Welcome to Litsy!

This book is filled with tragedy. Every page will bring you to tears, make you scream: “Never again!” It is vital that womxn everywhere have access. We will not go back. We decide. Our bodies are our own. Abortion always has been and always will be part of reproductive and sexual health care. Highly recommend this book.

When abortion is illegal, a woman who suffers complications faces the impossible choice of risking serious legal consequences if she tells the truth or serious medical consequences if she doesn‘t. If she is lucky, the wrong choice is not fatal. If we are determined and organized, no woman in America will ever have to face that choice again.

WE WILL NOT GO BACK. #abortionishealthcare #wedecide

It may comfort voters and policymakers to pretend that if we simply outlaw abortion, it will stop happening. That is not so. It will only become invisible again, and infinitely more dangerous. Women will continue to have abortions, legally or otherwise.

#voteprochoice #voteforthedaughtersofthefuture #nogilead

Even if contraception is readily available, we still need abortion because no contraception is foolproof. Until you have actually walked in the shoes of an unwillingly pregnant woman, you can‘t understand how desperate she is.

#abortionishealthcare #keepabortionfundedsafeandlegal

I had another abortion—a legal abortion—in 1976, and I feel absolutely no guilt over that. I was very sure in my decision and very comfortable with it.

#shoutyourabortion! #abortionishealthcare

I remember that my father sat me down and told me my unmarried sister was pregnant. There were tears in his eyes. He told me that if I got pregnant like that, he ~never~ wanted to know about it. I should just get married—no matter how old or young I was or what the man was like.

That is not how you love your children, ever.

I remember the priest telling us over and over, “You can‘t use birth control. It is a mortal sin. If you do, you will go to hell and you will burn in hell.”

FUCK YOU.

Back then I thought that no one else in my family or among my friends had ever had an unwanted pregnancy. I probably thought that no one but me ~ever~ had this problem.

You are never alone!

I was raised Catholic and conditioned from childhood on—at home, at school, everywhere—to believe that abortion is wrong, birth control is wrong, sex without marriage is wrong.

Basically, the body is wrong. Especially if it‘s female. 🙄🖕🏻

Half the population is female, and to make abortion illegal again would have a very adverse medical impact on women generally.

#abortionishealthcare #keepabortionfundedsafeandlegal

It is always the poor that suffer the most from laws like the anti-abortion laws.

All peoplx need access! Access everywhere!

What this case illustrates is that desperate people do desperate things, sometimes with tragic results. It all fits. When they couldn‘t get medical help, they just did what they desperately thought was the next-best thing.

#abortionishealthcare #keepabortionfundedsafeandlegal

What causes crime to go up and down is not a function of any law enforcement agency. It‘s a function of society and the resources that are out there for people—schools, health care, things Ike that.

YES! Healthy, happy peoplx with resources = healthy, happy community

Even if I had been in terrible pain, I would have felt terrific. It was over. Finally! I didn‘t have to find three psychiatrists or say I was going to kill myself or any of that business, but I would have if necessary. I‘d have done whatever it took. I did before and I would have again.

#abortionondemandwithoutapology

I would have paid anything and done anything. There was no conflict in my mind about the abortion decision. The decision was immediate as soon as I realized I was pregnant. They couldn‘t have stopped me. I would have done a lot—anything, in fact—to terminate this pregnancy. I knew what I had to do and I did it. It could have been pretty gruesome and I still would have done it.

I don‘t know where we went, but I kind of think it might have been his home. The room where the abortion was done was very clean. It was all white tile and looked like a clinic or a hospital, but I remember that as I lay there, children peeked around the corner at me.

This description made me laugh a little, because abortion is normal and extremely common.

“Nice girls don‘t do it.” Nice girls simply didn‘t have sex, and I listened to that message until I was eighteen or nineteen.

Sex is not a ‘sin‘. We all have sex.

I was born in 1958. In 1962, when I was four, my mother died from an illegal abortion. She was only twenty-four.

#keepabortionfundedsafeandlegal

But you know what I noticed that I hadn‘t noticed earlier? Her house was actually within sight and of no more than ten blocks from not one but two hospitals. Isn‘t that crazy? Those hospitals weren‘t available to me. Just the little old lady in the apron.

Access to compassionate and safe care is without question.

Although it was horrible in many ways, I would have willingly done things much worse if I thought they would work. I would have done anything.

I had an illegal abortion in 1966. I was twenty-one years old, married, with a year-old daughter. My husband was an extremely abusive man. I knew immediately that I wanted an abortion. With an abusive husband, an infant daughter, and an unwanted pregnancy, my choice was easy.

Abortion—even illegal abortion—saves lives. It saved mine, and Jeff‘s, and, now, Maggie‘s. Thank you, clinic, for making it easier and safer twenty-eight years later for my Maggie.

Thank you to all providers! We love you!

I knew in that first hour of that first day, as I laid in bed fighting the nausea and wondering how I would find the courage to go on, that I would have an abortion. There was not a doubt in my mind. I was absolutely certain.

Don‘t believe the lie that many womxn regret their abortion(s). Many do not.

Why would any woman take such a chance? I don‘t know why, but I know a lot of them did.

Why? Because nothing will stop a desperate womxn. Nothing. #abortionishealthcare

The attitude was “How could these women do anything so stupid as to get such a dangerous abortion?” Or “Why would any smart person take such a stupid chance?” I don‘t recall any discussion about the need to provide women with safer options.

