“I woke up in pain and crying in the recovery room. The doctor came in all annoyed and asked me “What are you still crying for?” He then told me that I cried through the whole procedure even under general anesthesia and that it was very distracting.”
On December 12, 2006, my obstetrician diagnosed my unborn baby with several and severe congenital heart defects and a kidney defect. An amniocentesis didn’t indicate my daughter had any chromosomal abnormalities. He recommended terminating my pregnancy since the defects were extreme. He also added all the other things that “could” be wrong with her including extremely small arteries, and an unattached abdomen.
I was told in the state where I live that I would have to start the termination procedure that day by 5pm or go to Kansas. I felt so much pressure to make a decision, but relied on my doctor’s recommendation to terminate to save my daughter from suffering. I was told that she would endure many surgeries, will probably need a heart transplant, and most likely would die. I was told she currently had congestive heart failure and was suffering at that moment.
I was devastated. I desperately wanted my daughter and was ready to have another child. I had been ill and worn down my entire pregnancy. I knew something was wrong and tried to tell the doctor’s my fears but it fell on deaf ears until I was 24.3 weeks pregnant and they saw it on the ultrasound. I am a strong person but the pressure and the trust I had in my doctor plus the fear of my daughter suffering scared me to death. I didn’t know where to turn or who to trust.
24 weeks
After careful measurements of my daughter, she was too big to terminate so my own doctor sent me to the wolves, Dr. Tiller. He gave me Tiller’s information packet and a phone in his office to call to schedule the appointment. He faxed my records and his diagnosis to Tiller.
I researched Tiller on the Internet and found horrible accounts and terrible things written about him. My baby’s father forbid me to search any further and told me he would take care of the paperwork and travel arrangements. I again trusted someone else.
We arrived in Wichita on December 17, 2006 and checked into the hotel. I was distraught and uncontrollably shaking.
Upon arrival at Tiller’s clinic on the morning of December 18 the pro-life advocates were setting up and I was horrified. I begged my baby’s father to take me home. He covered my eyes and drove on by. I blame myself for being weak. I should have left.
We were the first couple of four. We watched a video and they talked. I was clearly sobbing and the other mothers were composed. I can’t speak for their feelings but they were chatting and seemed fine. I couldn’t understand that. I was devastated and withdrawn. Tiller came in and spoke to the group and answered questions that this was legal, that we were all there to protect our children and our bodies. He seemed proud of himself to actually learn our names. I think he was trying to make us feel like we are people to him but clearly I was not.
I had to sign some forms and a form that stated I read the information and was within the 24-hour waiting period. I had not read that information but my fiancé said he did and that was enough. We were told we needed to pay four thousand dollars and if I wanted to wait it would be an additional five hundred dollars every day and after 26 weeks it would be even more because he needed a second physician’s signature.
As soon as we paid I was taken for an ultrasound. Dr. Tiller concluded with my doctor that the baby was not viable and then met with me in his office to explain my individual circumstance. I wanted to leave but how can someone leave when their own doctor sent me here. He had pictures of his family all over and I longed for a family. He has letters of thanks framed from other mothers who suffered. Tiller sent me back to the waiting room. Again I sobbed. I was called back in the ultrasound room and he gave me a twilight sedation and injected my baby with digoxin to stop her heart. He packed me with lamanaria and sent me back to the waiting room. He also told me he had to give me extra sedation as my body was fighting it and to relax or the process will be very difficult. I was allowed to use the restroom prior to that and I begged my baby for her forgiveness and told her goodbye.
We waited for about an hour. He checked for the heartbeat and when he didn’t find one he said, “I’m sorry, your baby has died.” I wanted to scream, “You killed her!” I was sent to Hart Pharmacy across town to get hydrocodone and benadryl. That night I had severe cramping.
The next day he told the group that he sent one girl back to her home state as she was only there for the digoxin shot because the delivery would have been too risky due to prior c-section deliveries. He said he doesn’t normally do that and went on to say “I never want to see your cervix’s again in here, especially C**** (the girl who was going home to deliver) because she has been here before.” I wanted to be sick.
He checked all of us and repacked me with lamanaria under sedation and sent me back to the hotel. The two other couples left were admitted to deliver because they were ready. Tiller told me I was not ready and sent me on my way. I just wanted to get it all over with, I was miserable. I was in so much pain that night we called Edna, the nurse on duty, and she told me to take double the hydrocodone and double benadryl. That only helped for a couple of hours. We went back in and Dr. Carhart was on duty and I sat there for what seemed like hours that night and ended up leaving. I was on a lot of medication so it’s hard for me to remember what was said, but I remember I was really afraid of him. I made it through the night shaking and not eating or sleeping.
