From Pro-Life Feminist to Pro-Choice Mama: My Change in Beliefs
(Ready, Cate? 1. Open can of worms. 2. Dump on head.)
NPR recently reported that in some Planned Parenthood clinics, the abortion rate is up.
We’ve seen some people who said that they didn’t really think that they would ever be making this decision, but recognize that this is a time when they have to think about taking care of the families that they have.
I’ve mentioned my mama before around here. She’s the home-birthin’, articulate and soft-spoken, intelligent and wonderful mother of 6 girls. Six vocal girls.
She raised me and my sisters to be pro-life feminists. Then, when I was pregnant with my first child, I became pro-choice.
Here’s why.
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Birth is natural. Our bodies were meant to do this.
Don’t let the men of the world tell you or show you that what your body was made to do is wrong. You’re just feeding in to their chauvinism.
Men have somehow convinced women to avoid what their body naturally does. That is, carry babies and give birth. Now women are even standing up for abortion and turning away from themselves.
Ever wonder if “pro-life feminism” is an oxymoron? The way my mom taught us, it is most certainly not. She’s a religious woman, but [thankfully] never forced us into church pews any more than she forced us to agree with her beliefs. She also didn’t believe that “God punishes all women for what Eve did with the pains of childbirth.” Because frankly, natural childbirth wasn’t all that bad. (And in my experience, it’s the worst pain you’ll ever forget…quickly.) Women’s bodies were, instead, wonderfully designed to do this amazing thing: grow and provide for a baby, and then give birth.
Don’t let them take that away from you! Don’t let society tell you that it’s wrong! Don’t let them make you feel that children are an “inconvenience.”
I very much believed that, once even going so far as to write a letter to Ms. Magazine asking them to examine “Pro-Life Feminism” (they refused).
But I still agree with that. As the mother of two boys and stepmother to two girls, I believe in birth and life. But it’s just not that simple.
When I was pregnant with Little L, my older son, I left his father. After catching him with another woman (on my birthday, no less) and discovering an increasingly horrible drug problem, I called off our engagement and moved out. And once I realized that the drugs were creating violence in him, I completely cut off contact with him, even though that meant losing out on a relationship with his then-3-year-old son, who I’d cared for 4-5 days a week for two years. It was a hard choice, but my priority was keeping myself and my unborn child safe.
During my transition from engaged woman to single mama, I had a handful of awesome women to support me. When I left Little L’s father, I moved in with a dear friend, who happens to be a bit younger than my mom. Two of my sisters lived here in Virginia (the rest of my family is in the Chicago ‘burbs) and were always around. I had my natural midwife, who very holistically asked me about my mental state and how I was adjusting every time I visited her. When I started to have “cramps” from the stress of the changes, I began to see a therapist, also a woman. I rented a house and moved in with another single mother and her young daughter. I became friends with the Pastry Chef at the resort hotel where I worked, who admired my supposed “strength” and was endlessly encouraging. Every time I needed someone to talk to, there was someone there. To help, to listen. I could pick up the phone and vent to any sister, and when I didn’t, they’d call me.
I was going to be a mother. Alone, which I had not planned. But everywhere I turned, I had support.
I know it sounds contradictory: “keeping my unborn child safe”, while becoming pro-choice. It happened out of nowhere, and was a surprise to even me.
At some point, I realized that most women don’t have to be thrown against a wall during pregnancy. Most don’t have a table thrown at them and duck while covering the belly. Of course, as a feisty feminist, I knew this was not “normal” and got out before it became regular behavior.
But I also knew that most women do not have the support network that I had at hand. Most women overall, not just pregnant women in bad situations. If another woman were in my situation, pregnant, how could I ask her to carry the child? That was my choice, yes. But would my choice be different if I had no one?
I felt Little L move very early for a first pregnancy (12 weeks). I am thankful for him every day. I was thankful for him every day that I was a single mom, too. No matter how I struggled at times. But Little L and I had incredible people in our lives. People who babysat for free so I could work. People who bought us loads of clothes or sent us Whole Foods gift cards. People who thought about what we needed and gave and gave and gave, without us ever asking.
