Ask me about my abortion

[Alka_Seltzer]

@Feyrat

That’s something I’ve never understood in the pro-life stance, and forgive me if this is a hijack - but so what if “life” begins at conception? It’s a very little life, and certainly not a human baby. It’s a potential human, but millions of potential humans get flushed naturally by a woman’s body every year. It’s a life, but so’s a fish, and sort of on the same level as a fish - and most of the pro-lifers I know aren’t even vegetarians.

I can sort of understand this. There is no magical moment where a fetus or baby becomes a person, it’s a process of development. A fetus is a potential person, while a fish is not.

Of course, many of the pro-lifers believe God fires down a soul at the moment of conception.

@KellyCriterion

The reasons you stated above, such as the “bravery” required and the “difficulty” of giving up a child for adoption, and how you feel you aren’t “capable” of it and you’ll “beat yourself up morally” about it. Those are your problems to deal with, not your child’s.

It’s pretty clear to me from Anaamika’s posts she was thinking both of herself and the sort of life an unwanted child might have. Can you not understand how emotionally devestating it could be for a woman to carry a pregnancy for 9 months, watch the baby be delivered, and then abandon it to an uncertain future? She had every right to think about the impact the pregnancy would have on her own life.

@KellyCriterion

Can you clearly explain what it is that adoption does to the child that has made you decide you could “never do it to them”? I’d like to hear your answer within the context of your earlier comment (also highlighted by Hamlet), that you support adoption “whole-heartedly”.

Adoption can be wonderful for both the child and the adoptive parents, but it doesn’t always work out well. There are already an excess of children put up for adoption, adding one more isn’t neccessarily the right thing to do.

There is no way of knowing what sort of life an aborted child might have had. However, the same could be said of any of the innumerable combinations of sperm and egg that never were.

[classyladyhp]

@Feyrat

That’s something I’ve never understood in the pro-life stance, and forgive me if this is a hijack - but so what if “life” begins at conception? It’s a very little life, and certainly not a human baby. It’s a potential human, but millions of potential humans get flushed naturally by a woman’s body every year. It’s a life, but so’s a fish, and sort of on the same level as a fish - and most of the pro-lifers I know aren’t even vegetarians.

What? Not a human baby? Then way the heck is it an alien baby?:smack:

[Hamlet]

@Anaamika

I think adoption is a wonderful thing, if done right. Truly. It’s just not for me. Many people believe wholeheartedly in abortion but would never get one. Many people believe in things they would never do themselves. I will keep my personal hypocrisy.

Thank you for your honesty. I understand adoption is much more difficult than abortion and I appreciate your honesty in why it wasn’t a viable option for you.

@Anaamika

To bear a child for nine months and then give it away - that has got to be incredibly brave and difficult. I don’t feel capable of doing it, and I would forever beat myself up morally.

I thought I understood up until the part when you say “I would forever beat myself up morally”, which made me question my understanding again. Why would you beat yourself up morally when you choose something that you agree is “brave” and “a wonderful thing”?

[Czarcasm]

[Moderator Note]This thread is about Anaamika’s experience having an abortion. If you have questions to ask her about it, or have had a similar experience you wish share, go right ahead, but take any debates about abortion and/or adoption to Great Debates.[/Moderator Note]

[IvoryTowerDenizen]

@Hamlet

Thank you for your honesty. I understand adoption is much more difficult than abortion and I appreciate your honesty in why it wasn’t a viable option for you. I thought I understood up until the part when you say “I would forever beat myself up morally”, which made me question my understanding again. Why would you beat yourself up morally when you choose something that you agree is “brave” and “a wonderful thing”?

Because people are complex and contradictory especially surrounding the issues in their own childhood. There are things I can recognize are fine when other people do it, but I beat myself up about it when I do the same.

[BigBertha]

Oh yeah, I do have a good question. How long did it take for your period to come back? I had mine at 8 weeks and it took three months for it to return.

[Anaamika]

@KellyCriterion

But as Hamlet has pointed out, you said in regards to adoption that you’re “never willing to do that to a child” (emphasis mine).

The reasons you stated above, such as the “bravery” required and the “difficulty” of giving up a child for adoption, and how you feel you aren’t “capable” of it and you’ll “beat yourself up morally” about it. Those are your problems to deal with, not your child’s.

Can you clearly explain what it is that adoption does to the child that has made you decide you could “never do it to them”? I’d like to hear your answer within the context of your earlier comment (also highlighted by Hamlet), that you support adoption “whole-heartedly”.

