Knowing What It’s Like
Remarks Delivered at Midpoint Rally for 40 Days for Life,
Fall 2012
Saturday 10/13/12 at 3100 Professional Dr, Ann Arbor Planned
Parenthood (slightly edited for place references, including resources and
language not used at the time because children were present)I’m here to tell you about three lives, my children’s lives, and their deaths. Why should you care? Well, if there’s anything that I hear most often as a pro-life woman, it’s this: you don’t know what it’s like, walk a mile in their shoes, you don’t know what it’s like to be a pregnant teenager, to be pregnant and poor and have no help, or to be pregnant by rape. I’m here to tell you yes I do know what it’s like. Many people who come here to Planned Parenthood or go to other clinics to pray and offer help know what it’s like. Let me tell you what it was like for me.
Outside my immediate family, the
pressure mounted quickly. My boyfriend offered to help me “take care of it.” I
was so naïve, I thought he meant he would help me raise the baby! I said, “No,
I’m giving him or her up for adoption.” He was shocked. I decided to go to IL,
where the adoption laws used to be the best in the country for open adoptions. This
meant leaving school, where I was dual enrolled in high school and nursing
school; the guidance counselor, after my Dad and I met with her together,
privately asked me why I didn’t just “take care of it” and continue my nursing
school career, since I was on the fast track. Before going to IL, on a family
vacation up North, I was resting on the couch in our cottage to stop a possible
miscarriage. A relative came in to tell me to stay away from her children, one
of whom had introduced me to my boyfriend, since I would be a bad influence on
them. She told me that since it would be best for everybody if I did have a
miscarriage, I should just go for a walk, take a swim, ride a bike, because
miscarriage is the body’s way of getting rid of something bad, and encouraging
it to happen would “take care of it.” In IL, I was in classes at Bradley
University and got comments from classmates: “what the fuck was I thinking?”
and, “didn’t I know where the clinic was?” The most hurtful remark came from a
total stranger. I was in a supermarket and the cashier looked at me with
disgust and said, “Don’t you have any shame? You should have had it taken care
of before you started showing, you
little whore.” I was in shock. Her solution to my being a “little whore” was to
have an abortion, to hide my shame. To “take care” of my baby—by killing him or
her.
So with all this pressure to
abort, what happened? I went to Peoria IL, lived with former students of my
grandma’s, and went through a very difficult pregnancy. The initial threatened
miscarriage didn’t happen, but I had to have frequent ultrasounds because I was
high-risk: I was young and had a short cervix. At 22 weeks, just before
Halloween, I went into preterm labor. My doctor put me in the hospital, on
complete bed-rest, on some really nasty medications to stop the labor. I was
there for six weeks, so my doctor got me a private room which became almost
like a dorm room. I had weekly ultrasounds and was on the fetal monitor almost
daily. I got to watch my daughter grow from a little blip-blip-blip on the
screen to a healthy little girl, who had so much hair it was visible on the
ultrasound as a halo around her head. She sucked her thumb, played with her
toes, and kicked the ultrasound probe and the fetal monitor when it pushed on
her. I loved her so much it hurt like death to think of the time I would give
her up. The doctor, nurses, and counselors tried to prepare me to deliver a
very pre-term baby who would have to go to the NICU and might not make it.
Nothing could have prepared me for what did happen.
My doctor came to me in mid
December and told me there had been a genuine miracle, something she could not
explain and had never seen or heard of: everything had reversed itself, closed
back up, tightened back up…I was back to normal. She said that pre-term labor
could be arrested, but that “things just don’t go back to completely normal;
there must be a lot of people praying for you.” I was able to have Christmas
with my family. I continued to go in weekly for checkups, but my doctor, who
told me she hadn’t expected me to make it to 28 weeks, now expected me to
deliver my healthy baby girl on March 8, 2001. On Feb 13th, I went
out to lunch with my Catholic Social Services worker, Tony, who had become a
very close friend during my whole difficult pregnancy, and another girl who was
pregnant, scared, and didn’t know what to do. Tony wanted me to encourage her.
My girl was very, very active during lunch, and that evening, finally turning
one last huge somersault.
That night, I had a terrible
nightmare: my baby had died, and my mom had taken her body and buried it and
wouldn’t tell me where she was. I woke up on Valentine’s Day and knew something
was horribly wrong; I didn’t feel any movement. I had an appointment that
afternoon, but when I called the office in the morning in a panic and told them
that I didn’t feel her moving, they said that I should just wait, since I was
already going to be coming in. I went to the appointment, and I begged Andrea,
the lady I was living with, to come in the room with me. The doctor put the
Doppler on my stomach: she couldn’t find a heartbeat. I knew then. My daughter was dead. But my doctor had
to be sure. She took me next door to the ultrasound room. I was there with
Andrea for a little while, waiting, and began praying desperately, though I had
left the Church, asking Mary to pray for me since she, too, had lost her Son.
