaker 1: place to be, Like he was like he was doing
Speaker 1: his medical duties, but like he was al once again,
Speaker 1: stay like that's it I felt in the room at
Speaker 1: that time. And then um, they didn't really go like
Speaker 1: for the aftercare, like they make you sit in the
Speaker 1: room and I think you've to use the rest room
Speaker 1: before you I remember correctly, Um, but noone talks about
Speaker 1: like they they say there might be some spot, but
Speaker 1: doone talks about like the amount of like blood lost
Speaker 1: that can happen and how that's like that's typically normal.
Speaker 1: So like I was, like I took a few days
Speaker 1: off of work because it was just like so horrendous.
Speaker 1: I was so sick, and they didn't really like explain
Speaker 1: that in detail. They were just kind of like, oh,
Speaker 1: all right, go on your merry way, and like didn't
Speaker 1: provide any support like um when he came to like
Speaker 1: abortion doulahs or any resources for like um mental health.
Speaker 1: And I think that probably kind of hindered like my
Speaker 1: healing process a little bit because I didn't know what
Speaker 1: to do. Like it was just like okay and you're done, goodbye,
Speaker 1: And so that I think that was the town type
Speaker 1: of thing, because he was just like it's like still
Speaker 1: very under wrapped, even though you're like out of plant parenthood,
Speaker 1: Like I'm in the South, I'm in the Bible Belt,
Speaker 1: so it's just like even the clinic is still like
Speaker 1: super high hush, and then so it's just like I think, yeah,
Speaker 1: they just want you in and out. And then my
Speaker 1: family knew and they were sportive of my decision, but yeah,
Speaker 1: it was just like we don't talk about it. Like
Speaker 1: any time I was upset, it was just like, oh, well,
Speaker 1: you know, it's this choice you made, and it's like that, yeah,
Speaker 1: but like not every choice in life, where whether it
Speaker 1: when it comes to abortion or not, there's choices we're
Speaker 1: gonna have to make in life that aren't easy choices.
Speaker 1: And just because this one has to do with abortion
Speaker 1: doesn't take away from that hurt I personally felt when
Speaker 1: I went through that, and you know, like my partner
Speaker 1: was like upset with me or like months down the road,
Speaker 1: like you know, he finally like turned around was like, well,
Speaker 1: you know you should it's my say too, and so
Speaker 1: they got that stigment to like you know, like it
Speaker 1: was just like it's just all of it was just
Speaker 1: so much like and then yeah, we just don't talk
Speaker 1: about it. I was almost ashamed because like I was like, wow,
Speaker 1: like not a lot of people go through this process.
Speaker 1: And then when I um I got diagnosed with HIV
Speaker 1: in the beginning of twenty I started to share my
Speaker 1: story because I became like an active for HIV care
Speaker 1: and then I found out how many people have had
Speaker 1: abortions or they've been with their friends and family members
Speaker 1: to support them, because like you typically take someone because
Speaker 1: they UM, sometimes they'll give you like anti anxiety meds beforehand.
Speaker 1: And I was just like, wow, why don't why aren't
Speaker 1: we talking about this? And like it was that's when
Speaker 1: I really started to open up, and then it led
Speaker 1: to other people opening up, and I was just it
Speaker 1: was such it. And then when I started sharing my story,
Speaker 1: like everyone coming together and us talking about it like
Speaker 1: really helped me work through that and be like, wow,
Speaker 1: there's no there's no shame, there's nothing, and it was
Speaker 1: just we're just I was done being quiet about it.
Speaker 1: My name is Belinda and I was seventeen when I
Speaker 1: had an abortion. I grew up in a pretty small town,
Speaker 1: about twelve thousand people, and it was raised I guess
Speaker 1: you could call it Southern Baptist um. You know, very
Speaker 1: just certain morals, certain things that you just didn't believe.
