Welcome back to Connect! Unite! Act! This week will seem a bit direr than most, because to pretend otherwise denies the reality everyone currently faces. There are a huge number of Americans who do not remember life before Roe. I don’t, and I’m fast closing in on 50. I was still only an infant in 1973 when the ruling occurred. So I never lived in a world where it was not an option.
I grew up in a very religious household, and my parents were of course strongly opposed to abortion, as was our family priest. As a kid, I accepted my parents’ views. My mother, who had six children, did so at great risk to herself. She battled cervical cancer and had challenges during every pregnancy. With the birth of my baby sister, on Christmas day in 1980, she would have her fourth C-section. We gathered around to share gifts Christmas morning before she went in, and even as a young child, it was made clear that the expectations were that mom may not come home, but we would have a new sister. I’ve got to tell you, as a child, I wanted my mom and a new sister, not one or the other. As an adult, I realize the choices my mother made for our family and for her beliefs. What made all of it so special was that she had a choice. Every child born after Roe was a child she chose to have, even at personal risk to herself.
I drive by signs in Kansas that read “choose life” and I always think, the only way you can “choose life” is if you are provided options as well as respect for your own beliefs. When you take those away, no one is “choosing” anything. They simply have no options. I knew I was a wanted child. So did my family members. I’m not so sure about those born after the current ruling—and how would you feel? My mother had no choice, so here I am?
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