The doctor came in and immediately focused on my daughter’s heart: it was
still. We all started crying. I still had to have it confirmed officially by
the hospital high-risk clinic. My doctor met me there, and another doctor, this
one cold, impersonal and uncaring, with residents watching interestedly,
performed another ultrasound, carefully examining every inch of my daughter’s
body, measuring bloodflow to the placenta and umbilical cord and the lack of
bloodflow in her heart. “Yep,” he said, “Got us an IUFD here.” Then he left. Intrauterine
Fetal Demise. My daughter was dead, and no one knew why. Andrea and my doctor
had to call my Dad and tell him, I couldn’t speak for the tears.
My parents came immediately, driving
from MI, to be with me while was in labor and delivery. My boyfriend and his
Mom eventually showed up, though not until just before I delivered; he had been
out with his other girlfriend and didn’t get the message I left on his answering
machine until the 15th. Mom and Dad got to Peoria at 9 pm on
February 15th 2001, and we went to the hospital immediately to begin
the induction of labor. My Dad stayed with me all night, and my Mom and Dad
were both with me all the next day. At 11:02 pm on 2/16/01 I delivered Lillian
Mary. My doctor cried as she put Lillian on the bed to examine her. Her
umbilical cord had twisted itself, probably during her final big somersault,
and cut off blood supply. In every other way, Lillian was a perfect little girl.
Her hair lay in little S’s on her head, her mouth was a rosebud, her ears and
nose were just like mine, her long fingers and toes were like her dad’s. She
was beautiful. I got to hold her, and so did my Mom, Dad, grandma, friends, and
even my boyfriend and his Mom. A priest was there to bless her body.
“Enormously worse” is the phrase
that represents my second pregnancy from beginning to end. I had descended from
worse to worse, through grief over the loss of my daughter, and my cousin Joe (who
died accidentally on my 21st birthday), and I’d gotten involved in
more and more abusive relationships. I was raped, tortured, and abused. In a
death spiral, I finally met Gaven, and he moved in with me. I found out in
stages that he abused alcohol, heroin, other drugs…and me. He was also a
literal Satan worshiper. A scary dude, all around. When I got pregnant, it was
a surprise, because I had been on birth control pills for years to control my
cycle. I had to stop taking the pill for medical reasons, and the doctor told
me I would be infertile for at least a month after stopping. Well, I got
pregnant immediately, without a period
between the last pill I took and the estimated date of conception.
I went to the high-risk clinic in
Pittsburgh, PA, because of my first pregnancy’s tragic ending. From the
beginning the doctors and the staff there took every opportunity to encourage
me to “terminate the pregnancy.” One day it was because the medications I was
taking could produce birth defects, the next it was because my mental health
was too fragile to deal with a risky pregnancy; naturally, when they found out
that my boyfriend was an alcoholic heroin addict who abused me, the pressure to
abort stepped up to a new level. I told them over and over that I would not,
under any circumstances, kill my child, but the pressure didn’t let up. “Did I
think it was right to bring a child into the abusive relationship?” No; I had a
plan with my social worker to get away from my boyfriend with the baby to a
shelter, if he didn’t keep his word about getting help. “Did I really want to
put myself through this, after what happened the first time?” Yes; I was
afraid, but my baby was healthy so far and I would not cause his death. The
pressure never stopped! I went through a number of difficulties with the
pregnancy; then I had other health problems like kidney infections, bronchitis,
and eventually pneumonia. It was the pneumonia which put me in the hospital
around Thanksgiving.
I was 22 weeks pregnant again
when I was hospitalized with pneumonia and severe asthma complications. I wound
up in the ICU, my oxygen levels dropped to 75%, I was almost intubated, on IV
antibiotics and other medications. My parents came down from MI because my Dad
had a feeling that they needed to be there. I was able to go back to a
step-down unit, and spent some time there, but in the very early morning of
12/4/05, I woke up in pain with some bleeding. In a panic, I screamed for the
nurses. They came and did an ultrasound: my son was still alive, but there was
a small tear of the placenta away from the uterus. The staff on the unit
assured me of what I already knew, through my nursing school studies, that the
tear was small, there was a lot that could be done to keep me pregnant as long
as possible, my son was not doomed to die. The bare minimum of viability at
that hospital was 23 weeks, but it would be best by far to keep my son in my
womb as long as possible. They were very reassuring. “Wait until the OB doctors
get here, they’ll help you, you’ll see. It’ll be okay,” the nurse said.
