Abortion - why it is necessary

[Aerows]

I'm going to tell this story again, and I apologize to those that have heard it before. It's rather important to me, though.

I would not be here if abortion were not legal in some hospitals.

This is personal to me. I would literally not be here were it not for a father that moved my mother from a Catholic hospital. They determined that she still had a child in the womb, even while she had miscarried. My father said he could smell the decay from outside of the hospital room. The Catholic hospital would not do an abortion, even though my mother was dying of an infection, because, well, it would be a sin to save a woman's live since they somehow detected that the baby was alive - even though the stench of death was reeking. I am not making this up. This was in the late 60's.

They moved my mother to a public hospital and did a procedure that also included extracting dead tissue and a dead ... clump of nearly necrotized flesh that legislation would have considered a child because it was too dead for them to figure out if it had a heart beat or not. Had they waited another day, my mother could never bear children again, because she would have been dead. Three years later, I was born.

This is a personal issue for me. It is a personal issue for my mother. My rabidly bible-obsessed sister, who cannot carry a child to term due to heart problems and depends upon birth control is completely against abortion. I love her, despite how misguided she is and I hope that if she gets pregnant, someone is there to terminate the pregnancy that would kill her and her child.

[hlthe2b]

1. These personal stories ought to make the difference, if only the anti-choice crowd would listen...

I've been pro-choice for as long as I can recall, having been told by my Mother how her own best friend died in her late teens--a victim of a then illegal back room abortion. My mother never got over that and that story ALWAYS will stay with me.

I only hope our young women (and men) are listening.

Thanks for sharing your own very personal story.

[Aerows]

7. I can't believe my mother was laying in a hospital

or what claimed to be one, and they would let her die.

My father is the one who moved her because he couldn't let her die. They've been together for nearly 50 years. So much for abortion breaking up families.

I wouldn't be here if he had listened to the idiots of the Church and "Authority".

[MotherPetrie]

2. K&R

[Rowdyboy]

3. Which is why abortion is and forever must remain an issue between a woman and her doctor..and no one

else.

[hlthe2b]

4. +1

[SunSeeker]

5. Sick assholes.

Hell, even here on DU, a poster peddled the virtue of that "admitting privileges" requirement for abortion clinic doctors that southern states are using to shut down what few clinics they still have. The poster claimed the rule was "to keep all the patients safe," alluding to the fetus to be aborted.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/1014443266#post32

I'm really glad your mom made it, Aerows. And that you are here with us.



Hopefully some day your sister and that poster will see the light.

[Aerows]

9. I hope she will, too

But somehow, I doubt it. She's knee deep in Southern Baptist Oklahoma. I'm not sure why she didn't get as much out of the education I got, because we both moved around, and were exposed to different cultures.

[alittlelark]

6. Thank you for sharing this....

...we all need to hear it.

[Aerows]

8. I'm glad I'm here to share the story

Thanks for listening.

[broadcaster75201]

10. Why on EARTH does it matter if it is necessary????

It is a woman's right. "Necessary" is meaningless.

[cali]

15. that's exactly right.

[Shrike47]

11. I had toxemia (preeclampsia) twice

I would never force a woman to go through a pregnancy.

[RudynJack]

12. Thanks for sharing this.

It's important.

[smirkymonkey]

13. Thank you for sharing your story.

My mother died in childbirth from eclampsia, which I would never wish on anybody. My brother lived. However the doctor knew that she was in danger and ignored it. He left the hospital after she died. My father could have sued, but he never did. He was too distraught. I only wish that I could have been old enough to take on the case myself, but alas, I was not.

[cali]

14. Thanks for recounting this, but I want to add

that abortion is necessary not only in such dire cases as your mothers, but for all other women who want to exercise control over their own bodies.

I'm afraid we fall into the anti-choicer trap when we focus so much on women whose health or life is at risk or women forced to carry fetuses with severe conditions.

Abortion is a right for ALL women.

[Aerows]

16. I agree wholeheartedly

and this post was not to imply that it shouldn't be purely a woman's decision. It was intended to illustrate the consequences of these abortion restricting laws that are going to end up killing women.

I do not understand how a woman can become so misguided as to support such nonsense, my sister being the very example that SHOULD oppose such legislation.

[Manifestor_of_Light]

17. I've heard horror stories about the local Catholic hospital.

Wouldn't take a dog or cat to one.
Let alone a person.

[forestpath]

18. K&R If I were of childbearing age I would NEVER go to a Catholic hospital.

[Sissyk]

19. I have not read your story before, Aerows

but it's one that cannot be told enough.

This we can all join together and fight for. Not one of us on this site should let up at all.

[ljm2002]

20. You should ask your sister...

...to quote the chapter and verse what the Bible has to say about abortion.

[Aerows]

21. My sister

is an idiot when it comes to women's rights. It pains me, because she is "educated" but was educated in Evangelical Christian institutions. We had to talk her down off of pointing a finger at rainbow bright dolls and declaring them objects of Satan in the middle of Sears so that everyone didn't think we were whackjobs.

[ljm2002]

22. Ah well...

...we're lucky when we can love our family members, even if they drive us nuts sometimes.

Cheers!