Most women—most poor families—do not have that.
How can we ask women to stay safe, protect the children they have, and leave a bad relationship without support? How can policymakers simultaneously rail against abortion while cutting funding for food stamps or TANF or proposing “welfare reform”?
I don’t think we as a society can. Look critically at your beliefs, especially if you don’t agree with me. Work hard to provide for the life around you. Work to help those with less. Especially in this economy.
If you are against abortion, ensure that the multitudes of poor women have other choices. Until there is justice and support for them, abortion must be one of those choices.
Image: Steve Rhodes on Flickr under a Creative Commons License.
My transformation was the polar opposite of yours. I was a pro-choice feminist, had a terrible pregnancy, and became pro-life.
I agree that women need support systems and practical care. That’s why I support Crisis Pregnancy Centers and do all that I can to help women facing unplanned pregnancy.
Instead of settling for abortion, I believe we should work to help women choose life. This is something we can all work for, outside of the polarization that usually comes with the abortion debate.
Because you were once pro-life, I imagine that you do consider the unborn child to be just that, an unborn child. While I understand your compassion for women facing crisis pregnancies, I do not agree that abortion is the answer to the problem.
To me abortion represents a symptom rather than a solution. We need to start looking for real solutions that honor both mother and child.
I realize that some women choose abortion because of reasons outside of lack of resources, but often “choice” is taken away women due to the circumstances you describe. Let’s all work to ensure that no woman feels backed into a corner with abortion as the only way out.
There is common ground, and I think we have an obligation to women facing crisis pregnancies to find it.
thank you for this post. your transformation of beliefs is amazing, and I could not agree with you more. i am sure there are others out there that agree - i just wanted there to be another comment up here letting you know…
I appreciate this article very much and I do not think it is edgy at all.
I believe that those who are adamantly opposed to abortion are those who have a very religious view. A view that says that death is the end. What if you are a Buddhist? They believe in reincarnation, death is not really the end. It is a religious view being pushed on those of all faiths, and that is wrong.
What about women who are raped, they should be forced to birth the rapists child? That is sick. What about a nine year old little girl in Brazil who was raped by her father and impregnated with twins. To save her life, the very catholic doctors and mother approved and performed an abortion and were immediately excommunicated from the church. How sick is that? I believe that there are many situations that mandate the necessity of an abortion, and therefore it must be legal for those circumstances. Let me be very clear that I am not talking about people who get serial abortions. It is not something to take lightly.
Let me also point out that it comes down to the right of the child, but not in the way you are thinking of (previous commenters, that is, not the author) I had an abortion when I was 18. I was stupid and made a mistake in getting pregnant. I was a disaster, immature, and would have probably been abusive to the child because of my mental state an immaturity. I was honest with myself and realized that having the child would be selfish to the child. Since I do believe in reincarnation I chose the give the soul back to the universe and I believe my child has been reborn into another home that is hopefully a happy one. I chose to go through my own pain and live with the sorrow of the baby I never had, for that childs sake.
I have a different view of life and death than most pro-lifers. Where do you get off telling me that my view is wrong, because your god said so? I don’t believe in your god so that logic doesn’t really apply to me.
Adoption is insanely expensive and not a viable option for many people who want it in the US. Not only that, but the adoptive parents have to be ‘approved’ by the, possibly, teenage girl who couldn’t keep her pants on in the first place. They must pay for all medical fees and hospital fees associated with the birth. We are talking thousands upon thousands of dollars. And then, the birth mother has the option to back out after all the bills have been paid without having to pay a dime back. She has SIX MONTHS to change her mind, after the adoptive parents have bonded with the child. Adoption laws in America are a joke. People who throw that out as a viable argument are simply showing how uneducated they are.
EVERYONE! Read the link Trish gave us before anyone else mentions “adoption”. Read the comments, too, because they are just as startling as the blog.