Speaker 1: Even abortion was one of those things. You know. I
Speaker 1: always thought, who does that? That's a horrible thing. I
Speaker 1: would never do that. And then when I was seventeen
Speaker 1: years old, UM I was date raped by UM, an
Speaker 1: old boyfriend. I was getting ready to start college and
Speaker 1: after that happened to me. It is incredible to me
Speaker 1: that there was never even a second in my mind
Speaker 1: about what I was going to do. There was never
Speaker 1: you know, oh, I've been for seventeen years. This is
Speaker 1: what I've been raised. That's horrible. What should I do?
Speaker 1: It was, this is what I'm going to do. I'm
Speaker 1: going to terminate this pregnancy. I'm seventeen, I have college.
Speaker 1: The way it happened, it was just too much. So
Speaker 1: that's what led me to decide to get the abortion. So. UM,
Speaker 1: I had an older sister who I don't have a
Speaker 1: relationship with now, but she had had one, and so
Speaker 1: I reached out to her. You know, of course my
Speaker 1: close girlfriends knew, and you're so young and naive that
Speaker 1: even though I probably did for pregnancy tests, take home
Speaker 1: pregnancy tests, I still was like, no, I'm not pregnant.
Speaker 1: I'm not pregnant. I'm you know. Um. So I told
Speaker 1: my sister, who again I don't have a relationship with her,
Speaker 1: but she ended up telling her mother. And so I
Speaker 1: came home one day, UM and just came into the
Speaker 1: house and my my mom was It was funny because
Speaker 1: my mom was upset and she said she handed me
Speaker 1: this bottle of prescription medication and she said, take these.
Speaker 1: So if you're not starting your period because of stress,
Speaker 1: you'll start your period. So she had called the dog
Speaker 1: her and said this is what's so. I don't have
Speaker 1: any idea what that was, but if you know, if
Speaker 1: it was going to happen naturally, I would have started
Speaker 1: and I didn't, and so my mother got involved. I
Speaker 1: probably didn't tell my mom the truth of the story
Speaker 1: until probably around I would stay around nineteen ninety. It
Speaker 1: took me a long time to tell her what had
Speaker 1: actually happened. But so, yeah, my mom was involved. And funny,
Speaker 1: we had a doctor in my town that delivered babies
Speaker 1: but also did abortions. You know, this was in three
Speaker 1: and so um that's you know. My mom called and
Speaker 1: made me the appointment, and then I went with a
Speaker 1: family member because my mother had to work and couldn't
Speaker 1: go with me. But it just was never talked about
Speaker 1: after that point. It wasn't something I ever thought I
Speaker 1: would do. I was I didn't believe in it. I
Speaker 1: didn't think people should do it, and when I made
Speaker 1: the decision, I just never looked back. It was it
Speaker 1: was the right choice, and I stand by it to
Speaker 1: this day. I was in grad school for Sexual and
Speaker 1: Reproductive Health UM during my Master of Public health at Columbia,
Speaker 1: and I found out I was pregnant a few months
Speaker 1: before graduation, and I UM, it was a really weird week.
Speaker 1: It happened to be the week that in multiple classes
Speaker 1: we were focusing specifically on pregnancy UM, and that was
Speaker 1: completely coincidental UM. But because of my my access and
Speaker 1: also UM kind of the knowledge that I had from
Speaker 1: my professional work UM, I felt pretty comfortable with what
Speaker 1: I knew kind of the steps to take UM about
Speaker 1: how to access the care that I wanted to access.
Speaker 1: So UM I made an appointment with my primary care
Speaker 1: doctor in Brooklyn UM to confirm the pregnancy, and simultaneously
Speaker 1: made an appointment at Planned Parenthood UM, and I knew
Speaker 1: that I wanted to have an in clinic abortion, even
Speaker 1: though I knew that I was very early. I have
Speaker 1: some chronic illnesses so UM. I tend to be very
Speaker 1: sensitive to a lot of medications, and UM I was
Speaker 1: much more comfortable with the idea of having a surgical
Speaker 1: abortion than rather than using the medication pills that UM
Speaker 1: affect hormones. Obviously, that's how they work. UM, So I
Speaker 1: made an appointment UM and in the meantime, I went
Speaker 1: to my doctor about about two days before. It was Thursday.
