Have you, or anyone you know, had an abortion?

I think you would probably be shocked to discover the number of women you know who have had abortions.

Seventeen and trusted a boyfriend.
Mom forced me to abort.
I felt it jerk.
I wish it would have been her instead of my child.

Years later I talked a friend out of one. She opted for open adoption.
When her son was still a toddler, he died in an accident.

Happy endings don’t follow unplanned pregnancies pretty often.

A girl who I knew in college had like 5. She also had two miscarriages, and has 5 children from 4 different men. Actually, I haven’t heard about her in a while, so there are probably more of all three…

I deliberately don’t know her anymore. I’m OK with abortions, but some self control would have been better, in her case…

Yes, I know many. Every one of them was sad about it, some more than others. They all chose to terminate the pregnancy for different reasons. Some because the physical and emotional toll of carrying to term then giving up the baby is very high. At least one because she felt that handing off a baby to strangers was an abdication of her responsibility. Another because of the health issues.

I noticed that one of your tags is “no one willing to adopt the child of a friend”. Do you actually know someone who has adopted the child of a friend (who had an unplanned pregnancy) without a pre-arranged surrogacy arrangement?

It was actually a relative, who adopted the child of a cousin.

I hope that worked out for them, it can be a very fraught circumstance.

I’m sure that at least one on my sister’s has had an abortion. It doesn’t seem to affect them adversely because they understood the issues and where they were in their lives, and where they wanted to be (sans children) so they accepted it and moved on.

My mom did, years before she had my sister or me. She had an IUD at the time, which has an incredibly low failure rate, but fail it did. I didn’t find out until my 20’s and I doubt my sister knows.

I have a friend who got pregnant while on a “ring” or something. She said that when in doctor waiting rooms, many other pregnant women were banking on the same method of birth control. It apparently isn’t reliable…

No and no.

I observed an “abortion day” at Planned Parenthood as part of my public health training. All of the women who were asked allowed me into the procedure room with them. Some of them asked me to hold their hands. Half were married. Half had other children. Almost all were using birth control that failed or were in a trusted relationship that ended abruptly. All seemed quite relieved after the procedure.

I know you didn’t ask this, but the idea that most women are depressed after an abortion is vastly overstated. When you account for prior mental health difficulties, there is no greater chance of depression after an abortion as there is for women who don’t have an abortion. Statistically speaking, most women fare well after abortion. Statistically speaking, most mother-child dyads don’t fare well after unplanned/unwanted pregnancies.

I haven’t personally had one. But I was forced to carry my pregnancy to term at 16 after being raped. That was a hell that I would never ask another women to go through.

^Condolences.

@Cupcake

To be raped and then victimized by the state, is an atrocity squared!

If it were up to me, whatever state forced you should have been forced to have at least provided you with total child support, for as long as you wanted it.

In what state were you living when this happened?

@Brian1946 It was my parents, not the state.

I did. Unfortunately, I found out I had uterine cancer. I was soooo upset, and I had to have a complete hysterectomy and then radiation.