missing mom

yesterday i spoke to a woman, age 28, who began her story by telling me all the reasons that she could not continue her pregnancy.  she had no doubt that abortion was a better choice for the baby since she felt that it would be neglected and possibly even at risk.  her older children had learned to avoid dad, an abusive alcoholic, when he was drunk.  and the patient, whom i'll call rachel, supported the family as sole wage earner.  there would be no income when she had to take maternity leave and her job would not permit her to work once she was showing because of the physical hardships of the job.  she felt that she could not risk leaving the baby alone with her husband at any time because he was not responsible and had lately been getting worse.

then she began to sob and told me that if her mom were still alive, it might be different.  both times that she was pregnant in the past it was her mom who encouraged her to continue the pregnancy, telling rachel that she could do it, that she, mom, would help her.  the day before had been mom's birthday and rachel told me she went to the cemetery to talk to mom, as she often does.  she had been telling mom about her situation, how much she missed her, how she wished she did not have to have an abortion.  rachel told me, it was all ok because her baby would be with mom.  mom knew that the baby was coming to join her in heaven, which made rachel feel at peace.  then rachel said, "the hardest thing for me every day is to be without my mom.  that's what i'll never get over."

Comments

[melika]

well what i would like to know is i had an abortion and when i was done i told my boyfriend that i think that am still pregnant is it possible that when the doctors check tha see if i was pregnant and how far i was through my pregnacy that they didn't see the other baby. right now am very confused wondering if this is possible when i did the abortion i was 9 weeks.

[Linda Flores]

You worry that this "might" be a pro-life group???

Seems pretty clear to me:
Americans on Call specifically seeks to help women find solutions to their circumstances that do not involve abortion. We believe women deserve better than that. We believe it is something most women must heal from. (from abortionends.org)

[Jacqueline]

I stopped posting because of your attacks on me. Discussion was out the window, instead it was nosing through your posts for an assertion of substance to address. I don't even defend myself from your attacks because I don't want to dignify them.

Whatever you want to accuse me of, have I ever called you a name?

Yet you throw out (in one post) rotten, lying, evil, heartless, cruel, vicious, sick, sad, bitter, nasty, cold, lonely, old, unloved, alone, undesired, ad nauseum.

I could attack you personally, yet I haven't. In fact, I think this is only the 2nd time that I have actually addressed you. I once referred to you as post-abortive and later apologized. I stand behind the fact that you are angry.

If what you say is true about your child being stolen, it would make sense that you'd be extremely angry. That's why, in absence of better judgement, I'm inclined to believe you. Even so, aren't there more productive ways to deal with your problem than screaming out at people that had NOTHING to do with your child's kidnapping rather than projecting (since adoption agencies are prolife and an adoption agency stole my baby then all prolife people are evil baby stealers).

I didn't hurt you in any way. Neither did Rachel. Yelling at us won't make you feel better. Proof positive is that you've been doing it for a while, and your posts just get more and more intense. If you want credibility for your problem, there are better ways to go about it. A think a law suit is a good idea. If people are doing this, please stop them.

And this really will be the last time I ever address you.

[Me (not the person below this post using my username)]

Wow, Jacque, you're really sick.

You're really just sad people, you prolifers.

You might want to read up on childbirth techniques of a few decades ago. They routinely strapped women down while giving birth.

My child was taken by the Catholic "home for unwed mothers" workers. Today such a place would be called a "crisis pregnancy center". Same difference. I never saw or held my child. I was sixteen.

My child wasn't removed from my custody at all, and to even insinuate such a lie (which is how we know this is Jacque) is so sick it's not even funny. I guess that's the prolife way - just call any woman who won't parrot their propaganda a liar. You really are a bitter, nasty lot, aren't you? Why am I not surprised.

You can post under as many usernames as you want, Jacque, but it's obvious it's you. It's pretty telling that you're posting under "Man", though. You really have issues.

You can lie about me and post under my username and pretend to be me, but that doesn't change the truth.

That you're prolife and nasty and mean and take pleasure in hurting others is no surprise to me. I've always known prolifers are the most selfish, coldest, most heartless and vicious people on earth. You don't care about anyone at all except your nasty old selves and the pathetic attention you can get by being cruel to others - all in the name of "life".

You're a rotten, lying, evil lot.

Fine, Jacque, you "win", I suppose, if you want to call it that, by being as vicious and nasty as it gets. Good for you. I suppose you have to have something to do. Your life sure is cold and empty and you sure are a bitter, lonely old woman. I feel sorry for you.

But thank you for reminding me what a crock of shit the prolife movement is.

I hope you find some comfort and some happiness somewhere. It must be sad to be so alone and so unloved and undesired, especially since that biological clock is just tick-tick-ticking away...

[Me]

Your right. Maybe I should do something about this instead of griping on the internet.

[Man]

Me- File a Lawsuit and quit your bitchin.

[Whatever.]

You were strapped down and your baby was stolen by CPC workers. Sure.

You child was removed from your custody for what reason?

Tell the whole story.

[L.]

