In an old post from 2009, a clinic worker describes how she feels about her job:
“I don’t know about you, but sometimes I feel our work can be incredibly isolating….for me and my co-workers, it can sometimes feel like we’re alone. No one wants to hear about where you work or what you do. Often family and friends don’t even want to know about your day. Maybe it’s a sign I’ve been doing abortion work a long time because I just simply don’t talk about my day anymore. And I hardly notice that I don’t. Who’s going to understand, anyway?”
“[Hospital administrators say] abortion is a sleazy and offensive procedure… The doctor who does abortions – even if they are only a small part of her practice – is known as an abortionist… This label is the kiss of death for any professional hopes a doctor might have.”
Glamour, October 1993
Quoted in Mark Crutcher “Access: the Key to Pro-Life Victory” Life Dynamics Incorporated
An abortion clinic worker talks about stigma. After saying that she finds it easy to dismiss criticism when it comes from pro-lifers, she says:
“What’s harder, though, is to talk about how our parents sidestep friends’ questions about what their progeny are doing these days, or how high school reunions are at even greater risk of being depressing/distressing/disastrous than for everyone else, or how we worry about our kids learning what we do not because we aren’t proud but because their classmates’ parents might shame or punish them.
We go to schools that don’t want to talk too much about abortion because some nebulous outside audience may object; we attend reproductive health lectures by professors who feel comfortable accommodating the opinion that it’s OK to be anti-reproductive health; we don’t get hired because someone thought we’d bring unnecessary attention to an organization that doesn’t even really care about abortion either way, maybe they even support what we do, but just wants to get its own work done without pointless interference. You will never see an abortioneer nominated to the Department of Health and Human Services.”
“I had a fairly long phone conversation with Dr. Hern (Colorado [late term] abortionist) today which was really interesting. He had a number of criticisms not only of the Democratic Party (which you’ve read about if you’re a reader here), but also of the pro-choice movement in general. …. He expressed concern that doctors are not included in the movement as much as he believes they should be. He was annoyed that the pro-choice movement doesn’t support him as much as he thinks they should. It was just very interesting to hear a doctor, who has a permanent, serious threat against his life for his work, criticize the very movement that should be helping both him & his patients.”
26 weeks
Reproductive Rights Blog, Talking to Dr. Hern: 8-17-2005
Quoted by Life Dynamics
Perhaps even many of those who claim to be pro-choice are uncomfortable with the actual process of abortion, in particular, of late term abortion. The baby on the left, at 26 weeks, could have been killed in Hern’s Boulder clinic.
Retired OB/GYN Marciana Wilkerson who performed abortions and had a private practice knew that if the public knew she was an abortion provider, she would lose patients, so she used deceit.
“What we did to protect me in private practice was, if someone called and asked for an abortion on the phone and she wasn’t one of our patients, the staff politely told her that I didn’t perform that service.… But if they knew who she was, they bring her in and I’d speak to her face-to-face. There was a big need for it; women would usually come and say “can you refer me to someone?” And they were thrilled when they found out I could offer the service and not send them out.”
Sarah Erdreich Generation Roe: inside the Future of the Pro-Choice Movement (New York: Seven Stories Press, 2013) 53
An abortion clinic worker describes the stigma of working in the abortion industry. She uses a pen name on her blog, The Abortioneers. She is only one of several writers on that blog. She explains that abortion is still a taboo subject. This stigma against abortion providers is one reason why there is such a shortage of abortionists and the turnover rate for clinic workers is so high.
“We frequently discuss how to talk to friends/acquaintances/family who are not abortioneers about being an abortioneer. Or even, simply, about abortion. Though I’ve been doing this work a long time, I find I go through stages. Sometimes it’s easier to discuss abortion and other times, it just isn’t easy at all. Probably some of it depends on how much is going on at work (if it’s stressful or we’re having a lot of protesters, I tend not to want to discuss work outside work as much. Especially with people who just won’t get it anyway).
It can feel isolating to have the people who are closest to you not understand your work, your commitment to it, and your passion for it. Only recently have I been able to have conversations with my dad about abortion after years of bitter silence. Sometimes, it’s still frustrating to even talk to my husband; for example, if I have a shit day, he is quick to tell me I should just leave the clinic. He reminds me that I already have to put up with protesters and the stigma that comes along with being an abortioneer. He asks why I should stick around if my boss is being…err…unappreciative. It’s hard for me to explain to him that I’m committed to something larger (the “work”) and can put up with a bunch of bullshit in order to feel like I’m making a difference in someone’s life…and I’m motivated by that…not quite as much by recognition from my employer.
It’s stigma that really makes it so difficult to talk about our work.”
