Category: Women’s Stories of Abortion Counseling

Pro-choice author Cara J. Marianna compiled a collection of women’s abortion testimonies for a book. One woman says:

“I had to [travel to another town for the abortion]. I remember going once and, thinking back now, there wasn’t any question from the nurses there about, ‘Do I want to keep this child?’ It was just assumed that this is what I’m going to do. There wasn’t any counseling otherwise or questions about it.”

Cara J. Marianna Abortion: A Collective Story (Westport, CT: Praeger, 2002) 78

A pro-life author tells the following story:

“In conducting interviews for this book, I was introduced to one young woman from the Southwest whose experience underscored the disinformation that comes from abortion clinics. As a single college student, Annie was shocked to learn that she was pregnant. After telling her boyfriend the news, he urged her to get an abortion.

Annie made the appointment. The clinic personnel told her to call “anytime you want to talk.” Feeling lonely and confused, she confided in her sister. Anne was in for a jolt. Having written a paper on pregnancy, her sister knew something about the development of the unborn and the experience of pain in the fetus. She pointed these things out to Annie, who didn’t know what to believe.

“I had to call the abortion clinic to find out for sure. When I reached them, I told the counselor who I was and asked “Will the baby feel it, and what will it look like?” The counselor said, “It won’t look like anything more than a little ball of cotton, and it won’t be able to feel anything.”

Unconvinced, she went to a crisis pregnancy center, which told her the truth and let her see an ultrasound. She kept her baby.

Curt Young The Least of These: What Everyone Should Know about Abortion (Chicago, Illinois: Moody Press, 1984) 59

In 1984, abortions were almost never done before seven weeks because the suction cannula used to perform abortions at the time often missed babies that were too small, leading to complications or a continuing pregnancy. Usually if a woman was not yet 7 – 8 weeks into her pregnancy, they sent her home to wait. So if the clinic workers were already trying to get her to come in, this woman’s baby must have been at least seven weeks old. A picture of a seven week old baby is below:

A woman who had an abortion remarked on the lack of counseling in the clinic:

“So, we confirmed the pregnancy. There was no interview about the decision at that time. I just said ‘No, I don’t want to continue the pregnancy.’ At that time, they weren’t even concerned about consulting with my husband. But I said, ‘He agrees.’ The doctor said, ‘So, when do you want to do it?’ Which I thought, years later, was interesting, because when I wanted my tubal ligation, after my second child was born, they counseled me every month for almost nine months. ‘Is that still your decision? Are you sure you don’t want your husband to come in?’ So, there was a great deal more counseling approximately five or six years later. Obviously, [there] should have been a little more concern [about the abortion]. They were very off-handed about the postpartum events after the pregnancy’s termination and things like that.”

Cara J. Marianna Abortion: A Collective Story (Westport, CT: Praeger, 2002) 63

When Carolyn Kasdorf became pregnant as a teenager, she was afraid to let anyone at her Christian school or church know. Also, her parents had always warned her not to come home pregnant. So she turned to Planned Parenthood for help.  She tells her story:

“Feeling I had nowhere to go, I turned to Planned Parenthood and ultimately chose abortion. At first, I struggled with the morality of the decision.

“Is it a baby?” I asked.

The counselor gave me all the answers. “No, it’s not a baby; it’s just cartilage like your ear. It’s a blob of tissue.”

Wendy Williams, Ann Caldwell Empty Arms: More Than 60 Life-Giving Stories of Hope from the Devastation of Abortion (Chattanooga, Tennessee: Living Ink Books, 2005) 98 – 100

Later, she had a second abortion. It was not until many years later that she came to regret her abortions.

The baby above is not cartilage.

Linda Keener Thomas remembers what she was told by the abortion clinic she called. She was pregnant and in college:

“Abortion seemed to be my only choice. It would solve everything. So I called a clinic for information and asked the lady, “Is it a baby?”

“No, honey, it’s just tissue. After all, you want to finish school, don’t you?”

I clung to that statement like a drowning person clutching a life preserver, repeating it over and over until I almost believed it. But deep in my heart I knew the truth that it was a baby, my baby.

Wendy Williams, Ann Caldwell Empty Arms: More Than 60 Life-Giving Stories of Hope from the Devastation of Abortion (Chattanooga, Tennessee: Living Ink Books, 2005) 143

Her baby was 20 weeks along and looked like this.

Hardly “just tissue.”

A woman describes the lack of counseling at Planned Parenthood

“Inside, I signed in and paid the fee. No counselors spoke to me and soon I was ushered into a cold, stark room with bare walls. I was lying on a table that was so cold I shivered. A nurse told me it would be over quickly and I could return to work the next day. She said it wouldn’t hurt.

She was absolutely wrong!”

Barbara Horak Real Abortion Stories: The Hurting and the Healing (El Paso, Texas: Strive for the Best Publishing, 2007) 80