Getting back to the subject of the orginal post... do any of you pro-lifers or pro-choices know anything about this new group? It sounds like an idea whose time has come, but I worry it`s just another pro-life group in a different cover: http://www.abortionends.org/faq.html

[Me]

Actually, no, I didn't sign "the paperwork" at all.

Duress? Gee, you think being strapped down to a table while giving birth and then having the baby taken away from you isn't "duress"?

You must be very young indeed if you don't think this kind of thing didn't happen all the time.

Deeply regret my "decision to place for adoption"? What decision. I was never given a choice. Let me guess....this is good ol' Jacqueline with her usual assortment of cold, heartless, mindless "assumptions". The clear disregard for other human beings and the inability to listen to others are dead giveaways. And, of course, the assumptions...

You think I'm the only one who has a story to tell? Go here: www.exiledmothers.org

Your problem is that you're so convinced you're right and that your opinion is the only one that counts that you can't stand to think that there could possibly be anything wrong with anything you're promoting.

Women have had their babies taken from them for hundreds and hundreds of years. It may be harder now than when it was done to me, but it still goes on.

And condoning coercing women and girl into "giving" up their babies and condoning lying to women to get them under your influence just goes to show that you're no more prolife than an abortionist. It's just all about you all the time.

[Me]

Actually, no, I didn't sign "the paperwork" at all.

Duress? Gee, you think being strapped down to a table while giving birth and then having the baby taken away from you isn't "duress"?

You must be very young indeed if you don't think this kind of thing didn't happen all the time.

Deeply regret my "decision to place for adoption"? What decision. I was never given a choice. Let me guess....this is good ol' Jacqueline with her usual assortment of cold, heartless, mindless "assumptions". The clear disregard for other human beings and the inability to listen to others are dead giveaways. And, of course, the assumptions...

You think I'm the only one who has a story to tell? Go here: www.exiledmothers.org

Your problem is that you're so convinced you're right and that your opinion is the only one that counts that you can't stand to think that there could possibly be anything wrong with anything you're promoting.

Women have had their babies taken from them for hundreds and hundreds of years. It may be harder now than when it was done to me, but it still goes on.

And condoning coercing women and girl into "giving" up their babies and condoning lying to women to get them under your influence just goes to show that you're no more prolife than an abortionist. It's just all about you all the time.

[Come on.]

If CPC's have hurt you and "thousands" of women, I invite you to pursue a class-action lawsuit for tearing your families apart. If they have done such things, they shouldn't be in operation and you should shut them down. You and the "thousands of other women." Surely you have evidence to back up your claims.

I doubt you'd have a case though. You signed the paperwork under no duress. You could have said no. Maybe you were coerced, but not forced. Adoption is a drawn out process and you could have stopped at any point.

Could it just be that you deeply regret your decision to place for adoption, are grieving and are looking for someone to blame?

[Seriously.]

Regardless about whether CPC's lie about services they do or don't provide, show me any evidence that they benefit from tearing families apart.

[Me]

Unfortunately, I know that CPCs do indeed coerce and manipulate girls into "giving" their babies away. I know from experience. They may not be able to pull as much illegal shit as they have in the past (like out and out kidnapping), but they are very manipulative in their efforts to get women and girls to walk through their doors.

They get babies, and babies are a commodity to them.

PP may make money, but CPCs deal in human beings. Their goal is to encourage women to "give" their babies away. Their desire is to separate the child from its natural mother. Their desire is to punish women by denying them motherhood.

CPCs are no better than abortion clinics. Don't tell me differently. I know the truth, and so do thousands of women who were denied motherhood by CPCs aka "homes for unwed mothers".

They lie. All the time. The second they tell the first lie, whether it's as seemingly innocuous as fudging the complete truth to women who call to ask whether or not they do abortions and who are told that the services "vary" or that those services "can be discussed in person" just in order to get women to walk through their doors, then they're guilty of deceit and manipulation in order to get a pregnant woman in their clutches so they can begin coercing her and pressuring her to put her baby up for adoption.

When CPCs are honest and truthful and above board and when their PRIMARY goal is to keep families together instead of ripping them apart, then you can tell me that this is all just a "conspiracy theory", but when the people who run CPCs openly admit they lie on the phone (as one did in a recent NY Times article), then you people haven't got a leg to stand on.

Until then, you're all just liars.

[Come on.]

Wow, Me. Your conspiracy theory couldn't be more wrong.

It is highly illegal to give 'kick backs' monetarily or otherwise from an adoption referral. In fact, CPC's must give a LIST of agencies and aren't even allowed a favorite because that might be misconstrued.

There is no money in adoption for a CPC. Yes, all services are FREE.

While adoption agencies are expensive and you can have a field day on their ethics, CPC's do not have any vested interested in adoption vs. parenting.

[Me]

You're implying that CPCs are "free" and PP is in it for the bucks.

CPCs are in it for the babies their sister-adoption agencies get to "place".

The point is that CPCs stand to gain something from all this, too. They get the opportunity to talk a woman out of her baby and give it to someone they personally think is more appropriate as a mother. They get a pretty hot commodity - a baby.