I’ve said my piece and don’t really intend to defend my personal emotions much more - it’s just the way it is. I am *wholeheartedly *in favor of open adoptions, and totally *against *adoption in my case. I just can’t do to a child what was done to me. And I know thinking that way is OK. That’s the beauty of pro-choice - I have every right to make the decision I do and still agree with a totally different decision for a different woman. Unless you are the woman in that situation, you really can’t get it.

But I do want to say - it’s not a “child” and it’s disingenuous to call it so before it is even born. I don’t know when “life begins” but in my eyes it certainly isn’t a child when it’s less than 12 weeks along, not viable by itself and completely and utterly unwanted. Yes, most importantly, it’s not a child until I want it to be. What I mean to say is, an anticipated pregnancy, sure she can call it a child as soon as the stick says YES. Why not? She wants it. For me it was a mistake and an inconvenience and still would be a mistake and inconvenience.
Please don’t extend that to say I am in favor of infanticide. Once the baby is independently viable that is a whole different story and not relevant to this thread.

Children should be wanted. That right there is the whole core of my ethos. All children should be wanted.

I don’t really remember how long it took for my period to come back, sorry. That was a long time ago.

[miss_elizabeth]

@BigBertha

Oh yeah, I do have a good question. How long did it take for your period to come back? I had mine at 8 weeks and it took three months for it to return.

I can’t remember for the first one (that was a looong time ago!) but the recent one, it came back on my very next cycle. That may be because I took the pill(s), or because I was so early in the pregnancy. I don’t know.

[rhubarbarin]

Thank you for posting this thread Anaamika.

@gonzomax

There are 520,000 kids in Foster homes and 127, 000 available for adoption is America right now. There is no guarantee your kid will get a home.

Well, if your baby is new-born, healthy, and white, chances are very high indeed that you can line up an excellent mid-income two-parent home - usually while you’re still pregnant.

However re: adoption (not directed at you gonzomax): being pregnant for 9 months (with all the physical unpleasantness and possible side-effects that entails, especially if you are a teenager and have a higher risk of many poor outcomes) with your biological child, giving birth, and giving your infant up for adoption (even these days when most adoptions are ‘open’ and you have more peace of mind as you get regular updates about your child) can be an extremely difficult or even traumatic emotional experience for the mother. Two of my aunts gave up babies for adoption in their late teens/early 20s, and neither of them have ever ‘gotten over it’ (about 40 years later now). I had a friend who gave up her baby when she was in high school (7 years ago now) and it’s something she struggles with every day…

Not to mention being an adopted kid, even if you’re adopted in early infancy by a loving two-parent family of the same ethnic background who looks like you and treats you exactly as they would their biological child, just isn’t the same as being a biological kid. I know a lot of people who were adopted, mostly within the first two weeks of life (including my father, several of my closest friends, and my cousin; one of the children one of my aunts gave up for adoption, who ‘found’ my aunt in 1999 and is now closer with our family than she is with the family who raised her), and every single one has significant baggage surrounding that fact, and a strong drive to reconnect with their biological family. Granted, most adopted people I know were adopted before the big adoption reform, when ‘closed’ adoptions and a certain measure of secrecy and shame were the norm… things are much better these days, and I’d be interested to know how differently adopted people and families feel now.

IMO it’s not ‘just adoption’ and is not a reasonable alternative to terminating an unwanted pregnancy, for most women. It’s also much more difficult (and expensive!) to adopt a child yourself, than many people assume.

[Unauthorized_Cinnamon]

Thanks to the ladies who have shared their stories here. I just wanted to add another “pro-choice mom” post. Being pregnant and having children has made me MORE pro-choice. And I really support and respect anyone who decides that parenthood is not for them, and it pisses me off that you get flack for it from idiots.

FWIW, I think people who say “Oh, you should just give the baby up for adoption” have a very ignorant and sanitized view of pregnancy, birth, and the emotional impact of adoption for both parties. Pregnancy permanently changes your body. Birth is violent and injurious, to the point that I support abortion on the theory of self defense, regardless of whether a fetus is a person. After my second pregnancy and birth, I was largely crippled. And even if you don’t have serious issues, the whole process is pretty burdensome.

Then lets assume you give the baby away. First, your body doesn’t know this. It’s not a quick and clean break no matter how quickly you give the baby to others, because your body will still make milk. I can’t imagine how difficult it is to feel that visceral connection to a baby you gave up. Then there’s the issue of who the adoptive parents are. You can never be sure they’ll be good parents, or even if they’ll be abusive. And a child who was adopted will have extra stresses due to it, even if their parents are near-perfect.

