Reproductive Health—a Very Personal History
Contraception, rape, babies, abortion, miscarriages... the whole deal
Although I’m now 84 years old and a tad beyond my reproductive years, I credit having control of my reproductive health with giving me the freedom to conduct my life as I wished. From my teen years to the life I lead today—my education, my career and earning ability, my ability to parent, my financial wellbeing and my overall health have all hinged on my autonomy and having control over my own body.
I cannot even begin to imagine what my life as a widowed mother
of two pre-schoolers would have been like if I’d been forced to deliver another baby.
So let’s get personal…
My reproductive health history:
1958 - Freshman year of college. My mom told the doctor I was about to get married (a lie) so he’d prescribe birth control—a diaphragm. Such a messy annoyance!
Got raped by a date a few months later. No diaphragm on hand. So grateful not to get pregnant.
1959 - Witnessed a (date-raped) college friend go through scary and costly hoops to find someone to give her a kitchen-table (literally!) illegal abortion, then suffer a dangerous infection and fertility problems.
1966-1972 Volunteered as medical assistant, newsletter editor, board member at the local Planned Parenthood affiliate. Firm believer in their original slogan: “Every Child a Wanted Child.”
1966 - Got married, and at 28 and 31 birthed two “wanted” children—three years apart, as planned.
1972 - Roe v. Wade gives women the right to abortion.
1974 - my husband dies of cancer. I had an affair and thanks to a faulty IUD, I got pregnant. Got an abortion quickly, easily, safely, thanks to Roe. I cannot even begin to imagine what my life as a widowed mother of two pre-schoolers would have been like if I’d been forced to deliver another baby. The emotional and financial burdens… and the cost to my existing kids.
1982 - remarried and was very surprised to get pregnant at 42. Miscarried in first trimester. Sad. Quick, easy D&C.
1983 - third wanted child is born.
1984 - pregnant again. Miscarried early in 2nd trimester. Much grief, but again quick safe D&C.
1995 - volunteered for Planned Parenthood’s booth at the Clark County Fair, giving out pamphlets describing their services. Gratitudes from countless women for the routine care they got at the clinic—pap smears, contraception, STD testing and medications—and a few mentioned their abortions. But I’ll never forget one particular couple. As they passed the booth, the woman eagerly reached for a pamphlet, but her husband grabbed her arm, saying “We don’t believe in Planned Parenthood,” and pushed her on down the aisle.
…. Years pass. Younger women, asleep at the wheel, take these hard-won reproductive rights for granted, while the GOP/Christian right are busy dismantling them.
2017-2020 Trump appoints three Supreme Court justices he knows intend to throw out Roe, in addition to the three conservatives already on the court.
2022 - The Supreme Court overturns Roe 😡 and within two years,
14 states have a total abortion ban—no exceptions.
27 states have abortion bans based on gestational duration.
8 states ban abortion by 18 weeks’ gestation.
19 states ban abortion at some point after 18 weeks.
In some states women need to be close to death before they can get an abortion or a D&C after miscarriage.
2024 - The Heritage Foundation prepares Project 2025,* 💩 a blueprint for the 2nd Trump presidency. (When word of its radical nature becomes public, Trump tries to distance himself from it, but most of the people who wrote it are, or have been, actively involved in his administration or campaigns.)
2024 - The good news! Abortion protection measures are on the 2024 ballot in eight states so far. Several states have already passed similar measures. And we have a vehemently pro-choice candidate for president 💕.
Reproductive freedom isn’t just one thing—it’s all things. A woman's “right to choose" is too benign a description of what’s at issue. "Forced birth" is more accurate. If you are denying a woman the right to contraception and/or abortion, then you are, in effect, forcing her to give birth to a child she does not want. It is a form of enslavement and torture.
When half the entire population must be subjected to laws controlling their bodily autonomy while the other half is free to inflict pregnancy on them with impunity, something’s deeply wrong in that society.
What’s your reproductive rights story? Do you worry about your daughters and granddaughters? Don’t forget— your sons and grandsons are also affected by contraception and abortion laws. (They live with and love people with uteruses.)
* Project 2025 is 922 pages long and covers all the ways a second Trump administration would remake the United States government—its focus, laws, regulations, and powers. The section on overhauling the Department of Health and Human Services (renamed ominously the “Department of Life”) was written by Roger Severino, who was Director of the Civil Rights Division at HHS during the first Trump administration.
Goal #1: Protecting Life, Conscience, and Bodily Integrity. The Secretary [of Dept of Health and Human Services] should pursue a robust agenda to protect the fundamental right to life, protect conscience rights, and uphold bodily integrity rooted in biological realities, not ideology. From the moment of conception, every human being possesses inherent dignity and worth, and our humanity does not depend on our age, stage of development, race, or abilities. The Secretary must ensure that all HHS programs and activities are rooted in a deep respect for innocent human life from day one until natural death: Abortion and euthanasia are not health care…
Respect for Life and Conscience. The CDC should eliminate programs and projects that do not respect human life and conscience rights and that undermine family formation. It should ensure that it is not promoting abortion as health care. It should fund studies into the risks and complications of abortion and ensure that it corrects and does not promote misinformation regarding the comparative health and psychological benefits of childbirth versus the health and psychological risks of intentionally taking a human life through abortion…
HHS should use every available tool, including the cutting of funds, to ensure that every state reports exactly how many abortions take place within its borders, at what gestational age of the child, for what reason, the mother’s state of residence, and by what method.
Some other relevant issues in Project 2025, summarized:
Reverse FDA approval of chemical abortion drugs.
Ban mail order dispensing of abortion drugs.
Allow employers to opt out of birth control coverage in their workers’ health insurance
Promote "fertility awareness" as an "unsurpassed" method of contraception
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Thanks for sharing your personal story. Very inspiring. ❤️ And thanks for all the work you’ve done through the years on behalf of women.