Since the US. Supreme Court decided on June 24, 2022, that the U.S. Constitution does not confer a right to abortion, the country has been in an uproar with threats, confusion, fear, and other words that could be used to describe myriad feelings.
As we sort this out- that is, if it’s capable of being sorted out- I’m offering positions shared with me by three informants even as I realized a dissertation could not adequately cover the disparate positions in our country.
As a nineteen-year-old, one of my informants worked in a clinic in Virginia where abortions were performed. She now questions the long-term impact on individuals whose abortions she documented. In that clinic, a psychiatrist was responsible for assessing whether those who came to him had “fragile mental health” which made them candidates for abortion. She recalled a specific case in which a patient “had been given abortion meds which worked faster than expected,” and the patient was “all upset and was saying, ‘It’s a baby! It’s a baby!’” when she delivered the fetus. This informant wonders about the current mental health of those who had abortions and concludes that the doctors who performed them “are not innocent and have now met their Maker.”
Beka Lindeman believes that voters have the right to determine the laws that impact their lives. She writes, “Abortion is healthcare. Full stop. Restrictions like this are about control, and they don’t save lives – they endanger them. I collected petitions for the gerrymandering issue a few years ago, and the two are certainly related. Ohioans want to have a say, and putting this amendment on the ballot will give us that chance.”
My third informant hopes that “personal stories might make a difference.” She lost her first pregnancy with what she terms “an early-stage miscarriage.” The second came at just over three months, and when she was “five months along” with the third pregnancy, she found herself on a gurney lying in “a puddle of blood from the back of my knees to the nape of my neck.” The medical care she received – or failed to receive – frightens the most stoic of us. She acknowledges that without medical care, she could have bled out or had a massive infection.
She concludes as follows: “It’s a medical decision between a woman and her doctor. I don’t need to know why someone needs an abortion. Because it’s none of my business.”
Where do you stand? What experiences have led you to your position? Has that position changed over time? Is compromise necessary, possible? What does compromise mean to you, to your neighbor, to legislative bodies? And please don’t tell me that you are dealing with too much now to even consider this.
Vivian B. Blevins. Ph.D., teaches telecommunication employees from around the country and students at Edison State Community College and works with veterans. You may reach her at 937-778-3815 or [email protected].