The doctor told my parents I was
dying, that to save my life they had to perform a D&E, dilation and
evacuation or extraction, immediately, and that I had to sign the papers to
consent. I refused, because the last ultrasound showed my son was still alive.
A D&E, I knew, would rip his arms and legs off, tear his guts out, and rip
his head off his spine, causing him grievous pain. They perform that same
procedure here, at this clinic, and at abortion clinics around the country, on
babies who can also feel the pain. My parents told me that I could not save my
son’s life by dying for him, that dying with him was not morally permissible,
and that I was not consenting to direct abortion but to a procedure to save my
life with the effect that my son would die. I signed the papers. I felt like I
signed my son’s death warrant. I told the nurse that I wanted him baptized, I
wanted the general anesthesia I received to be one that would cross the
placenta, and that they had better take him out in one piece if they could. Then
I was beyond the point of speech; blood loss had sent me into deep shock. I couldn’t
even ask for a priest, though I realized that I was on the point of death and
needed to be right with God.
As they ran with me down the
hallway to the OR, I had a near death experience: floating above the stretcher,
I saw my body. Then I was in a tunnel, rushing toward light: I came to a stop
and I saw my daughter, my cousin Joe, and my son in Joe’s arms. I pleaded with
my cousin to take me with him, but he told me it wasn’t my time and that I had
to turn around. He showed me that my children were with him, in heaven, and
that I would see them again…if I turned my life around.
It was the hardest thing I’ve
ever had to do, to come back to my body, in so much pain and grief. I was
hurting so much I had a “morphine pump;” I could push the button every three
minutes, and every tick of the clock seemed like eternity. I heard from a doctor
later that the kind of procedure I had at the gestational age my son was
produces pain the equivalent of a traumatic amputation: like getting your arm
taken off by a chainsaw. The emotional pain was worse. I felt like a murderer.
I felt like I had killed my son so that I could live, when I would have given
my life for him. Then the high-risk doctors added insult to injury and fudged
the chart, saying I was only 19 weeks, 6 days along so that they didn’t have to
give me a fetal death certificate or any documentation of what had happened, or
why they took no action to save my son. They had pushed for the death of my son
from the beginning, and in the end they won.
The only way I won was in getting
his body: I refused to let them dispose of his body as medical waste, the way
they do with babies here at Planned Parenthood or other clinics around the
country. I had my son cremated, since he was not able to be buried right away
because I was in the hospital so long. The finale of the story is that when I
went back to the apartment I shared with my boyfriend, he didn’t listen to the
restrictions the doctors had put on me as far as certain activities, and his
abuse of me tore some things and jarred some clots loose, sending the clots to
my lungs and putting me right back in the hospital. The nurses and doctors told
me that they would release me to my grandparents, to a shelter, or to my
parents but if I went back to my boyfriend I would die.
So my parents rescued me. I came
back here, to MI, where I buried my son across from my daughter. I tried, after
a little while, to go back to church…all on my own steam, without the grace to
do it. No wonder I ended up falling flat on my face. Because that’s where the
third little life begins and ends. I met a guy through a young adults group,
and we became friends. He had a girlfriend at the time, and I wasn’t looking
for a boyfriend. I trusted his good reputation and I told him everything about
myself and my history. On the anniversary of my daughter’s death and funeral, I
was house-sitting for a friend, and asked this guy to meet me at Aubrey’s in
Depot Town to talk me through the pain. Neither of us drank anything but Coke,
but we sat there for hours talking. He offered to drive me back, though the
place I was house-sitting was just around the corner. Instead of leaving once
he dropped me off at the foot of the stairs, he followed me up and didn’t
leave. I won’t get into details, but he raped me brutally. On the advice of a
very close family friend, I went to the hospital, filed a police report and
pressed charges. One thing I did not expect, since it is so rare, was to be
pregnant. But a few weeks later, as I was getting counseling from Safe House, a
local rape crisis center and shelter, I told them I was “late.” They told me
they could refer me to Planned Parenthood and “take care of it.” I said, “no
way.” Besides, I wasn’t sure yet.