In case you missed it:
http://shakespearessister.blogspot.com/2009/03/breaking-silence-on-living-pro-lifers.html
Thank you, Trish, for bringing up this incredibly viable point.
Cate, I’ve read the post at shakespearssister.
Kitty, it matters not what someone’s view of the afterlife is. We don’t allow somone to kill their 3 year old because they believe in reincarnation. We might hold them less criminally accountable if their mental health is proved to be flawed, but we do not excuse their crime.
Likewise, someone’s view on the nature of death do not excuse taking the life of a preborn child. You may believe that the child’s sould is released back to the universe, but it doesn’t change the fact that a life has been taken. Society does not recognize a persons beliefs regarding the afterlife as a valid defense for killing.
As for rape, I agree that much support should be given to the woman who has endured such trama. However, I disagree that we should allow further trama to occur in the form of abortion. Again, let’s look to how society deals with such situations post birth.
Could a rape victim kill the born child of a rapist? Of course not. A child conceived in rape is no less a child than one conceived in a loving act.
The bottom line is that we must consistantly apply ethics. We live in a society that says it is wrong to kill. If we consistantly apply this ethic, abortion can not be just within our society.
Of course, abortion violates other consistantly held ethics as well, but before we get to that we must establish that it most certainly takes a human life and doing such is not something that is within our society’s ethics.
Sorry for the typos in my last post. I’m juggling a baby while typing.
I would like to add to my comment. I have had no experience that changed my views. Still, as these exchanges show, one’s perspective can develop through what life brings our way.
As a woman who works with a local abortion-alternatives organization (a non-political group, NOT affiliated with traditional “crisis pregnancy centers”), I believe that choice strengthens life. It is in trusting women, not restrictive and punitive laws, where lives can be saved.
For every woman who became pro-life while pregnant, there’s one like me who was pro-choice before, and whose belief in the importance of a woman’s autonomy over her own body was affirmed both during pregnancy and after giving birth to a very much wanted child.
I really appreciate how civil everyone is keeping this. There was much more anger on my circumcision posts. Go figure.
Thank you Heather and Sadez for your succinct and supportive words. Zahevti, I am so impressed with your choice of work. All choices must be available to women, and I commend you.
Lauren, though we clearly disagree, I appreciate your perspective. It’s interesting to see the complete polar opposite switch.
I’ve been thinking since yesterday about Jamie’s comment. (Shoveling compost, thinking of it. Taking the kids for a walk, thinking about it. Breastfeeding, thinking of it.) Jamie, you clearly went through a lot and struggled a lot. I’m proud for you for standing up in what must have been a terribly hard situation. Good for you for keeping those kids and yourself safe. We both cherished those babies we were carrying and chose them over the “easy” path.
We obviously don’t agree and won’t on this topic. But your beliefs in the face of a hard situation, and my change in beliefs in the face of a hard situation has made me muse on our individual growth through tough times. It is so interesting to me how we came out of (vastly different) similar situations with completely different outlooks.
I cannot imagine what you went through. Thank you for sharing a very personal story.
Thanks to those who mentioned that adoption is not an easy alternative to abortion. I think asking women to bear a child and give it away is about as cruel as anything you could ask. I am an adoptive mother and know first-hand the pain and distress placing a child can cause a mother. Some women do indeed choose adoption, but many, many do not. They are forced to give away their babies because either they had no access to birth control (and may or may not have chosen sex), no access to abortion, or because they wanted to parent their babies, but were not given the kind of support Cate describes here and saw no way to keep the baby. Sadly, for many, many women whose children are placed in adoption, it is a toxic combination of many of these factors that lead them to the greatest loss a mother can experience–the loss of her child.
Blithely suggesting that every woman facing a crisis pregnancy should simply have the baby and place it for adoption is heartless and cold, and does not take value mothers.
let’s keep adoption a CHOICE by keeping birth control and abortion easily and non-judgmentally available.