commotiocordis: Green on black, an animated depiction of a normal heart rhythm on an ECG monitor. (Default)
[personal profile] commotiocordis
So this is in response to something [livejournal.com profile] xx_housecat_xx posted in her journal asking about people's views/responses/emotions regarding abortion. And my response became long and such, so I figured I'd just throw it over here. As I went way off topic of her initial query. And ended up staying up way later than I planned so that I could finish typing it.

It gets kind of personal, though, so if you're not comfortable with that for some reason. . . .


Good topic. I've actually thought about this a lot, about how people say that you can't ever actually know what you'll do until you're actually in that situation and I think that I can still say that I know that I would never do it.
(Whoa, long sentence.)
(Edit: rather long response in total. What can I say, good topic.)

I know a lot of my anti-abortion stance comes from the fact that that was how I was raised; Catholic and more or less conservative. And though I'm essentially neither at this point, the pro-life thing is one of the few viewpoints I've retained. And I've realized that one of the main reasons for my keeping it is because my mum tried to have kids for so long and couldn't. I'm the first of 3 kids out of 6 pregnancies that actually took, not even counting the undoubtedly countless that never did or miscarried before she knew. And I've never been able to comprehend why someone would throw away something that some women try so hard for and can't get. But I know that's really hard for a lot of people to understand, the desperation and sorrow and such that comes with not being able to have kids. It's almost irrational, honestly, the amount of pressure that women have to propagate successfully, but it is the biological purpose of life, so it makes sense that there's this huge drive for it.

Regarding the whole "you can't understand until you're in that situation", I think it works both ways. You can't really understand the entire debate until you've had to try to keep your kid siblings in the front room while listening to you mom sobbing in her bedroom after just having been told that the baby she's carried for 5 months and will carry for 4 more (after having two later-term--one late first, one early second trimester--miscarriages and thinking she was out of the woods) has no chance of surviving. (That's still one of the most harrowing memories of my entire life.)

Plus there's the whole I see it as murder thing. Because, um, that's a person. In there. Not random growth. Having babies, the fact that we can do it, the fact that an entire sentient being can come from the union of two zygotes is what I've seen for a long time as the greatest miracle of the universe. I mean, if you think about it, it's pretty wicked beautiful of a phenomenon. Sentience as a whole is pretty wicked cool if you think about how many species are not sentient and how we managed to get the luck of the draw (or survival of the fittest, I suppose) and come out on top. And that somebody would willfully destroy that before it even had a chance and furthermore that it would actually be legal sort of baffles my mind.

And I understand the wanting an abortion for rape/incest/whatever, but if you report it, they automatically give you a triple dose of birth control that induces menses within 48 hours, thus preventing pregnancy, thus not actually needing to terminate a child (though I know that some people would consider the birth control thing abortion in itself, but I give a bit more leeway than that). Barring that, say she didn't want to report it at first and by the time she finds out it's too late for the birth control thing, I'm semi-okay with early abortions in that case.

But here's the kicker. Banning abortion = pretty much impossible. You ban it completely, you're a heartless bastard who cares nothing for the emotional welfare of abused and raped women. You ban it except for in cases of rape or incest, all of a sudden you've got every woman who wants an abortion claiming rape. Pretty soon, nobody's going to investigate rape seriously at all because it will have become synonymous with simply wanting an abortion and rapists will walk the streets free.

So it doesn't really work. My opinion is that the best bet is to provide birth control and better education. None of this abstinence education shit, real sex education so you actually know what's going on when the time comes. That's what's going to lower the abortion rate faster than anything. Let's put some money into better, cheaper, and more insurance coverage for birth control instead of male impotence drugs.

But yeah. I think the one thing that cemented my knowing that I'd never ever be able to get an abortion was something my mom told me about after having and losing her 6th kid, Riley. We had known that he was terminal since her 4th or 5th month, and sometime in there she and my dad had seriously talked about aborting him. Because all the doctors had told us that there was no chance, he probably wouldn't even make it to term, it would probably be cheaper, etc. And my dad had sort of been for it because basically it was fucking up my mom (totally understandably, you know) and by extension our whole family. But mum said no. A, they weren't clear/right about what was wrong with him and she knew they were wrong about what they had initially said at that point because of things they had said earlier, etc., and if they were by chance wrong and only found out after they had killed him that he wouldn't have died in the first place, she wouldn't be able to live with herself. And this had already happened to us before, more or less, as my parents were given some list of things that were possibly wrong with my brother Tyler way back 7 years earlier, all or most of which were terminal, and he came out okay. (Well, you know. Little brother kind of okay.) Those, of course, were never given as certainties like Riley's was, but she didn't want to take any chances. But the way she phrased it still nearly makes me cry every time I think about it:

"I had to live with carrying him for 9 months. I would have had to live with the possibility that I was wrong for a lot longer."

So yeah. That's essentially why I'm against it. To put it in a nutshell.

Wow, now I'm all somber and teary-like. Nice job, Cathryn. *pokes*

Date: 2007-04-26 10:58 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] chaosity.livejournal.com
Best. Response. Ever.
And I totally feel for your mum. My mum miscarried once before having me and she said that was one of the most traumatising experiences of her life (up there with being sexually assaulted at 5 and raped at 14. I don't know why I'm fine casually sharing that, but it gives a good comparison) so I can't imagine how it would feel to (consciously) lose three children.

