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roe vs wade

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Women share how experiencing pregnancy and childbirth changed their views on abortion

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We live in a world where men, who have never and will never experience pregnancy or childbirth, make laws about women's reproduction, which in and of itself is a headscratcher. When we're talking about anti-abortion legislation, which effectively forces women to go through pregnancy and childbirth whether it's healthy for them or not, it seems like the people who actually experience those things should have a more heavily weighted say in such legislation.

Of course, women have varied opinions on the matter. (The most recent Gallup poll found that 53% of women in the U.S. identify as "pro-choice" and 43% identify as "pro-life.") But interestingly, a Twitter thread is showing how actual experience can either shift or concretes a person's views.

Writer Jennifer Wright wrote, "Raise your hand if pregnancy and childbirth only made you *more* pro-choice," and the responses came flooding in.

Raise your hand if pregnancy and childbirth only made you *more* pro-choice.
— Jennifer Wright (@Jennifer Wright) 1630511326

Scores of women responded in the affirmative, saying that going through pregnancy, childbirth, and childrearing has either made them change their stance from anti-choice to pro-choice or solidified their pro-choice beliefs.

For some, it was getting a first-hand taste of the potential dangers pregnancy poses.

Pre-eclampsia here too. Needed emergency csection to save me and my baby. I was 34 weeks and it took a long time to recover. I wouldn\u2019t wish what I went through to anybody.
— Rose (@Rose) 1630518513

I had to go off my meds for baby 2 and 3. It was excruciating, and I don\u2019t even have a severe mental illness. My 3rd pregnancy, I had to go back on my meds in the 3rd trimester, I just couldn\u2019t take it anymore. I definitely went from \u201cpro-life\u201d to pro-choice.
— jenmilbar (@jenmilbar) 1630518096

For others, their experiences with adoption solidified their pro-choice stance.

I am also adopted. Like your mother, I also could have aborted. I wholeheartedly support the right for all women to choose. There are many like me and your mom, I suspect.
— Lorelee Campbell (@Lorelee Campbell) 1630526233

Absolutely, as did my experience as a foster mom.
— Gorilla Librarian (@Gorilla Librarian) 1630521500

I\u2019d also like to add that I\u2019m adopted, and while I\u2019m grateful for my life I definitely don\u2019t agree that adoption is a reasonable alternative to abortion, especially now that I\u2019ve had my own kid. Just let women choose for themselves for fucks sake
— kirbaqueen (@kirbaqueen) 1630513086

Some shared that losing a baby or nearly losing a baby helped them realize the complexities of choices surrounding pregnancy and childbirth.

I\u2019m so sorry you lost your son. My first was a 25 weeker we spent 135 days in the NICU, her survival was improbable. (Almost 8 now.) Then I wanted another! He stayed in until 31 weeks. It is so layered and complex I am so thankful for my agency in my reproduction & furious at TX
— Adele Oliveira (@Adele Oliveira) 1630517334

Many women shared that going through pregnancy and childbirth made them realize that forcing someone who doesn't want to be pregnant or birth a child to do so is cruel.

After my two pregnancies there is no way I would force a person to go through the same thing who wasn't consenting to the experience. I loved being pregnant but it was hard as hell on my body and mind. No one should be forced to be host.
— Kyra Ison (@Kyra Ison) 1630520568

Yep. My mom had a real hard time with me and was a nurse in the babies ward for a bit - the combination made her rabidly pro-choice.
— House of Moderna \u2696\ufe0f\u267f\ufe0f\ud83d\udc9b\ud83d\udc1d (@House of Moderna \u2696\ufe0f\u267f\ufe0f\ud83d\udc9b\ud83d\udc1d) 1630525941

Yep. 45 hour labor with first, 2 weeks overdue with second. These children were planned, wanted, supported, and loved. But physically I will never be the same. My body was permanently changed and required surgical repair. No woman should be forced into pregnancy and delivery.
— Nora Katzenberger (@Nora Katzenberger) 1630524945

Even those who enjoyed being pregnant or who had loads of support shared that the experience pushed them toward choice.

Single mom over here - pregnancy, childbirth, child rearing - all of it is expensive, stressful, and you need to want it. I loved it all but I was ready and wanted it and I had a support system. Pro choice, always.
— Shawn Tylka (@Shawn Tylka) 1630527911

I have a husband, health insurance, a home and access to solid medical care and it was still the most terrifying and difficult year of my life.
— jdubs (@jdubs) 1630513457

Experience can be eye-opening.

Had an abortion at 16 then had to fight with my doctor to let me keep my third child when I was 36 (because it was such a high risk pregnancy) Both experiences validated why being pro-choice is the only choice for me.
— Lisen Stromberg (@Lisen Stromberg) 1630531464

Even experiences that someone might guess would lead to different views.

My miscarriages made me more pro choice . I know that sounds backwards and please don\u2019t come at me. Also I still grieve still wonder what if.
— jpm2375 (@jpm2375) 1630526951

Hell, my first baby dying made me more pro-choice.
— Megan the Klutz (@Megan the Klutz) 1630521295

A few men even weighed in, saying that their experience just witnessing their wives' pregnancy and childbirth difficulties made them see that no one should be forced through it against their will.