We checked in again on December 20, and Tiller checked me. He said I was ready to be admitted. My baby’s father had to wait while they got me in my bed. I don’t remember how I got to the room but I remember the beds with the curtains. I remember an angel statue that I focused on to try to keep my mind clear. I was hooked up to an IV and given a pill to hold under my tongue. They then allowed my fiancé to join me. I would guess we were there for two hours and the pain got so bad I cried out.
I think it was Cathy that checked me and said I should have told her I was ready to deliver. I couldn’t even stand up for fear I would deliver on the floor. She got Tiller and he gave me more of the twilight drug and I remember having the urge to push. I delivered in the bed. Then he made me stand up on my own and walk to another room and get in stirrups. He gave me more of the twilight drug and at that point I had given up because I don’t remember what he did then. I woke up back in a recovery bed and then was sent back to my hotel empty hearted and empty handed.
On December 21, I returned to hold my baby girl, name her, and have her baptized. I went into a room and she was wrapped in a blanket and there was a pastor there. I sobbed and sobbed as I held my daughter. She appeared perfect and I felt like I had been tricked and in some sort of nightmare. The pastor sprinkled water and blessed her and he actually cried at my grief. That is the first person in that awful prison that showed humanity. Edna was very proud of her “cleanup” of my baby. I was released with some prescriptions for antibiotics and more pain relievers and was told we could drive the nine hours back home in another state that day. I don’t remember much of that drive back.
I didn’t get any follow-up from Tiller’s office until weeks later. A package arrived with my daughter’s ashes and a note saying they were thinking about me. I don’t really know if those are my daughter’s ashes or someone else’s but I put them in an urn and a keepsake box of my horrible experience in Kansas. I never want to return to Kansas. I hate that state. I wish Tiller’s clinic is closed and I wish it was closed in December of ’06. I have so many regrets and I will never forgive myself.
My fiancé made my life miserable the minute I found out I was pregnant and was relieved when termination was an option. He forced me to terminate, he guilted me into by saying my daughter who is alive will suffer the most if I was in hospitals all the time with the baby, and he mocked me while we were in Wichita and I was suffering. I was 32 years old at the time so there is proof that even adults can be coerce into something they don’t feel is right. If I could convince one woman to be strong and stand up for herself and her baby then perhaps I could relieve some of my sadness. Thank you for listening.
“In Their Own Words: Women’s Stories Of Coerced, Botched, and Illegal Abortions At Tiller’s Women’s Health Care Services in Wichita, KS” Operation Rescue
From a book that told the stories of postabortion women:
“20-year-old Rickie, who is a Black Muslim, opposes abortion and has been mad at herself since she had an abortion 6 weeks ago. She had the hardest time the night after the abortion. She recalls, “I woke up in the middle of the night and I felt so bad. I was crying all night. I felt really low, like I was the stupidest person on earth.”
Eve Kushner Experiencing Abortion: A Weaving of Women’s Words (Binghamton, New York: The Haworth Press, 1997) 53
A British woman who had an abortion tells her story:
My decision to deny a child a future has in many ways been a personal life sentence for me. The first time I had sex I fell pregnant.
I’d been going out with my first boyfriend for seven months and we stupidly didn’t use protection, but I was so young I didn’t really understand the consequences.
I was petrified – especially when my boyfriend make it clear he didn’t want me to keep the baby. He said if I didn’t get rid of it, I’d never see him again. …
The weekend I went into hospital was awful. I was put on a ward with a group of pregnant women – everyone was so excited about having their babies but I felt guilty about terminating mine. Every hour or so the nurses would come back and ask if I was still sure I wanted to go ahead – it made the experience so much worse. …
No one apart from close family and my boyfriend knew about it, and if the topic ever came up in conversation, I would never admit to having had one. I was terrified people would think badly of me.
My guilt worsened when, aged 23, I met my first husband and had Katie. Every time I looked at her I thought of the baby I’d terminated.
I fell into a terrible depression and began to think anything that went wrong in my life was my punishment for having a termination and I turned to alcohol.
Eventually I pulled myself together and had counselling in my early 30s. It was the first time I’d spoken about how I felt. It made me realize that while I believe I made the right decision at the age of 17 – I really wasn’t capable of bringing up a child then – I could never destroy another potential life. …
I’m still not over my abortion – I even wrote a letter to the baby that might have been and buried it in the garden – it would be 19 now, and probably at university
NATASHA PEARLMAN; JENNY NISBET “ABORTION: THE LEGACY” The Daily Mail July 27, 2006 42.