Another twist most people who blithely suggest adoption probably don’t think of. I have two kids. Not only can I cannot go through another pregnancy, I also don’t think I could handle raising another child. If I somehow got through a pregnancy and went with adoption, it would seriously screw with my kids’ heads for me to give away their younger sibling. No matter how reassuring I was, I’m sure it would be devastating, and they would wonder if I might give them to some strangers if things didn’t work out right.

Oh and another anti-adoption angle: some women get pregnant by a man who is a horrible excuse for a human being. And if they carry the pregnancy to term, they don’t necessarily get to choose adoption. The douchebag father can take the baby and ruin someone else’s life -this time from the very start. Women in abusive relationships and such may have a very strong need to abort rather than consider adoption.

[Sidewise]

Thank you to the OP and others for sharing your stories. It’s good to know that others have had a similar experience as mine, and that I’m not the only woman in the world who never wanted kids and who doesn’t feel particularly guilty about the abortion I had. I don’t mean to imply that I’m “pro-abortion” and think it’s a good thing, of course. I wish it hadn’t happened, but I’ve never felt really guilty about it. But I’ve often thought that I’m supposed to feel guilty about it and that maybe there’s something wrong with me because I don’t.

This was in the 1980’s, and I was a couple of years out of college. My partner and I had a birth control failure. He was willing to go along with whatever I wanted to do, and we had been dating long enough that the idea of marriage wasn’t out of the question. But as someone else mentioned, I’m sure he was relieved at my final decision. Both of us were really just getting started out in our careers and neither one of us wanted or were financially or emotionally prepared to have kids.

I can’t think of a single time, up to and including now, when I wanted kids or looked back and wished I had them. It’s not that I don’t like children. In fact, in younger children, I quite enjoy both their lack of a filter (saying exactly what the see/feel/think) and their sense of awe about the world because so much is new to them. So as long as there’s someone I can hand them back to after a little while, I’m totally cool with kids and can enjoy their company. I’ve just never, ever had the slightest desire to have one.

And I knew at the time back then that I was just not the mothering type, and that in general I’m too “into” my career and doing my own thing (or too selfish, however you want to look at it) to be a good mother.

After I found out I was pregnant, all of the above went through my mind very quickly. Can’t say as I spent much time thinking about it. I simply knew immediately that having and raising a child wasn’t an option that made any kind of sense for me or for the possible child. I thought briefly about what it would mean to go through with the pregnancy and then give up the kid for adoption. That just didn’t seem right to me, either, for various reasons both of self-interest and otherwise. As a female working through some pretty difficult opposition in an all-male field (at the time), even just being pregnant would have a serious affect on my career back then even if I gave it up for adoption. There were and are plenty of kids already who need a loving home and parents, and I couldn’t see adding to that by having a kid and then putting it into an unknown adoption situation where their life could turn out amazing, or where they could end up in the worst kind of family situation. I’m pretty sure that not knowing how that turned out would’ve caused me much more guilt in the long run than having an abortion.

Again, I recognize that may be considered purely selfishness on my part. But I can’t imagine that a 6 week old fetus could have any sense of “lost opportunity” at not being allowed to come to term, so to me that’s less of a loss to a “potential person” and to society than some of the horrid things I could imagine from an adoption situation. (And please don’t take this as an insult to adoptive parents, I’m sure most are very good people who provide a good family situation for the adopted children. But I’m equally sure that there are a few times when that’s totally not the case, either. ) And what if the kid was born with physical imperfections or whatever that made them not easily adoptable? Would it be fair of me to subject him/her to a childhood in “the system” without having a real family at all?

So, in a perfect world, I would rather there not have to be any abortions ever. But I’m glad there was, and still is for the time being, a choice and still think it was the only realistic and rational choice for me.

Thank you for giving me a place to get this out. The only people that know about my abortion, before now, are the people at the clinic (whoever they were) and the guy in question, who I lost track of years ago. While I’ve had no guilt about my decision, I’ve had significant guilt over the fact that I haven’t felt guilty about it, if that makes any sense.

Edited for typo.

[Rushgeekgirl]

@YaraMateo

I know one woman touched on this, but I’ve wondered about this in the other cases. Did anyone of the other women who’ve had abortions and decided they were having kids, or never wanted them like the OP, look into getting their tube tied? I’m not really prolife, but I didn’t enjoy reading a few women post that would have NO problem simply having another abortion in the future.