#keepabortionfundedsafeandlegal

I shudder to think what would have happened to me and my boys if I hadn‘t gotten that abortion.

Abortion saves lives. #abortionishealthcare

It was absolutely unthinkable for a young unmarried female to be sexually active. Abortion was never discussed and birth control was never discussed because a chaste female had absolutely no need to know anything about either of those things, right?

All peoplx need sex ed, contraception and abortion!

The same group of women remained friends for years, and only later, when we were all safely in our fifties, did I learn that almost all of us had actually had illegal abortions.

1 in 4 womxn will have an abortion. There is no shame. #abortionishealthcare

I could not possibly have continued the pregnancy. I was barely surviving with two little kids, no job, and an abusive husband. With a third child I would never have gotten away or survived.

There were very strict teachings that sex was wrong if you weren‘t married.

🙄

In 1950 my mother died from an illegal abortion. She was twenty-seven years old. I was almost six, and my brother, Eddie, was four. Her name was Vivian.

The system, and especially the lawmakers who left her with no choice, killed her just as surely as if they had held the catheter or coat hanger or whatever. I‘m still angry. It was all do unnecessary.

Then why didn‘t you do something about it?! As a doctor, you have a voice with power—why didn‘t you use it?!
#abortionishealthcare #keepabortionfundedsafeandlegal

I‘m sure that some of them did something else, because pregnant women don‘t like to wait. Once they know they‘re pregnant, they want to get that abortion as fast as they can. I know I always did.

My doctor would always tell me, “You‘ve got too many kids, too many kids. You have to stop having babies. It isn‘t good for you.” But he was very clear that he wouldn‘t do an abortion.

So help her!!! #womxnarenotincubators
#abortionishealthcare #womxndontneedpermission

Again I got involved with a woman and she got pregnant. That just kept happening to me, it seems.

Well...how about getting a vasectomy???

My mother also had an abortion, in 1952. Her doctor said, “You know, Lucille, you‘re going to die if you don‘t stop having babies.” She had six at that point. He said, “I can‘t do anything if you get pregnant again, so don‘t let that happen.” He was Catholic, and there is no way he could or would have helped her end her pregnancy.

#keepyourrosariesoffmyovaries

Reluctantly, I told my mother I was pregnant. Her response was to call Bill‘s mother. Then they got together and essentially planned my abortion. Isn‘t that something? My Catholic mother planned my abortion. In 1936 my mother got pregnant when she wasn‘t married. She was completely ostracized for being pregnant and unmarried.

Religious folx need abortion and contraception too. If that religion says no, let it go.

Afterward there were spirited discussions among the doctors about whether we might have able to save her if we had done something differently—maybe different antibiotics, things like that. But no one talked about or even seemed to notice the really obvious solution: making legal abortion available.

YES! Preach! #abortionishealthcare #keepabortionfundedsafeandlegal

With illegal abortion, there were lots of ways to die. The lucky ones made it through. The not-so-lucky ones died fairly horrible deaths.

#abortionishealthcare #keepabortionfundedsafeandlegal

When I was a child, my father adored me and I him. But when I became an adolescent—when I began to look like a woman—then everything was different, and I too was the recipient of the same hostility. To him, all women were either the Virgin Mary or sluts. He didn‘t categorize them any other way.

#fuckmisogyny

I had no doubt and no mixed feelings about having an abortion. I desperately wanted that abortion. I felt that although what I had done was illegal then, it shouldn‘t have been.

Abortion is NOT a crime. #abortionishealthcare

In those early days I was young and really didn‘t know anything about abortion, but I had been raised to believe that it was a terrible thing. Then, when I got to know Douglas and to know ~why~ he did abortions, my attitude began to change.

All reasons are valid, womxn owe no explanation to anyone. Ever. #abortionishealthcare

I was aware of one highly respected physician who was rumored to do abortions. He was nothing like my stereotype of the incompetent marginal physician. He was well respected, and he certainly didn‘t need the money. I have no idea what motivated him.

Gee I don‘t know, something called empathy and compassion?! A general desire and need to help others?

#abortionishealthcare

In my medical school days the wards always had women with post-abortion complications. There were always women being brought in who were acutely ill following criminal abortions.

There is no such thing as a criminal abortion because abortion is NOT A CRIME. #abortionishealthcare #keepabortionfundedsafeandlegal

It‘s easy to say abortion is wrong if you‘ve never been face to face with a desperate woman threatening to commit suicide and you have the ability to help her.

#abortionishealthcare

The climate was so hostile to abortion and so dangerous but the need for the service was so great that we just continued on in spite of the dangers.

I always used a catheter, but sometimes I took it out and other times I left it in. Mostly I left it in because you get better results that way. It was about a size 14 regular catheter. They were made of red rubber and were about 12” long. When they didn‘t come in the sterile packets, I sterilized them myself by boiling them in water with Clorox.

#keepabortionfundedsafeandlegal

This isn‘t a black thing, this is a woman thing.

⬆️For those who say abortion is racist—news flash. ALL womxn, in every part of the world need and have abortion(s). Transwomxn need them too!

In spite of what my doctor had told me, the hospital sent me home with no birth control. 🙄🖕🏻

#womxnneedbirthcontrol

My husband was physically abusive, and he would throw my birth control if he ever found it.

Fuck that, and fuck him!