Watching my wife spend 7 days in the hospital giving birth to our daughter made me hate 2 things more than anything: 1) Fathers who abandon the women they impregnate and make them go through that alone, and 2) Govts who make women go through that against their will.
— Inhumanoid (@Inhumanoid) 1630517563

Absolutely. I watched my wife give birth (I about passed out multiple times) and could never again imagine even suggesting someone go through labor without a complete desire to do so.
— Eric VanEpps (@Eric VanEpps) 1630515016

So many stories, so many reasons to believe in giving women autonomy over their own medical decisions.

*losing a pregnancy at 36 weeks* made me more pro-choice than ever before.
— Kim Wexler\u2019s power pony (@Kim Wexler\u2019s power pony) 1630512437

Yes. Had a still born at 27 weeks. Only specialists who could do the procedure were abortionists. Even in my blue state, there are only 2 who can do 3rd trimester evacuations because we've made being an abortionist so deadly, so few gyns ever get the training.
— blackademthick (@blackademthick) 1630517511

Never assumed I'd have to have a medically necessary abortion at 35, but if I weren't pro-choice to begin with, boy would I have been radicalized in that moment.
— Kaitlin S (@Kaitlin S) 1630519515

I had an easy birth. Less than 6 hours unmedicated birth with no complications for a first time mom. I wouldn't ever want to put someone through that who wasn't 100% sure they wanted a baby.
— Tonya (@Tonya) 1630529686

Both pregnancies very much wanted, officially normal and no serious complications... but neither was \u2018easy\u2019 and the second was tough going. Nobody should be forced into something so personal and life-changing and physically perilous.https://twitter.com/jenashleywright/status/1433094488231235592\u00a0\u2026
— Jenni Adam (@Jenni Adam) 1630531479

Scrolling through the hundreds of comments in the thread, the consensus was clear.

Pregnancy and childbirth are difficult and dangerous, with lifelong consequences, even when you want a child. Adoption is not the panacea people make it out to be. Struggling through infertility and multiple miscarriages can make women more understanding of how complicated reproductive choices are. And the idea of the government forcing a woman to stay pregnant and deliver a baby no matter the circumstances feels wrong when you know exactly what that can mean for her.

Let's leave personal medical choices that don't affect others to patients and their providers, period.

From Your Site Articles

Just a reminder that the majority opinion in Roe v. Wade was written by a lifelong Republican

Maria Oswalt /Unsplash (left), Wikimedia Commons (right)

Few topics are as politically polarizing as the issue of abortion. Those of us who are middle aged and younger have always known the abortion debate divided between the political right and left, conservatives and liberals, Republicans and Democrats.

But that has not always been the case.

In fact, it was mostly Republican-nominated Supreme Court Justices who made the case for choice in 1973.

Roe vs. Wadewas decided with a 7-2 vote, and not along partisan lines. Those who ruled in favor were as follows, with the president who nominated them and the party of that president indicated in parentheses:

Harry Blackmun (Nixon, R)
Lewis Powell (Nixon, R)
Warren Burger (Nixon, R)
William Brennan (Eisenhower, R)
Potter Stewart (Eisenhower, R)
Thurgood Marshall (LBJ, D)
William Douglas (FDR, D)

Those who dissented on Roe vs. Wade:

Byron White (Kennedy, D)
William Rehnquist (Nixon, R)

So five Republican-nominated justices and two Democrat-nominated justices ruled for choice, while one Republican and one Democrat-nominated justice ruled against.

A lifelong Republican justice, Harry Blackmun, wrote the majority opinion in the case, which basically stated that state laws that unduly restrict abortion were unconstitutional—not specifically because a woman had a right to choose to have an abortion, but because of a the right to privacy under the 14th amendment.

When viewed as a private medical decision, the fact that the party-of-less-government-interference Republicans ruled that way makes perfect sense. It has always struck me as odd that the party who advocates for less government regulation and less government interference in our lives would be the one to push for the government to stick its nose into people's personal medical decisions. It turns out, they've only pushed that argument during my adult lifetime.

There are, of course, debates to be had about when a person should be considered a person with full rights and protections under the law, and people are free to debate the moral questions that come with the personal and/or medical reasons people choose to abort a pregnancy. But there's no question that abortion is a medical decision, which automatically makes it an issue of privacy. That has not changed since 1973. That has not changed since Republicans ruled in favor of choice.

It's only since the religious right aligned itself with the Republican party in a direct way (and vice versa) that making abortion illegal became a Republican stance.

Interestingly, that relationship—and the corruption that inevitably results in when religious ideology slips into bed with politics—even played out in the life of "Jane Roe" herself. The woman in the landmark case who pushed for choice, whose real name was Norma McCorvey, ended up publicly changing her stance and pushing an anti-abortion message for decades.

Then, in her dying days, she confessed that it was all an act—that she had been paid by anti-abortion activists to put out that messaging.

AKA Jane Roe | Deathbed Confession Highlight | FXwww.youtube.com

Despite how passionate some people's anti-abortion stances are today—and how politicians use that passion to garner support—abortion has not always been a big, controversial political issue. For much of Western history, abortion was viewed as a private matter between a woman and a doctor, and history also shows that making abortion illegal doesn't make abortions not happen.

Since the only things proven to reduce abortion rates are comprehensive sex education, easy and affordable access to birth control, and access to healthcare in general; since choice was originally a Republican-led stance as evidenced by the Roe vs. Wade ruling; and since abortion rates have fallen consistently for the past four decades—more drastically under Democrat administrations than Republican, oddly enough—and are currently at record lows, overturning Roe vs. Wade in an attempt to end abortion seems like a strange goal to pin one's partisan hat on.

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