Hello dear readers, this weekend I wanted to draw your attention to a post made by fellow WordPress blogger, Sarah Thomas. I find her post very enlightening– when talking about Roe v. Wade, she brings up current abortion bills and contemporary pro-choice movements. As you guys might have guessed, I had to catch myself up to date with the aforementioned trial. Roe v. Wade occurred in the 70’s, and for those of you who are new to my blog, I was warped in time during that decade. And for those of you who are unfamiliar with Roe v. Wade, it was a lawsuit in which the Supreme Court declared that a pregnant woman has the right to attain access to an abortion without the scrutiny of the Government. Obviously I’m over simplifying it. Since this case was brought to trial, there was much controversy, with people filing into “pro-life” or “pro-choice” debates. I’ve majoritively abstained from the realm of politics, yet the right to attain safe abortions is very important to me. I lived through an era in which women were denied access to safe terminations. When I was a very small child– about 5 or 6– I lost my mother to an attempt to perform a termination herself. It was around the mid 30’s, and the United States’s citizens were still burdened by the Great Depression. My family had a lot of trouble making ends meet, I more often than not went to bed hungry. The only thing that could keep my mind occupied in such a devastating time was my mother and father. My father fueled my curiosity of the solar system, while my mother showed me the beauty in numbers. Losing her was one of the most heartbreaking moments of my life, yet I only understood the circumstances of her death much later.
I remember the day before I left my home to attend college, my father sat me down. He told me that in my childhood, our family’s financial situation felt hopeless for him and my mother. He had been searching for work tirelessly to no avail. My mother was lucky enough to find a job as a maid in an affluent Lawyer’s home. However, her salary was far from enough to provide for my father and I. When she found out she was pregnant, she was ravaged. She told my father in tears, and at first he was overjoyed at the idea of having another kid. It was only seconds later that he realized that my mother’s weeping was from the thought of having another hungry child. My father told me that he calmed her down and got her to bed that night, but the morning after, he found her in the bathtub not breathing. He spared me the details, but be told me that she had died trying to terminate the pregnancy. He apologized for not telling me sooner, and we embraced.
I was lucky enough to have such a progressive father, given the time. He didn’t blame my mother for her actions. He understood that she simply didn’t want to bring a child into being when she didn’t have the resources to provide for it. Since, I’ve advocated for access to safe abortions, yet I saw little change throughout my lifetime. It provides me with such a feeling of happiness to see how this issue has changed over the years. My intuition tells me that there have been thousands of lives saved due to being able to access to safe abortion procedures. No one should undergo the same loss as I over something so preventable. Although I can’t see the people of our planet from orbit, I’m glad I can listen to the voices of others through the internet.
Thank you Sarah, for sharing such a historic event and celebrating its anniversary.
-B. Swain
Betty Swain's Life up Above 