I went home and took a home
pregnancy test and it was positive. I had had a blood test done a few days
earlier, and I got the results that very day: my hCG was high but not
definitive, I might be pregnant but about to miscarry. I couldn’t face it then;
the next day I had to go testify in the preliminary exam. What they say about
rape victims testifying in court is true: it is like being raped all over again. I was on the stand for 8 hours.
My close friend who had advised me to go to the police, who was like another
father to me, was there to support me. He said it was the hardest thing he had
ever had to do in all his life, just sitting and listening. I went home with
bad cramps, the next day I started bleeding. I bled and bled: then I saw the
little body—just a glimpse, but I saw his hand clearly. Perfectly formed, even
at only 7 weeks. My baby, and I couldn’t catch him, couldn’t save him, couldn’t
get his body to bury it…my baby, and he was flushed down the toilet. Like so
many others, killed by medication abortions. I had to go to the University of Michigan
ER because I was bleeding so heavily, and the doctor there congratulated me that my body had cleaned itself out so well that I
didn’t need a D&C. He said that it was better this way, because I was
spared the trouble and expense of getting it “taken care of later,” which would
also be more painful. He knew that the pregnancy had been caused by rape. I
told him to get the fuck out.
In every circumstance, I was
under so much pressure to have an abortion: I was a teenager; I was high-risk,
had an abusive boyfriend, and was on Medicaid; and last but not least I was
pregnant by rape. Everyone was shocked when I made a different decision, like I
had no right to make the choice for LIFE. My babies all died anyway, and I
don’t know why, but I know I did not choose death for them. I grieve so much
for the women who come to Planned Parenthood or go to other clinics, under so
much pressure, who choose death for their children. I’ve seen their faces as
they leave after making their choice; I’ve met their eyes, and seen their
tears, and they’ve seen mine.
I want to share one final story
about another death, which I witnessed in a way while praying here. I was
meditating on the 4th and 5th Mysteries of the Rosary,
the Carrying of the Cross and the Crucifixion. As I saw a woman being dropped
off for an abortion by her partner, I saw that this road right here, the driveway to Planned Parenthood, is the Via Dolorosa, the Way of the Cross. The women
who come here, who are pregnant and seeking an abortion, are carrying crosses
in their burdens and pain, and the babies inside their wombs are carrying the Cross, on the way to torture and
death. This, Planned Parenthood,
is Calvary, the Place of Skulls, where Christ is being crucified in the bodies
of the babies who are being torn apart, ripped out of their mothers’ wombs. I
realized that we here, though restricted in what we can do to save lives and
save mothers from a lifetime of pain and regret, we here can do one thing: we
can be John, the Beloved Disciple, Mary Magdalene, Mary Mother of God, at the
foot of the Cross, bearing witness and loving Jesus to the end. I love my children, regardless of the
circumstances of their conception. I loved them to the end and gave each of
them a name: Lillian Mary, Gaven Joseph, and Aaron Michael.
My sisters, if you are pregnant
and don’t know what to do, know that I have
been where you are. If you have had an abortion, I have too, though in
different circumstances. I know the pressure and the difficulties and the panic
that you felt when faced with an unexpected pregnancy. I, too, was burdened,
and I needed help and hope and healing. I still need it! Whatever burdens you’re
carrying, there is healing and hope for you in Jesus and in the people who want
so much to help you. Jesus did carry
his cross and die for you, so you can lay your burdens on him. We in the
pro-life community will help, too, so that you know the Father’s love for you
through our hands. I hope you understand this is a message of love, not
condemnation, from someone who has been on the road you’re on. May God bless
you with peace.
There are local resources to help
you all through your pregnancy and afterward. Two examples are the Family Life
Services Center at 2950 Packard Rd, Ann Arbor, phone (734) 434-3088 and ArborVitae
Women’s Center at 625 E. Liberty, Ann Arbor, phone (734) 994-8863. There are also
national hotlines that can connect you with help; for example (800) 712-HELP.
If you have had an abortion and are experiencing pain and grief, anger, regret,
depression, or other emotional distress: you are not alone. There is help and
hope for you, and many people who want to help you heal. Rachel’s Vineyard and
Silent No More are two examples of national post-abortion healing groups. These
groups also offer help to men who are suffering after their wife or girlfriend
chose to abort their child; men regret their lost fatherhood, too. There are
local retreats offered frequently, and private options with counselors at the
Family Life Services Center and ArborVitae. There are many groups and people
who can help. Go to the website http://silentnomoreawareness.org/
and look around; or check out http://rachelsvineyard.org/.
If you need to talk to someone right away, call the Rachel’s Vineyard hotline
(877) HOPE-4-ME. 