Speaker 1: My appointment was on Saturday, UM and she confirmed my pregnancy.
Speaker 1: And then the other reason I went to her is
Speaker 1: because I was already having really, really really intense nausea
Speaker 1: and UM I wanted to see whether she could prescribe
Speaker 1: some kind of stronger anti nausea medication that could help me,
Speaker 1: even just in those two days and then in the
Speaker 1: following days before the pregnancy hormones kind of subsided after
Speaker 1: the procedure UM and UM, I had a specific idea
Speaker 1: of a drug that I take for UM for my
Speaker 1: migraine that I've always had a really good response to.
Speaker 1: UM and I asked whether I could UM kind of
Speaker 1: re up my prescription for that because I was running
Speaker 1: out at home and UM she looked up kind of
Speaker 1: the drug interactions and whatever and said, you know all
Speaker 1: this maybe you know just so you know, there's a
Speaker 1: somewhat of an interaction with your anti depressants. So I
Speaker 1: was aware of that because I had taken the medication before.
Speaker 1: UM and I said, you know, thank you for telling me.
Speaker 1: I'm I'm comfortable with taking it. UM. And then a
Speaker 1: moment later she stopped and said, actually, I don't know
Speaker 1: that I want to give this to you because it
Speaker 1: says here that it's not recommended for pregnant women. And
Speaker 1: I was confused and said, well, I know that I'm
Speaker 1: pregnant now, but it's not going to be much longer. Um.
Speaker 1: And she refused to give me the medication because she
Speaker 1: was afraid that I would change my mind. UM, And
Speaker 1: I was. I was shocked, honestly, and also really upset
Speaker 1: by the interaction. Has It felt like she was giving
Speaker 1: me her own personal waiting period. I was in a
Speaker 1: state that has a state mandated waiting period. Um, because
Speaker 1: the idea that saying I want an abortion of you're
Speaker 1: going to have to wait forty eight hours and check
Speaker 1: again and if you still want it, then I'll give
Speaker 1: it to you. UM. It felt like that. And UM,
Speaker 1: you know, no matter how much I said to her,
Speaker 1: there is zero chance I'm going to change my mind.
Speaker 1: There is absolutely zero chance. I know for certain this
Speaker 1: is what I want to do. UM. And it's also
Speaker 1: two days away. She didn't budge, and UM, I know
Speaker 1: that it has to do with you know, She was
Speaker 1: afraid of legal ramifications of her choice more so than
Speaker 1: you know, the moral ones. But it doesn't change the
Speaker 1: fact that it meant that her fear around at and
Speaker 1: this kind of belief that I could potentially change my mind,
Speaker 1: even though I was an adult telling her I wasn't
Speaker 1: going to UM and it was again two days away.
Speaker 1: UM that superseded basically the quality of care that I
Speaker 1: should have received in that appointment UM. And she ended
Speaker 1: up prescribing me a pregnancy specific specialty drug UM that
Speaker 1: my insurance didn't cover when I went to go pick
Speaker 1: it up UM, and it was going to be hundreds
Speaker 1: of dollars UM. Obviously, I wasn't interested in doing that.
Speaker 1: I was I was really uncomfortable with how nauseated I was,
Speaker 1: But it wasn't you know, I wasn't going to the
Speaker 1: emergency room level, I wasn't vomiting UM. I was fine.
Speaker 1: It was just really more to do with my comfort.
Speaker 1: So I said, no, I'm fine. I sent my primary
Speaker 1: care doctor a message and explained, and I asked her
Speaker 1: a again, please just give me this medication that I
Speaker 1: know is safe for me to take, given all I've
Speaker 1: taken it before. I have a good response, I'm not
Speaker 1: keeping this pregnancy UM, and she ended up getting it
Speaker 1: to me. UM. She prescribed a few pills and UM.
