Former Abortionist: Dr. Kathi Aultman

Columnist Phil Greenberg witnessed former abortion provider Kathi Aultman’s testimony at a trial on Partial Birth Abortion at a federal courthouse. From his column:

“One of the expert witnesses, Dr. Kathi Aultman of Orange park, Florida, explains that she no longer does abortions. She used to. She never thought overmuch about what it was she was destroying. Actually, she found it fascinating, how all the expelled parts fit together into a tiny, perfect being. Amazing. She would go down to Pathology and section them- the little hearts and livers and lungs.

But one day Dr. Aultman read an article comparing the abortion industry with the Holocaust.

“Personally,” she testifies, “I had a hard time understanding how the German doctors could do what they did during the war.” Now it became clear.  “Any time you take a group of people and consider them non-human, you can do anything to them. It wasn’t until I had my own baby and then read that article that I understood how the German doctors could do what they did….All of a sudden, I saw what happened to me during training.”

Phil Greenberg “A Perfectly Normal Morning” October 12, 1997.

From “To Life: A Collection of Editorials & Columns on Abortion, Life, and Choice” (Little Rock, Arkansas: The Arkansas Democrat Gazette, 1999) P 91

On another day of testimony:

Testimony of Kathi A. Aultman, MD before the House Judiciary Committee’s Subcommittee on the Constitution at a Legislative hearing on HR 4965 the “Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act of 2002”  July 9, 2002 

When I started my OB/GYN Residency, I was very pro-abortion. I felt no woman should have go through a pregnancy she didn’t want. I felt abortion was a necessary evil, and I was determined to provide women with the best abortion care possible. I perfected my D&C with suction technique and then convinced one of our local abortionists to teach me to do D&Es. I moonlighted at an abortion clinic in Gainesville as much as I could. The only time I felt uneasy was when I was on my neonatal rotation and I realized that the babies I was trying to save were the same size as the babies I had been aborting.

I continued to do abortions almost the entire time I was pregnant (with my eldest daughter) without it bothering me. It wasn’t until I delivered my daughter and made the connection between fetus and baby that I stopped doing abortions. I found out later that few doctors are able to do abortions for very long. OB/GYNs especially, often experience a conflict of interest because they normally are concerned about the welfare of both their patients but in an abortion they are killing one of them. It’s hard for most doctors to deliver babies and do abortions.

It also has to do with the fact that to almost everyone else the pregnancy is just a blob of tissue, but the abortionist knows exactly what he is doing because he has to count all the parts after each abortion. I never had any doubt that I was killing little people, but somehow I was able to justify and compartmentalize that.

Even though I later became a Christian, I continued to be a staunch supporter of abortion rights. I just couldn’t stomach doing them myself anymore. It wasn’t until I read an article that compared abortion to the Holocaust that I changed my opinion. I had always wondered how the German doctors could do what they did to people. I realized that I was no better than they were. I had dehumanized the fetus and therefore felt no moral responsibility towards it.”