[Come on.]

I'm sorry, Me, but we weren't talking about the adoption industry.

It started talking about unbiased places for women to get referrals and information. I said Planned Parenthood was biased.

You'd say adoption agencies are. Fine. But what does that have to do with Planned Parenthood?

[Diatryma]

You're pretty much right, L; I sometimes run into problems because I assume that women are educated and making free choices (I assume that of pretty much any adult) and I'll argue with people who assume women are not-- or I'll have to go into tedious definitions to explain that we actually agree, and no one sits through them.

[Me]

And like the adoption idustry doesn't, either.

Why do you "prolifers" insist on turning this into a choice between adoption and abortion? How are you any different from abortionists in your manipulative and coercive efforts to separate mothers from their children?

I realize that many "prolifers" believe any woman who isn't Christian and married and breeding babies year after year for Jesus deserves to be punished, either by the risks incurred from having a backalley abortion or by having her baby taken away from her, but the TRUTH is that the happiest solution for the only people who matter in these situations (and that would be the mother and the child) is for our culture and our health care system and our society to support motherhood and to provide what's necessary to keep families together.

But the other dark little TRUTH is that when a mother in a non-traditional situation keeps her baby, no one makes any money and no one gets her baby.

The "prolifers" have just as much a vested interest in separating mothers from their children as abortionists do.

To automatically assume the natural alternative to abortion is adoption just goes to show that natural motherhood and women's overall well-being is the last thing the prolife movement is interested in.

[Come on now.]

Regardless of whether or not 138 women came for abortions only, abortions make up 34% of PP's income. If women place for adoption, Planned Parenthood makes no money.

They have lights to keep on and ineffective condoms to hand out. Like they don't care about making money!

[L.]

Storm, that`s a great point, but I took the "feel at peace" as more resignation than true satisfaction with her decision. I would never have denied this woman an abortion, if that`s what she decided she truly wanted. But as I said, discerning what she "truly wanted" from a few paragraphs is next to impossible, and our interpretations say more about ourselves than about her.

[storm]

What seems to be missing in a few of these arguments is that in the end, Rachel felt at peace about her decision. The quote of "she wished she did not have to have an abortion" is taken out of context--that was said to her deceased mother. To say that she had an abortion that she didn't want is to take away the self-empowerment she has left, and that's unfair.

[manxome]

L, like you, my comments also say more about what I think. I'm just deciding that, with the information given, that whatever choice this woman made, it wasn't without its drawbacks for her. Since she touched on many areas of consideration, I figured that she weighed the effects and decided abortion, while not the perfect outcome, provided a better outcome for her. All I can do is take her at her word.

I don't think we're really disagreeing, just seeing diferent aspects of it, because I do agree that the choices are limited to sucks, bites, and really sucks, which aren't really choices at all. True choice is about much more than whether a woman can get an abortion or not.

I, too, wish that could be truly objective, informative, inclusive centers were the norm. It's the politics. Except, no one is thinking politics when they need reproductive information and services. That's why such centers are needed more.

Ericka: Strawmen are so boring.

[L.]

"Come on," excuse me, but what if 138 women show up at PP seeking abortion and only 1 wants an adoption referral? Do the stats really tell the story? PP provides what its patients go there seeking. I know women went to PP for their prenatal care. I myself went there for years, for my birth control.
And Christina, there are pro-choicers (me included) who support crisis pregnancy centers, too. I give them diapers, not money, because I know they are funded by a group which seeks to criminalize abortion. So many people, on BOTH sides of the issue, are fighting for the laws, either to change them or keep them -- sometimes I think we`ve lost sight of the individual women. We on the pro-choice side have to fight so hard lately to keep abortion legal that we`ve forgotten about the "safe" and "rare" parts, or at least they`re on the back burner.

[Come on.]

Less than 1% of abortions are for medically necessary reasons and since they are elective, they must be economical.

That's why they are so cheap. Counseling is minimal, no referrals are needed and they are done in a back-to-back manner like vaccinating cattle.

Most surgery requires doctor consultations- most women never know the name of their abortionist.

Most surgery requires informed consent- laws have had to be made to force abortion clinics to do this with them fighting all the way.

Most surgeries are done by specialists, competant doctors- abortionists are typically medical school wash-outs. George Tiller, a famous late-term abortionist is a chiropractor, not an OBGYN.

Abortion is not legitimate health care and that's why it's so cheap.

Regardless of whether it's cheap or not, 1 referral to 138 abortions shows where their true interests lie.

Preventing abortions? PP's condoms ranked LOWEST in a consumer test. Birth control encourages sex which encourages the likelihood of pregnancy, pregnancies that will end up in abortion.

[Christina]

This woman needed somebody to step in and help her the way her mother used to, and all she got was an abortion she didn't want.

Somebody else said it well, that you can say, "Every child a wanted child," but life would be much better if the only abortions were wanted abortions.

Almost nobody wants an abortion. So why aren't the defenders of "choice" helping women to get what they really want -- ways to avoid abortions?