Speaker 1: I never went back to her ever again. I didn't
Speaker 1: even tell her why. I was just UM. Absolutely, I
Speaker 1: just felt like my trust or it felt like she
Speaker 1: didn't trust me because she didn't UM, and that meant
Speaker 1: that for me, especially with chronic illnesses, my relationship with
Speaker 1: my doctors is so incredibly important to me UM and
Speaker 1: having feeling like they don't trust me is like, that's
Speaker 1: not gonna work for me. So UM. When I ended
Speaker 1: up going to get the abortion UM two days later,
Speaker 1: I hold the UM the doctor and UM. I had
Speaker 1: to physicians and UM a couple of nurses in the room,
Speaker 1: and they were absolutely lovely. They were really interested in
Speaker 1: my work and UM and I told them about this
Speaker 1: story but would happened with my primary care doctor and
Speaker 1: they were horrified UM. And also told me that actually
Speaker 1: the drug that she was afraid of prescribing to me
Speaker 1: is prescribed off label all the time for morning sickness
Speaker 1: UM and is UM. It's just a case of the
Speaker 1: fact that clinical research hasn't definitively proven it's safe for
Speaker 1: UM for the pregnancy. UM not it's definitely safe for
Speaker 1: the person who's pregnant. UM, and there's no evidence to
Speaker 1: suggest it isn't safe. It just hasn't been definitively proven
Speaker 1: that it is. UM and UM. You know, the care
Speaker 1: that I received there was absolutely amazing. I was I
Speaker 1: was in and out in less than maybe four hours.
Speaker 1: Even though there's the ultrasound and lots of counseling and
Speaker 1: UM it was. It always felt very comfortable and UM
Speaker 1: like my like I was being respected and trusted. UM.
Speaker 1: And I had an abortion do LA and that was
Speaker 1: really wonderful. UM. Even just having the option made me
Speaker 1: feel so much more uncomfortable that they were even considering
Speaker 1: kind of the emotional UM needs of the patient and UM.
Speaker 1: The only other kind of hiccup that happened to do
Speaker 1: with my abortion was that I had confirmed with my
Speaker 1: health insurance that they would cover it. UM. I called them,
Speaker 1: I looked at the UM explanation of coverage. I looked
Speaker 1: at everything, and it was very clear that abortion was covered.
Speaker 1: Then I received a bill for a few hundred dollars
Speaker 1: UM from Planned Parenthood, and I called my insurance and
Speaker 1: I was confused, and they explained that oh, actually, only
Speaker 1: medically necessary abortions are covered, and they had never mentioned
Speaker 1: that before. UM, and they just made it sound like
Speaker 1: there was some kind of like miscommunication around whether it
Speaker 1: was UM, in their words, an elective abortion or UM
Speaker 1: medically necessary one. UM. But then UM, you know I was.
Speaker 1: I had the abortion for two main reasons. One, I
Speaker 1: don't want children, now that's a good one UM. And
Speaker 1: then the other thing is because of my chronic illnesses,
Speaker 1: I'm at a higher risk of pregnan and see complications.
