I had an abortion and I don't regret it!

I always find great things on feministing.com. If you haven't made it your homepage I suggest you do! I found the following piece from the community section and it warmed my heart:

This is the story of my abortion. If you're against abortion or you are easily grossed out by talk of graphic surgical procedures, don't read. :)

I had an abortion last month. It was probably the hardest choice I've ever had to make. I love children and I want to be a mother SO badly. Call me unfeminist if you will, but my dream is to have that white picket fenced house in the suburbs with a pack of kids, a husband, and a bunch of pets. I'm 21 years old, I don't have a steady job or a car or my own house, my boyfriend and I have only been together for 6 months, my health is crap, I'm a borderline alcoholic, yada yada yada. So really, bad time to have a baby. I am not a fan of adoption - I've heard far too many horror stories, and I couldn't send my baby out in the world to be raised by someone else who might not be a good parent. If anyone's going to fuck up my kids, it's going to be me!, and given my health and drinking, it would have been likely that I and/or my child would have been seriously damaged by the pregnancy.

So the choice was clear: abortion was the way to go. Even though deep down I knew that I just couldn't have a child right now, it really hurt to admit it, and I was terrified (irrationally so) that maybe the pro-lifers were right - I WOULD regret it forever, I WOULD have "post-abortion syndrome", I WOULD be smote by God, I would become infertile and get breast cancer and DIE, or something. I was also scared that it would hurt too much, physically, and I would die from blood loss or something. Surgery scares me, and considering I found out I was pregnant quite late due to my irregular periods (14 weeks) and wasn't able to get an appointment until nearly 16 weeks, it was a more invasive and risky procedure than if I had found out at say, 6 weeks and had it terminated at 8 weeks.

So, I went in to the clinic with my boyfriend, filled out a few forms, and went in to the "counseling room" with a kind young woman who explained the procedure and asked if I had any questions. I had checked the boxes on the form for birth control prescription (obviously the pill wasn't doing it for me, so I wanted to try something new) and pap smear, so she also explained a few different types of birth control and we settled on the nuvaring, which she wrote me a prescription for on the spot. I was a little shaky, so she gave me a hug as well.

After that, I continued on to the exam room, where the tech did a quick ultrasound and gave me a muscle relaxant and some sort of white, sharp sided pill (cytotec?) to put up my vagina to soften the cervix. Ick! This was the worst part of the procedure by far. The feeling just grossed me out. But somehow I survived, and after an hour of listening to White Snake in the "comfort room", I was led to the OR and I cracked grammar jokes with the nurse while she hooked me up to an IV. I honestly don't remember much after that, but apparently the procedure took a mere 5 minutes, and it didn't hurt at all. The nurse led me out to another waiting room and fed me juice and cookies, and I was allowed to rest for as long as I needed.

And....that's it! I felt pretty crappy for about 2 weeks afterward - I bled like a stuck pig for almost a week, my breasts were swollen to painful proportions, and my emotions were a total rollercoaster, but...it got better. I'm sitting here now feeling 100% okay with my choice. My abortion went totally by the book, I haven't been smote by a vengeful god, I'm not wracked with guilt, and my boyfriend and I are still together and happier than ever.

That's my happy abortion story. Does anyone else have one to share?

Swallowing Ice at The Harbourfront Center

There are two really great exhibits going on at The Harbourfront Center right now, Close Distance and Swallowing Ice, both part of the Contact Photography Festival going all this month. Swallowing Ice is the MFA thesis work of Artist and Curator Jennifer Long. It is an elegant and beautifully put together work that brings to light the decision making processes and inner dialogue that women experience when deciding whether or not to have children. The images are on her website but if you're going to be near The Harbourfront Center anytime this month i highly encourage you to go check it out.


"My artwork parallels my life experiences, and as a woman in my mid-thirties, I currently find myself surrounded by discussions of parenthood. Conversations with friends rarely get ten minutes in before the topic is raised. Originally the dialogues focused on fear and debate, but quickly turned to expectations, techniques, and experiences. Between 2007 and 2008, I had seven close friends give birth, two desperately “trying” to conceive, and a remaining group feeling overwhelmed and confused by this incredible shift. This experience inspired the creation of Swallowing Ice, an exploration of the decision-making process involved in a woman’s choice to have or not have children."

Look Great While You Give Birth with Pretty Pushers

Pretty Pushers is a company based in the US that is selling a birthing kit that includes lip gloss, a mirror, a dress, a lemon-water towelette, and heated massage oil. Can we find anymore ways to place even more pressure on women to "look their best" in every aspect of their lives? I mean, socially it's expected that women hide their bodily "troubles" like menstruation, passing gas, pooping, sexuality and now during childbirth (when it's arguably one of the most painful moments of one's life) one must repress any expression of discomfort in an effort to be presentable. As if child birth wasn't hard enough!

- Alice

Rape/Abortion Case in Brazil

Click here to read "Nine-Year-Old's Abortion Outrages Brazil's Catholic Church".

"Archibishop Jose Cardoso Sobrinho of the coastal city of Recife announced that the Vatican was excommunicating the family of a local girl who had been raped and impregnated with twins by her stepfather, because they had chosen to have the girl undergo an abortion. The Church excommunicated the doctors who performed the procedure as well."

- Alice

Herbal abortions

I'm not sure how effective these methods may be but anyone who's interested can check out this website which contains suggestions for herbal abortion methods. The site can be kind of confusing to navigate through but there is some interesting information in there if you're willing to search for it.

Warning: use herbal abortion methods at your own risk.

- Alice

Forced sterilzation & HIV in Chile

Here's an article from feministing.com where a woman in Chile was sterilized without her knowledge because she was HIV positive. We've posted information about issues of confidentiality and HIV testing recently (I think it's in January's batch of posts), and how the disclosure of this information has been and continues to be used to discriminate individuals from jobs, immigration and more. In this instance, this woman was robbed of her choice in reproduction.

- Alice

Confidential Abortion Clinics in Toronto

Here is some general information about abortion procedures and abortion clinics in the city of Toronto from the hassle free clinic's website. Please feel free to contact us if you live outside of Toronto and we will help you find a clinic near you. The clinics listed on this page are confidential and do not require parental consent. They are covered by OHIP but will take women without health cards for a fee (depending on the procedure).

- Alice

Yoga for Women

Yoga for Menopause

Yoga for PMS

Prenatal Yoga

- Vivian