Survivor Voices: A Reminder of What’s At Stake
When I first heard that Roe V. Wade had been overturned, I immediately thought back to conversations with people who assured me this would never happen. Well, we are here. Now the conversation has become about how we are lucky to live in a state where we can still access reproductive health care without fear of prosecution. What happened to the idea that social justice means for all and not only if it applies to me?
I was exploited for years and in a marriage where my body did not belong to me even longer. The first time that I became pregnant, this was by my exploiter. At that time, I was had also become dependent on substances. I had never been to a gynecologist and was terrified of where to turn for help. My use increased and I eventually miscarried. I was alone and never received follow-up care. The second time I became pregnant, it was during a time when I was forced to have sex for money that I would turn over to the man exploiting me. I thought that if I kept using, I would miscarry and I wouldn’t tell anyone and I could just keep going. This was not the case. Scared, I went to him and told him I was pregnant. He threw $500 on the bed and told me to “take care of it”. I didn’t know where or how. I looked in the phone book and found a place that could help. I showed up to the appointment, money in hand, and was hoping that it would be over quickly. The doctor came in, although, in retrospect, I am not sure he was. He squirted the cold jelly on my abdomen and ran the wand over it until an image popped up on the screen. It looked like a jelly bean. He shut the machine off and pulled out his wallet and removed a picture of a little girl. He began, “this is my daughter”. He went on to tell me a story of how his girlfriend became pregnant and how even though they were scared, God told them it would be ok. I later learned that they didn’t perform abortions, they were a clinic that would convince you that this pregnancy was a gift and it was a sin to do anything but carry a baby to term.
About a week later, I found a place that performed abortions and I scheduled an appointment right away. I went into the exam room and they hooked me up to a heart monitor. They told me they did not use any anesthesia. My heart began racing, so much so that it set off one of the machines. They told me they would not perform the procedure because I could have a heart attack. I got dressed and left.
With no other ideas and being farther along in my pregnancy, I began thinking about what the first doctor said. Was this a gift? Was I a sinner? I wasn’t. I was not equipped at that time to take care of a baby; I couldn’t even take care of myself. If I had carried the baby to term, it would most likely be taken away and put into the Department of Children and Families custody. It could have been born dependent on the substances I was putting into my body. I. Was. Not. Ready. I went to the hospital and was connected to a clinic that was able to safely, remove the fetus.
As traumatic as my experience was, I was still able to make a choice, a decision, about what I wanted to do with my body. This should be an option for all people that are able to carry a child. The elimination and criminalization are just the beginning. In addition, these laws and decisions will continue to impact the most marginalized. People of color, people who are living in poverty, people who are anything but white, heterosexual, Christian, and male. No matter where you live or who you are, you should be able to make decisions about your body. This is not a place for the government.
This decision will directly impact the hundreds of thousands of people who are victims of commercial sexual exploitation and trafficking every year. This will lead to people, like me, trying to terminate their pregnancies in other ways if they are unable to access care. This is not something that can be remedied by the theory, if you don’t want to get pregnant, don’t have sex. So many thought this was never going to happen and it did, what’s next?
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