Speaker 1: And it was absolutely consideration for me UM that I
Speaker 1: wasn't comfortable with the idea of continuing a pregnancy given
Speaker 1: my health and UM my insurance. The person I spoke
Speaker 1: to UM said that I would be able to kind
Speaker 1: of retrospectively at UM at a letter from a doctor
Speaker 1: saying that my abortion was medically necessary and then they
Speaker 1: would retrospectively cover it. UM. And I reached out to
Speaker 1: my geneticist and explained what had happened, and UM, they
Speaker 1: wouldn't write the letter because they said that there wasn't
Speaker 1: enough research done into my conditions and how they interact
Speaker 1: with pregnancy. And as somebody who works in you know,
Speaker 1: public health from in reproductive health specifically and also have
Speaker 1: these conditions. I know that that's not true. UM. There
Speaker 1: has been plenty of research very clearly linking the genetic
Speaker 1: disorder that I have with higher risk pregnancy complications and
Speaker 1: often worsened symptoms post pregnancy. UM and knowing that plenty
Speaker 1: of people end up getting UM approvedramatically necessary abortions for
Speaker 1: various health conditions, including mental health reasons UM and the
Speaker 1: fact that they wouldn't acknowledge that my chronic illnesses would
Speaker 1: be a valid reason to not want to continue a
Speaker 1: pregnancy even without the absolutely clear research that does exist UM,
Speaker 1: they ended up make it meant that I ended up
Speaker 1: having to pay for it out of pocket UM, and
Speaker 1: I had no clue that that was going to happen,
Speaker 1: but because of my financial situation, I was able to
Speaker 1: pay for it myself. And UM. In lots of ways,
Speaker 1: my story is kind of an example of someone with
Speaker 1: a lot of privilege geographic, financial, UM, informational, the fact
Speaker 1: that I work in this space UM, and I think
Speaker 1: kind of the one area in which that I don't
Speaker 1: have a lot of privileges is my health. And it
Speaker 1: was kind of ironic that I was experiencing these barriers
Speaker 1: um as a somewhat related to my health conditions, but
Speaker 1: then also through my doctors, um that they were the
Speaker 1: people who were kind of getting in the way between
Speaker 1: of me being having the access or it wasn't even
Speaker 1: access I went, stopping me from getting an abortion. They
Speaker 1: were just making it a little harder, um and more uncomfortable.
Speaker 1: And then also like this area, this kind of sense
Speaker 1: that they didn't trust me, um is was kind of
Speaker 1: um even worse um than than than the actual consequences
Speaker 1: of what happened. Although having to pay for um the
Speaker 1: abortion was pretty sad, um, but it was possible, so
Speaker 1: you know, I didn't It wasn't the end of the world,
Speaker 1: but it was it could have been for somebody else,
Speaker 1: you know, it could have been a much bigger deal
Speaker 1: for another person. And um, I think about that all
Speaker 1: the time. Honestly. My name is Natasha ko Techi and
Speaker 1: I am forty six years old, and I had an
Speaker 1: abortion when I was seventeen years old. I um, you know,
Speaker 1: I had a sexual relationship with two guys one summer
Speaker 1: before my senior year. I was free. I was exploring
Speaker 1: my own sexuality, which was very important and and I
Speaker 1: think that is something at the heart of women's reproductive
Speaker 1: justice that we don't often think about um sexuality, and
Speaker 1: I think I think it has a lot to do
Speaker 1: with UM. With this also, but um. And I found
Speaker 1: myself pregnant uh a couple of weeks after school started,
Speaker 1: and of course I called both of them, and both
Speaker 1: of them said, well, it's not mine, because suddenly I was,
Speaker 1: you know, the virgin Mary um. And they turned the
Speaker 1: backs on me and left me to figure it out.
Speaker 1: So I called my cousin who lived in Maryland, and
Speaker 1: she was She really stepped up to the plate for me.
Speaker 1: She did everything, she arranged everything. I didn't even bot
Speaker 1: an eyelid. And you know, I often struggle with the
Speaker 1: fact that I didn't even think twice about it. I
Speaker 1: it was always you're having an abortion. I never even thought,
Speaker 1: oh my god, let me think about this, let me
Speaker 1: see how it's going to go. It was. That was
Speaker 1: never the case. It was always I was having an abortion. UM.
Speaker 1: So thankfully I had a cousin who was older than me,
Speaker 1: who was able to take care of everything, and she did,
Speaker 1: and I met her at the clinic and she paid
Speaker 1: for it. I never paid her back, which I still
Speaker 1: feel very guilty about to this day, and I talked
Speaker 1: about with her often. UM And that was it. After that,
Speaker 1: all of my friends abandoned to me. I had no
Speaker 1: friends my whole senior year of high school. I went
Speaker 1: to a very small Catholic high school. I was one
Speaker 1: of fifteen graduating seniors. UM My supposed best friend who
Speaker 1: I went to school with, made it her business to
Speaker 1: tell everyone my business. UM and I had to confide
Speaker 1: in adults at my school that I had had an abortion.