“When I got pregnant I’d only been going out with my boyfriend for a month, and even though I cared for him deeply, I didn’t want to bring a child into such a fragile relationship.
He wanted us to keep the baby, but there were so many things I still wanted to do with my life and I was scared of what my parents would say.
The morning of the abortion, when I was eight weeks pregnant, was awful, and I was worried I was doing the wrong thing. My boyfriend was more upset about it than I was – he ended up taking antidepressants in order to deal with it. …
I met my present partner three years ago, and in September 2004 I came off the Pill. We both wanted a child, but it took almost a year for me to conceive – that in itself worried me as I’d heard abortions can affect your fertility.
Our happiness was short-lived however, because five days after finding out I was expecting – and at seven weeks into the pregnancy – I miscarried.
I was really upset and immediately I thought of the abortion. But I know it’s not uncommon to miscarry a first pregnancy so decided not to let it affect me. In January 2006 I conceived again, but again at seven weeks we lost the baby. I was inconsolable.
It feels like I’ve been on an emotional rollercoaster and I can’t help wondering if my losses have been the result of my abortion nine years ago. My doctor hasn’t confirmed a link, but inside I blame myself.
My termination was a quick fix because I didn’t want that baby. I only wish I’d considered how I would feel when it came to not being able to have the babies I do want.”
Sarah Fry
NATASHA PEARLMAN; JENNY NISBET “ABORTION: THE LEGACY” The Daily Mail July 27, 2006 42.
“It was much more painful than I thought it would be. Jenny held my hand and I think the nurse held my other hand– she was very nice to me. I was pretty stoic about it but it was very painful, physically. I mean, everybody told me it was unpleasant but they didn’t tell me it was terrible. I mean, it didn’t last very long, but…
The doctor was just perfunctory. It was kind of depressing because obviously he was doing a series of these; he was clicking right through it… It probably would’ve been psychologically better if he would have taken a few more minutes before, a few more minutes afterwards.… I kind of felt – I analyzed this looking back – I feel like he’s taking no responsibility, well, no responsibility for his part in his relationship to you. Because just physically, he is doing this thing to you and he needs to take a little time with that. You need to know there is a person on the other end of this experience. A little warmth, too. That would have helped.
It’s a very vulnerable thing… You’re in the most vulnerable position in the world.… It doesn’t matter what they say, it’s still close to rape in terms of that sort of feeling of being gutted emotionally as well as physically… It was a real crushed feeling. I think that I had a moment of, well, I did think this was the most horrible thing in the world.…
And I felt a lot of pain afterwards. In fact I had to go in a couple of times because they thought maybe something had gone wrong or something, but nothing had. So I was worried for a quite a while.”
Sumi Hoshiko Our Choices: Women’s Personal Decisionsabout Abortion (New York: Harrington Park Press, 1993) 98 – 99
In 2009, I had my tonsils removed. They had been bothering me for a while and no one knows what they are really for anyway…so I figured I might as well have them out. I knew a lot of tonsil-less people, so I wasn’t nervous at all about surgery. A couple days before I went “under the knife” I had my pre-op visit with my ENT. We were going over a few things that I already knew. Then, he started talking about the risks. I guess I hadn’t really thought there would be risks with a tonsillectomy. Severing vocal cords and being unable to speak…damage to teeth…extreme blood loss…damage to my tongue…and even death. WHAT??? Um, maybe I should just keep my annoying tonsils. I suddenly became very nervous. My doctor assured me that my fear were kind of irrational…he just HAD to tell me those things. Needless to say, two days later, the tonsils came out. I had no problems. My throat has never been happier. Now, flashback to 2003. I was 23 years old, a volunteer at Planned Parenthood, a college student, a woman who was 8 weeks pregnant by her husband…a husband she was divorcing. I didn’t want a baby so I had a solution…abortion. I had already had one abortion and it was easy. Surely, this time it would be the same. Instead of a surgical abortion, I thought this time I would choose a more “natural” way to abort…the medication abortion. It was all pills and that seemed really simple. Everything was done at home. It was private, on your schedule, under your control and seemed less invasive. “Nothing worse than a heavy period,” according to Planned Parenthood. Sounded pretty easy to me. So, I took the bait. I made an appointment and got the money together. The day came and it really felt like any other day. I wasn’t nervous…I wasn’t having surgery. This was going to be simple. At the clinic I filled out paperwork, had some basic lab work done, had an ultrasound (that I don’t remember), and got put in a room for abortion counseling. I had brought someone with me, but I, of course, had to do all of this alone. No one except the patient was allowed past the waiting room. I remember my “counseling” as if it happened yesterday. “You will have some heavy bleeding and period like cramps. None of it should last too long. You will be back to normal in a couple days,” my counselor said. “Sounds good,” I remember saying. And I guess it did sound pretty good. I could get rid of my biggest burden for $400.00 and a little cramping. Not a bad deal. There didn’t appear to be any risks or side effects…or if there were, we didn’t go over them. Surely if there were risks, they would have told me about them, right? So the exchange was made. I gave them $400.00, and they gave me a Mifeprex pill and a brown bag of pills to take home. After taking the Mifeprex, I felt great! No side effects…just like she said. The next day, I did as I was told. I ate a light lunch and took the 4 pills in my brown bag called Misoprostol. They told me these were the pills that would start my bleeding and cramping…but nothing a few Ibuprofen couldn’t take care of. I was told after taking the pills at home that I would probably start bleeding in about an hour. So, I made myself comfortable on the bed and turned the TV on. Ten minutes later, I started to feel pain in my abdomen unlike anything I had ever experienced. Then the blood came. It was gushing out of me. I couldn’t wear a pad…nothing was able to absorb the amount of blood I was losing. The only thing I could do was sit on the toilet. I sat there for hours…bleeding, throwing up into the bathroom trashcan, crying and sweating. I used to watch shows about childbirth. I would see these women in labor and they would be covered in sweat. I would always think, “Gosh, do they keep it hot in the delivery room, or what?” But at that moment, sitting on the toilet, I knew it wasn’t from heat…it was from pain.
After several hours on the toilet, I desperately wanted to soak in the bath tub. I was hoping that would make me feel better. Maybe the warm water would help the cramping. Certainly it would make me smell better. I had vomit all in my hair and on my legs, not to mention how sweaty I was. I filled the tub and climbed in. It actually did feel pretty good. I remember closing my eyes and leaning my head back. I felt exhausted. The cramps kept coming, but the water helped soothe them somewhat. I opened my eyes after 15 minutes and was horrified. My bathwater was bright red. It looked like I was sitting in the middle of a crime scene. And I guess it was…I had murdered my child.
I knew I had to get up and wash the blood off of me. I stood up slowly and straightened out my body. As soon as I was completely upright, I felt a pain worse than any other I had experienced. I began to sweat again and felt faint. I grabbed on to the side of the shower wall to steady myself. Then I felt a release…and a splash in the water that was draining beneath me. A blood clot the size of a lemon had fallen into my bath water. Was that my baby? I knew this huge clot was not going to go down the drain, so I reached down to pick it up. I was able to grasp the large clot with both hands and move it to the toilet. I stood in the warm shower for a few minutes…feeling a little relief from the cramping. Then came the excruciating pain again. I jumped out of the shower and sat on the toilet. Another lemon sized blood clot. Then another. And another. I thought I was dying. This couldn’t be normal. Planned Parenthood didn’t ever tell me this could happen. This must be atypical. I decided that I would call them in the morning…if I didn’t die before then. It was around midnight and I had been in the bathroom for a good 12 hours. I knew I couldn’t leave yet. I didn’t want to lay in the bed…the bleeding was too heavy. And the clots were still coming; not as often, but they were still coming. So, I decided to sleep on the bathroom floor that night…right by the toilet. The cold floor felt good on my face. I was physically depleted, but I could not sleep.
The next morning, I called Planned Parenthood as soon as they opened and asked to speak to the nurse. I was told she would call me back soon. She did. I told her about my previous day. She told me, “That is not abnormal.” WHAT?? She could not be serious. All of the bleeding, the clotting, the pain…that was NORMAL??? “Yes,” she said. “Use heating pads, soak in a warm tub, and take Ibuprofen.” I was angry. How could they not tell me the side effects? I felt betrayed.
Eight weeks passed. Eight weeks of blood clots. Eight weeks of nausea. Eight weeks of excruciating cramps. Eight weeks of heavy bleeding. When it was finally over, I went back to volunteer at Planned Parenthood. My anger was gone and had now been replaced by self-reproach. I no longer blamed Planned Parenthood, I blamed myself. And honestly, I was glad that I wasn’t pregnant. So, I just chalked it up to a terrible experience and vowed that I would do my best to never let anyone I know choose medication abortion. I did not want anyone else to experience what I had been through.
