At a New Year’s Eve party, I couldn’t drink due to meds that I’ll be on for a week and a half, so I told everyone who inquired about my complaining about it, that I was maybe preggers and didn’t want to drink. (I did explain I was joking to everyone…well, mostly.) Everyone accepted that–except one person, who pointed out that if I knew I would get it aborted, I should go ahead and indulge.
So I got to wondering…if you are pregnant for sure and you know you don’t want it, would you drink/use drugs/have unprotected sex with strangers/bungee jump? are you a bad person for doing so?
This exact situation happened to me. I happened to find out I was pregnant just before I went on a two-day music festival/camp-out that I had planned months in advance. I immediately planned to have an abortion ASAP (as in, the following week, as this was the weekend). So I went to the music festival and drank. Pretty normal stuff (there was no drugs, sex or bungee jumping! Just some cold beers!)
So yes, it’s OK. If you were planning to have an abortion, what would be the reason to abstain from drinking?
Of course (to the first), if you’re pretty sure you won’t change your mind. I can imagine this sort of thing happens a lot, though, unintended, as many women don’t know they’re pregnant 'til a few months in. I’ve definitely been in the position where I was getting nervous about my next period but didn’t think twice about drinking, smoking, etc. I actually thought ‘Even if I wanted a kid, it’d be majorly fucked up after what I’ve indulged in this weekend.’ If anything, it calmed my nerves!
No unprotected sex with strangers, though, under any circumstances. I suppose if I were pregnant and getting an abortion, I’d forego birth control with my SO. If I even felt like having sex. Is that morbid?
Reaction to being pregnant varies a lot, but speaking personally I was waaay too tired to party within days of conceiving my twins. As in I had plans with my favorite girlfriends for partying 6 days later, but all I could do was sleep.
YMMV, I’ve known a couple of women who didn’t realize they were pregnant for months.
Hmm, for consistency’s sake I’d have to say that I can’t defend a prohibition against things that are bad for a fetus if you were sure you were going to abort.
But I feel really squeamish about giving the green light for such behavior. With a pregnancy you just never know what is going to happen.
Case in point: my husband and I conceived a child (and by the way, I reserve the right to bitch-slap everyone who says “we got pregnant”) when I was old enough to be at much higher risk of Down’s Syndrome, etc. We agreed we’d abort if we learned of anything serious wrong with the fetus.
The tests reported that everything was fine. But after we received the results, I asked my husband “Now that I’m actually pregnant, instead of this being a hypothetical situation, if the tests had found that the fetus had Down’s, would you have wanted to abort?” He said “NO!” and I felt the same way.
Go figure. I never would have predicted that reaction from either of us. (And let me go on record as stating I fully support the decision of people who do decide to abort in such cases, or for any other reason.)
I hope that’s not a hijack, and if it turns into one, it probably doesn’t belong in IMHO. My point is just that pregnancies and the feelings that go with them are a lot less predictable than you think, and as long as you are still pregnant, it might be wise to behave well toward the fetus.
It did occur to me that hormonal/body changes could be another issue from abstaining. I know that I get exhausted and crampy just from menstruation at times, and the antibios I was on had me super tired. I figure that pregnancy is potentially something that could have me feeling physically unwilling to party, if not emotionally so.
I think that’s a good point. Plus, in many other cultures, a bit of drinking isn’t considered a huge deal even when you know you’ll keep it. (Granted, I don’t know anyone encouraging pregnant women to bungee jump, but I digress.) I think if I were pregnant and even if I knew I wouldn’t abort, I might still have a glass of wine with dinner or something. Definitely would have that glass of wine if I were going to abort, now that I think about it.
The only consideration that I would have is to make sure my dating was right. There are many times that a woman shows up for her consulation, plans an abortion, and finds out she is farther along than she thought. Usually it’s just a matter of scheduling a different type of procedure, but there is always a small risk of being past the date at which abortion is legal in my jurisdiction.
Abstaining from drinking during pregnancy is about protecting the health of the fetus, not the mother - although the mother’s health may benefit from avoiding alcohol, the dire warnings the health authorities keep issuing are about protecting the fetus. As abortion is the ultimate negative for fetal health, I don’t see any reason to abstain from drinking if you’re planning to abort. It’s probably wise to consider that your body may react differently to alcohol when you’re pregnant and be cautious about your limits.
I think, for some women the drinking heavily bit comes between finding out they’re pregnant and deciding to terminate the pregnancy.
Drinking heavily is not a good idea if it puts you in a vulnerable or unsafe position full-stop, and is probably not a good idea if the termination is only theoretical and the pregnancy has not been definitely confirmed as intra-uterine. Ectopic pregnancy + alcohol or recreational drugs is not a good combo.
If this pregnancy is 100% not going to continue and you want a drink, well, it’s your body.
Unprotected sex would be a BIG no-no prior to a termination (either medical or surgical) as there are risks of ascending infection into the pelvis (from organsims such as chlamydia or gonorrhoea) which might affect future fertility and/or make you seriously unwell. Besides, STDs are never generally fun, even if you aren’t dealing with an unwanted pregnancy.
My own reflections on this question take me to an interesting moral perspective. I’ve hesitated to post this, but I’m not seeing this perspective reflected in the discussion. I’m saying up front that I’m not going to get into a conversation about when a fetus becomes a person, because I don’t know. I am pro-choice and also think abortion is a culturally-sanctioned form of killing. I am not opposed to this, just as I am not opposed to killing in self-defense or in certain military situations when it appears to be the best option.
If I were pregnant and certain that I would (and could) abort, I think I would abstain from alcohol and other teratogens. My response is predicated on my general intention to decrease the amount of suffering I cause in the world. Even if the fetus is going to wind up dead, it’s alive now. If I ever have to kill another human, I would like to think I would do it as humanely as possible. I would not poison an adult whom I was going to execute, even rationalizing that that person will soon be dead anyway. Nor would I inflict harm on a fetus I was going to abort. I’d rather abstain from substances until after the abortion for a variety of reasons, one of which is that I would perceive myself as putting my own pleasure before the potential suffering of another human for whom I have ultimate responsibility. I don’t see how I could think well of myself if I decided that anything went since I’d be killing the person later.
But this particular debate is not about whether or not the fetus will be carried to term. It’s a given, in the OP’s scenario, that the fetus will be terminated.
The debate is not about whether or not to have an abortion. There will be no baby (and pretty soon, no fetus) to be affected by the consequences of the woman’s drinking, so in this case it is precisely a women’s health question.