No, why would I do that? I was only fifteen. I aborted because I didn’t want to be pregnant anymore. I didn’t want to have a baby. I did later. I have two lovely daughters. But now I don’t want any more, so am super careful. I am not interested in nor do I have the money to get my tubes tied though. On the way off chance that I do get pregnant again at my age I will definitely abort. I don’t want to be pregnant and I’m not really interested in having more children. It’s highly unlikely anyway. I’m just saying I wouldn’t regret it any more now than I did back then. Abortion is nothing more than a medical procedure. I can’t help it if other people have it in their head that a 10 week old fetus is in any way equal to a baby. The one thing that upsets me about that abortion is that I was so ashamed about it because people make out like it’s some sort of murder.

[Rushgeekgirl]

@CrazyCatLady

Unfortunately, doctors willing to sterilize a woman under about 35 who hasn’t had kids already are pretty goddamn thin on the ground. After all, you’re young yet and things change and you don’t want to do anything drastic or permanent. Which is stupid, because it’s not like there’s anything this side of dying more drastic or permanent than parenthood. A fair number of doctors don’t even want to offer long-term birth control like IUDs to women who haven’t had kids, on the off chance that it might potentially in some cases affect future fertility. Which is even stupider because a) that doesn’t actually happen and b) a G0 looking for long-term birth control is often childless by choice and actively wants her future fertility impaired.

To sum up, the most effective forms of birth control are often denied to people who are most opposed to carrying a pregnancy to term and are thus most likely to abort in the event of birth control failure. It’s all just phenomenally stupid and counter-productive.

I remember back in the eighties (not sure if it’s still like this) I was on state insurance briefly and thought it would be great because I could get free birth control. However the state wouldn’t pay a dime unless it was “medically necessary”. I know they didn’t cover abortions, unless for the same reason.

They pay everything from office visits to l & d to aftercare if you get pregnant though.

[Rushgeekgirl]

@BigBertha

Oh yeah, I do have a good question. How long did it take for your period to come back? I had mine at 8 weeks and it took three months for it to return.

I have never had an normal cycle so I couldn’t say.

[KellyCriterion]

@Anaamika

I’ve said my piece and don’t really intend to defend my personal emotions much more - it’s just the way it is. I am *wholeheartedly *in favor of open adoptions, and totally *against *adoption in my case. I just can’t do to a child what was done to me.

What was done to you that doesn’t get done to other adopted children?

[Unintentionally_Blank]

@KellyCriterion

What was done to you that doesn’t get done to other adopted children?

Doesn’t matter. You might as well ask why someone likes vanilla over strawberry, or republican over democrat.

[KellyCriterion]

@Unintentionally_Blank

Doesn’t matter. You might as well ask why someone likes vanilla over strawberry, or republican over democrat.

Nope. It’s more like asking what the difference is between two vanillas that appear ostensibly to be the same.

[Unintentionally_Blank]

@KellyCriterion

What was done to you that doesn’t get done to other adopted children?

@Lynn_Bodoni

If I’d gotten pregnant when I was single, for instance, and my parents knew about it, they would have been shocked at first. But they would have wanted and expected me to keep the pregnancy, and then keep the baby. They would have been horrified if I had given the baby up for adoption.

But for many people in this thorny situation:thats the difference between being involved and being committed (see the breakfast joke about the chicken being involved and the pig being committed) and is the root of the argument: people who are not necessarily committed to the decision, are trying to convince another person to make a HUGE life-altering commitment that vastly outweighs the initial “oops”.

That’s the crux to the “every child a wanted child” part of the unending debate.

[IvoryTowerDenizen]

@KellyCriterion

Nope. It’s more like asking what the difference is between two vanillas that appear ostensibly to be the same.

I’m not sure why it is hard to imagine that she can intellectually understand that adoption can be ok for some people, but because of her emotional trauma she couldn’t do it herself?

My parents are Holocaust survivors. Some survivors and their children have gone back to Poland and Germany to visit the camps. I think it’s a marvelous thing they do and there is no way in hell I could ever do it myself.

[KellyCriterion]

@IvoryTowerDenizen

I’m not sure why it is hard to imagine that she can intellectually understand that adoption can be ok for some people, but because of her emotional trauma she couldn’t do it herself?.

Here’s the breakdown.

I’m not asking about how adoption affects the parent.

I’m asking how it affects the child.