Speaker 1: UM And in the handbook, the student handbook, it's specifically
Speaker 1: states that if you have an abortion, that we can
Speaker 1: remove you from the school. Now. Thankfully, the two adults
Speaker 1: that I had confided in did not tell anyone that
Speaker 1: had me removed from the school. But it was, you know,
Speaker 1: it was a very you know, it's a very Catholic school. UM.
Speaker 1: And so that year was hell for me. Living hell,
Speaker 1: I mean I was. I didn't struggle with the decision initially,
Speaker 1: but living with it without having a support system was
Speaker 1: really difficult for me. And UM, I fell into what
Speaker 1: I would call a depression. But I don't think it
Speaker 1: was a depression because of my abortion. I think it
Speaker 1: was a depression because I was sad and lonely that
Speaker 1: I didn't have any friends or support system. Um, and
Speaker 1: you know that manifests itself in different ways, and you know,
Speaker 1: kind of snowball when I graduated from my school. But
Speaker 1: that's my story, and you know, honestly, I thought about it.
Speaker 1: I think about I used to think about it all
Speaker 1: the time. I think about it all the time now
Speaker 1: because it's front and center of the news cycle. Um,
Speaker 1: But it did consume me for a long time. And
Speaker 1: I think what bothered me is that I didn't have anyone,
Speaker 1: you know, and and even my cousin who had set
Speaker 1: everything up, she wasn't able to provide the emotional support
Speaker 1: that I needed, which is why I became an abortion Duela.
Speaker 1: It's one of the most rewarding and um, you know,
Speaker 1: as I said in my Shout your Abortion story, I
Speaker 1: needed to become who I needed and that has helped
Speaker 1: me in more ways than I can ever express. Once again,
Speaker 1: here's renamed Bracy Sherman from We testify my goal with
Speaker 1: whatever we do with we testify, whether it's any of
Speaker 1: our campaigns or efforts like it is to end the stigma,
Speaker 1: which the pervasive belief all around us that abortion is
Speaker 1: something to be whispered and not talked about. UM. To
Speaker 1: end that stigma, to end the way that people who
Speaker 1: have abortions are treated with disrespect and just like lack
Speaker 1: of any sort of autonomy or used for our stories.
Speaker 1: UM and create a world in which we are loved
Speaker 1: and honored and celebrated and supported. And to teach people
Speaker 1: who haven't had abortions how to love us and how
Speaker 1: to show up for that loved one in your life
Speaker 1: who needs an abortion, because there is one, I promise,
Speaker 1: and they are hoping that they can come to you
Speaker 1: for some support. And they have been listening to everything
Speaker 1: you say along the way to see whether or not
Speaker 1: you're a safe person. And so everything we do, all
Speaker 1: our social media and art projects and campaigns, they're beautiful,
Speaker 1: and we want them to be a beautiful mirror of
Speaker 1: people who have abortions, because we know that we're beautiful
Speaker 1: people who just walk among us. We're asked to do
Speaker 1: it silently, and I'm saying that we shouldn't need to
Speaker 1: do that anymore. If you want to share your own
Speaker 1: abortion story, connect with other storytellers, or find ways to help,
Speaker 1: you can visit we testify dot Org, as well as
Speaker 1: shout your Abortion dot Com. Thank you again for listening, everyone,
Speaker 1: for sharing your thoughts, and for sharing this podcast. We
Speaker 1: hope it encourages, at the very least conversations around this
Speaker 1: important but often taboo topic. Check out the description of
Speaker 1: this episode for more ways you can help and organizations
Speaker 1: and people you can follow to stay engaged in the
Speaker 1: fight for reproductive rights. Abortion. The Body Politic is executive
Speaker 1: produced by me Katie Couric and was created by small
Speaker 1: team led by our intrepid supervising producer Lauren Hansen. Editing
Speaker 1: and sound designed by Derrick Clements, researched by Nina Perlman,
Speaker 1: and a special thanks to CASEM producers Fortney Litz and
Speaker 1: Adriana Fasio.