The Elliot Insitute News shares this real story in a recent newsletter:
My sister and I were both victims of incest. My sister was being sexually assaulted by my brothers for a number of years when she got her first abortion at the age of sixteen. Had she been questioned by anyone as to how a minor like herself had come to be pregnant in the first place, perhaps she could have been saved from any further abuse within the family.
This is indeed what should have happened in any agency that claims to be concerned about preventing child abuse. As it turned out, she was given the abortion without my parents’ consent or knowledge and then returned to the same environment.
Years later, after having given birth to three children, and having had many years of psychotherapy and antidepressant drugs, she became pregnant in a crisis situation. She was advised by friends and self-appointed do-gooders to abort the baby to take care of herself. This caused her a great deal of distress and anxiety. The decision was very difficult for her and in her weakened state she succumbed to the “sensibility” of their arguments and scheduled the abortion.
She was crying when she entered the clinic, she cried throughout the procedure, and was sobbing as she left. No one at the clinic asked her any questions that might upset her any more. But of course, had anyone asked her, they might have recognized that she was not emotionally strong enough to stand the abortion. Had they inquired about her health history they may have seen her as the high risk patient she was.
None of this took place. One week after the abortion she took her life with a gunshot to the chest, striking her heart. Her three children are growing up without their mom because no one wanted to ask questions. … [A]bortion without regulation doesn’t give women a chance to make all the decisions based on the true facts and the security of knowing that as much as possible has been done to protect her against criminal-minded persons and inferior medical practices.
