Becoming a mother was a privilege that I fought hard for. I had multiple miscarriages before and after my daughter was born. She is the light of my life, and, like most of you, I take my role very seriously. Parenting is a hard, often thankless job during which you constantly toggle between joy, fear, guilt, amazement, frustration, and overwhelming love. My favorite quote about being a parent comes from Elizabeth Stone: “Making the decision to have a child—it is momentous. It is to decide forever to have your heart go walking around outside your body.” I believe it is a miracle that the body of the mother creates every cell, bone, hair, vein, and organ of each baby.
So my fury at watching politicians and religious zealots dismantle a woman’s right to have autonomy over her body comes from being a long-time supporter of access to abortions, yes, but it is also rooted in my personal experiences and utmost respect for the power of pregnancy and giving birth.
I’m not upset about abortion bans. I’m not disappointed. I don’t dismiss these actions as political strategy or race wars or unfortunate for women outside of progressive states—though they are all those things. What I am experiencing is absolute rage that women with uteruses are being forced to carry unwanted pregnancies by people who will take no financial or emotional responsibility for that child once it is born. People who do not care for the mother or baby—only for the “principle” of abortion.
I won’t waste time trying to explain how abortion is a safe procedure when done under the care of a medical professional. I’m not here to convince anyone to support abortion. I deeply respect every woman’s right to decide when and if she has a baby, and, if you’ve read this far, I bet you’ve already made up your mind on the subject. I will simply say this: a person who doesn’t have autonomy over what they do with their own body is a slave and slavery is evil. Not just bad, not just illegal: evil. And it always has been.
Every day the news is filled with unbelievable reports: almost total abortion bans in 14 states; legislators willing to undermine the authority of the Federal Drug Administration just to thwart the sale of mifepristone—a safe drug that has been prescribed for over 20 years across the world; Idaho Republicans passing a law that makes it criminal for people to help minor women from getting abortions. I wept when Roe vs. Wade was overturned last summer even though I knew it was coming. I still mourn for that protection which women were given for almost 50 years. I am ashamed that we as a nation are not sufficiently protecting our women and girls from this traumatic dystopian existence. It is time to treat this situation like the state of war it is.
Almost 20 years ago I worked for Planned Parenthood of Orange and San Bernardino Counties and saw firsthand the complicated reality of providing women’s healthcare and abortion services. The individuals who came to our clinics spanned every imaginable demographic: scores of people without insurance who had been denied healthcare elsewhere; under-represented communities who had grown up with poor health education; single mothers who worked three jobs to feed their kids; scared women who found a lump in their breast.
Each one of those patients had a complicated story not revealed by statistics and data. I vividly remember the day our clinic was locked down because a mother had brought her 12-year-old daughter in for an abortion and the father had shown up to vociferously object. Unfortunately, the father of the 12-year-old was also the father of the baby inside of her. He became violent, attacking his wife and the clinic staff. The police came and arrested him, but can you imagine what that preteen girl had to go through just to get to that clinic and how much worse it would have been if she had been denied access to an abortion? This story is extreme but it’s not unique. The reasons that women seek to terminate a pregnancy are endlessly diverse, and it is my fervent belief that the only person qualified to decide whether or not to do so is the one who is growing the baby.
Last month I had the opportunity to hear the former President of Planned Parenthood Cecile Richards speak about this harrowing time in our nation’s history. While I loved hearing this intelligent, capable, and insightful woman talk about her upbringing and life as an activist, it was somewhat disturbing to realize that she is as shaken as the rest of us with what is happening. This is someone who understands the intricate power dynamics of our government and she is more concerned about women and transgender rights than she has ever been before.
Ms. Richards ended her talk in a somewhat positive manner, noting that many supporters have protected reproductive freedom and abortion access in various state ballot initiatives. She was heartened by the swift mobilization of voters who—since the demise of Roe vs. Wade—have turned out in various ways to demand legal protection for the sanctity of a woman’s body. But, for me, the most interesting thing that Cecile said that day was this: we need to find new ways to fight these attacks. What has worked in the past is not working now. Our tactics must evolve, or we will fail.
I feel the truth of this in my soul. In my decades of fighting for women’s rights, I’ve participated in the cause in the usual ways: marching, voting, protesting, advocating with legislators, canvassing, stuffing mailers, donating, writing articles, volunteering with organizations and nonprofits. It is all necessary and important. We can’t stop doing any of it. But it is also not enough to win this war.
Here’s what I think can win: a coalition of mothers who are willing to become powerful. We, the mothers of the earth, must seek, claim, and retain power as we have never done before, with purpose, strategy, and unity. We must work together to have more power than our opponents. It’s that simple.
For too long we have only reacted to our enemies. They come up with new attacks and we spend an enormous amount of time, energy, and money putting out the fires they light. We are figuratively huddled in the castle, surrounded by adversaries, slowly starving to death. We are fighting the battles that they begin, by their rules, with inferior weapons. Those are not conditions under which any militia can succeed. We did not choose to go to war, but now that it has come, we must fight.
Diplomacy is not cutting it. Pleas for mercy and logical debate are not working. It’s time to go on the offensive.
So why do I think mothers are the answer? Because we care more than anyone else and we are forces of nature when provoked. Did you know that the vast majority of women who seek abortion are mothers? According to 2019 data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), six in 10 women who have abortions are already mothers, and half of them have two or more children. The right to choose what we do with our bodies needs to be the number one issue for mothers because it influences everything else: finances, quality of life, educational opportunities, mental and physical health, community welfare and progress, personal safety.
The freedom to control our bodies is fundamental to our existence and we should fight for it with everything we have. I happen to think that this battle is one that my people—Generation X—is uniquely equipped to engage in. We are fiercely independent and refuse to be told what to do. We have always been the underdog and had to be smarter than the multitudes around us. We grew up giving the middle finger to self-righteous hypocrites, and now we have wisdom, money, and influence. It’s time to use them.
In 1986, Ursula K. Le Guin gave a commencement address to the graduates of Bryn Mawr College, saying, “I know that many men and even women are afraid and angry when women do speak, because in this barbaric society, when women speak truly they speak subversively—they can’t help it: if you’re underneath, if you’re kept down, you break out, you subvert. We are volcanoes. When we women offer our experience as our truth, as human truth, all the maps change.”
If there is anything good about being a middle-aged woman, it is this: there is little motivation anymore to stay silent out of fear of being judged. Society has already determined that we are not wanted or useful, so what do we care if we are seen as crazy or outrageous? What difference will it make? As women, we have the power to create but also destroy. They built their cities on our backs not knowing that we are volcanoes. It’s time to wake, burn, and change the maps.
I am a mother and I am for abortion.
Main photo by Stewart Munro at Unsplash.com.