When I started working at Planned Parenthood, I did just that. It actually became a joke around the clinic. “Don’t let Abby see the MAB (medication abortion) clients. She will change them all to surgical and we will be here all day.” I HATED medication abortion. I hated that we were pushing it at all of our clinics. I did not think it was best for our patients. And I told them the risks. I told them my story. I told them about the clots, the cramping, the nausea, the bleeding. I had seen too many women that had been hurt by this “natural” abortion method. There was nothing natural about it. At a management meeting, I voiced my concerns. Why weren’t we talking about the risks? Why hadn’t anyone told me? “Well, we don’t want to scare them,” my supervisor said. “Oh, like they are scared when they think they are dying from the amount of blood they are losing because we choose not to tell them that is supposedly normal,” I responded. That didn’t go over too well. That was their answer? They didn’t want women to be scared?? The night of my medication abortion, lying on the cold bathroom floor, I had never been so scared. What if I died there alone? Who would find me? Would my parents find out that their daughter died because she had an abortion? That fear was real.
Looking back on my tonsillectomy and my abortion, one thing really stands out. When my ENT was going over all of these crazy risks, I was kind of thinking, “Hey, can you just NOT tell me any of this.” But then I was grateful. Because if I woke up and I wasn’t able to talk, or if my two front teeth were all busted up, at least I would have known that was a possibility. At least I had the CHOICE to back out. With my abortion, I wasn’t given that CHOICE. They didn’t tell me what was really going to happen to me…because they didn’t want to “scare” me? So much for freedom of choice.
Here is another glaring contrast. When my ENT was explaining the risks to me, I became nervous. But as he was calming my fears, I remember him saying, “Don’t worry, none of this has EVER happened before to any of my patients.” That made me feel better. But the same cannot be said of abortion…particularly medication abortion. Women have died from medication abortion. Thousands of women have had very serious complications. I saw many of them with my own eyes…I was one of them.
To not give women all of the information about abortion because you think it will “scare” them is actually very offensive. Doesn’t Planned Parenthood claim to “trust women?” Then why don’t they trust these women enough to give them all of the information? Do they not think women are smart enough to handle basic facts? What kind of female empowerment is that? Here’s the truth…Planned Parenthood is not worried about women being “scared”…Planned Parenthood is scared. They are scared women will walk out the door if they get accurate and thorough information. Every woman that walks out is lost revenue…that is Planned Parenthood’s biggest fear. They are scared. They are scared of the truth. They are scared to give women the truth.
In 2003, a young woman died from a medication abortion. Her name was Holly Patterson. Since then, her father, Monty, has been working to expose the dangers and risks of abortion. He recently created a website, http://abortionpillrisks.org. This website is full of accurate information on the true risks of medication abortion. I encourage all of you to please share this with people you know. Please post this website on your facebook or twitter. Right now, Planned Parenthood is planning to expand their medication abortion protocols to EVERY family planning clinic in the country in the next 5 years. We must act now. Holly didn’t have to die. Women do not have to be hurt by abortion. Expose the truth. Someone has to trust women to make the right decision…it certainly won’t be Planned Parenthood.
The story of a woman whose secret abortions haunted her:
… I recall a story my mother shared with me when coming onto my puberty. She told me that my paternal grandmother on her deathbed was quite frightened of dying. She confessed to my mother, who attended her passing, that she was “afraid to meet all her dead babies on the other side.” It seems Grandma had induced several abortions which were secrets kept from family and friends alike. At death’s door, Grandma confronted her previous liasions with mortality and murder, carrying this hidden fear for years.
End of first trimester
That story made a strong impression on me, as I had been taught through the popular “planned parenthood” information materials that abortion was more like a tooth extraction than murder. A little painful, but not such a moral crisis. How could this be true when Grandma carried that guilt all her life? I couldn’t imagine similarly repenting my dentistry operations upon my deathbed.
“… the urge to mother, and to grieve that life I let go from my body so long ago, remained with me over all the years, underground, surfacing only in my sleep.
Ever since the abortion, I’ve had recurring nightmares in which I happened upon forgotten babies tucked into dresser drawers, inside pianos, under sinks. Every time I found one, it would be thin and weak and unconscious. Inevitably, I would feel desperate to revive it, but whether or not I could do so remained to be seen.
More recently, perhaps six months ago, I had the last (so far, anyway) in this years-long series. In this dream, for the first time, the baby I found in my sock drawer was already dead, its limp, frail little body cold to the touch.” ‘