I've been thinking about it more, and I'm not sure how, but I'm certain I couldn't abort a pregnancy. If I was raped I'd try to report it and take that morning-after pill or whatever they're calling it, but obviously I can't say what my state of mind would be and how long I'd wait before telling someone. I know people think if you're raped you would hate to have a reminder of the attack, but I've read so many stories of women who've been in that situation but kept the baby, and never looked back. This is a child we're talking about, after all. It's a life, a soul.

Also, something my mum told me has stuck with me. I never actually saw it, but just hearing about it is more than enough.
She watched this documentary late one night on abortion, and it showed them aborting a baby at ... I think it was 20 weeks. A baby can live outside the womb at 21 weeks, right? Slim chance, but it's possible. Anyway, she said it was horrific. They showed the ultrasound footage of the procedure, which involved them using this vacuum tube to smash the baby's head in to kill it, and then suck it up in little pieces or something. he said you could see the little arms thrashing about in agony as they killed it. I'm not sure if that was an extreme case or what, but to me I think it's a perfect example of the cruelty.

But... I dunno. I was watching that video clip, and I all of a sudden felt this profound sadness. And loneliness. I guess because my mum always described having a tiny being growing inside you as being the most wonderful feeling in the world. And I've thought about it. It'd be like having someone there with you (literally a part of you) all the time, someone who loves you unconditionally and relies on you to live. It'd feel amazing. And... to take that away would leave you feeling so hollow, and alone. Like those lines in the song, when she's all alone. idk. I'm having that annoying thing where I've got all these thoughts in my head but they're not forming into words. Grr.

Your mum's quote is beautiful. If I were in her situation I'd feel the same. I'd also want to be as close to him as possible, for as long as possible.

I want a little baby now. To cuddle and things. LOL. It happens sometimes, when I'm all menstrual and stuff. Probably because my body knows I'm not pregnant. SORRY MATE. NOT THIS TIME. PROABLY NOT FOR A LONG TIME, IF EVER.
the prospect of not having a baby ever saddens me sometimes. I feel like Cuddy!

Hee, sorry for getting you all emotional like that. :p *shnuggles*

Date: 2007-04-26 03:06 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] rainbowjumpsuit.livejournal.com
Wow, ok. from all this powerful insight with the two of you to um, well... me. I'm still in that "I don't know" phase. I mean... I could debate it in a really long drawn out (unscientific and unsatisfying) way but I won't do that because you guys obvioiusly put way more thought into it...

My feelings are just that if I was ever in the situation to need one... I don't know. It's that damn thing everybody says again about not knowing what you'd do until you were in the situation. I'd like to think I could stick with a strong "No" but I have seen cases where abortion has helped the mother by like not ruining her life or making it much harder and in most of these cases maybe(??) the child was helped as well or saved from a life on the streets or something. I know there is always adoption but the Adoption places are so often overrun with children and so many of them never make it out of the system.

That's just my point of view anyhow. I totally respect where you guys are coming from and everything your parents went through and why you feel the way you do. Totally, and it was much more eloquently put than I'd be able to phrase anything. Just adding my 2 cents on the subject!

Date: 2007-10-24 05:46 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] crashcart9.livejournal.com
I definitely get that. The kids' lives might suck, and they will probably never get out of the system. But if the allowing abortion to prevent shitty lives thing is true, then people shouldn't have as much of a problem with suicide, because isn't that the same situation? Your life is shitty, you want it over. In fact, it's even more in that situation than abortion, because you at least already know that your life is shitty, you're not just supposing it.

I don't know. I'm okay with, to an extent, legalization of v. early abortions. RU-486? Go for it. The late term ones, though, I find completely and horrendously immoral. I mean, they're delivering these babies most of the way and then brutally killing them before taking them the rest of the way out. Many of which could live outside the womb just fine or are within a few weeks of being able to do so.

So yes. Though I don't think it's really possible to illegalize abortion like I said (they've done studies, also, where they compare abortion rates in countries where it's legal and illegal, and they're just about the same and the only difference is a higher level of maternal death when it's illegal because they're getting shitty abortions), I think the late term ones should be illegal, because there's really no reason for them.

Date: 2007-04-28 05:52 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] xakana.livejournal.com
We're having this debate on my parenting forum. My favorite response to the "if you haven't been there, you have no right to be pro-life" (that PISSED me off) was:

In that case, all of us [on the forum] have the right because we have children and have therefore, chosen not to abort them.

Then there's the people who hate people like me, who are pro-life at heart and soul, but politically pro-choice. My reasoning for that is that I've never been a 14 year old rape victim expecting my father/brother/uncle's child or a woman looking at death/permanent injury if my pregnancy is continued. Therefore, while I'm against any abortion after the first trimester, excepting in extreme medical cases, I'm pro-choice for the first due to circumstances. Also, pro-choice means that I'm not saying that my beliefs are superior to another person's. While I'll hope that they'll NOT choose abortion, I know that they would choose it any way they can (meaning a coat hanger in an alley or kitchen table abortion) so it's better to have it legalized. At least in the first tri.

Just my two cents.

Date: 2007-04-28 05:52 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] xakana.livejournal.com
Oh, it was the 'no right to' that pissed me off, not the response--I LIKED the response!

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