Abortion, Adoption, and the Pregnancy in the Middle That No One's Talking About

Last night I attended the forum on Initiative 26 at the Ole Miss Law School. The panelists and many commenters brought up countless problems with the initiative: with the language, with the intent vs. the potential interpretation, and with the unintended consequences. And of course, there were many commenters from the Yes side who voiced their opinions. I didn't speak up at the forum because most of the time I was so flushed, angry and appalled that I couldn't have strung together a coherent sentence. I also didn't respond because most of the commenters from the No side who did respond voiced my opinions along with their own. But there's one response I wish I had made, and so even though the man I'm responding to will most likely never read this, I'm going to post my response here.

The issue of forcing rape victims to continue a pregnancy to term when they have been impregnated by their rapist came up, as it often does in these debates. More than one women spoke about how demeaning rape is, and how mentally, physically, and emotionally terrible it would be to carry a conceived-in-rape pregnancy. Then a local pastor spoke up. He was polite, and I think he truly believed what he was saying, but he was very naive. He said that he is an adoptive father, and that he knows many people in his congregation who, if a woman came to them and said, "I've been raped and I would like you to adopt my baby," they would be more than happy to adopt that child. I was annoyed by how easy he made the adoption process seem when we know it is not at all easy. And a couple of people responded to him. Cristen Hemmins, a panelist at the forum and a local activist for No on 26, pointed out the vast number of children in our country right now who are in need of adoption; why aren't these "good Christians" offering to adopt these children? Elizabeth Feder Hosey, the panel's organizer and the founder of a new student organization for reproductive justice, also spoke up, saying that "as a recently pregnant woman," she felt that no one who has not been pregnant should be able to tell women that they have to carry a pregnancy to term. Both of these responses were perfect, and should be enough. But in case they are not, I have another one.

We still have a wage gap in this country. Women make less than men when in the same jobs. And women who are mothers make less than women who are not. Women do not get paid maternity leave in this country. Most women who have babies have to use up their vacation time, time that should be spent on rest and relaxation, for their first weeks as sleep-deprived, emotionally and physically exhausted mothers. Other women use their sick leave, as if pregnancy were a disease. My mother, one of the hardest working women I know, someone who was both a great parent and is great at her job, has almost never taken a vacation from work. Now, I can't speak for the years before my sisters and I were born, but I can not recall her having taken a legitimate vacation from work ever when I was growing up. Why? Because she had to use her vacation time, as well as her sick leave, for her children. She took twelve weeks off when my older sister was born. Those twelve weeks were made up of accumulated vacation time that she had never taken for herself. When I was born, she took off twelve weeks from more accumulated vacation time. By the time my younger sister was born, she took off what little vacation time she had left, and the rest was unpaid sick/maternity leave. When we were growing up, she used her sick days, her personal days, her vacation days for the days when she needed to take us to the doctor, to stay home with us, to chaperone field trips. She took a huge pay cut to change jobs so that her job could accommodate these missed days for children.

So when people (and yes, they are usually men) say that women should carry an unwanted pregnancy to full term, I ask them to think not just of the already living children in need of adoption. I ask them not to think only of the physical and emotional difficulties of living while pregnant. I ask them to also think of the financial strains you are putting on the woman. Just because a woman knows that at the end of this pregnancy she will pass the child along to someone else, doesn't change the fact that she will have to miss work for doctors' visits. It doesn't change the fact that she will have to take days off because sometimes she will be so sick and feel so terrible that she simply cannot make it to work. It doesn't change the fact that she will have to take unpaid time off from work to give birth. It doesn't change the fact that in order to keep making money, she will most likely have to work right up until the point she goes into labor (which, hopefully, won't occur at work, but very well could).

And in my opinion, the fact that she doesn't want this pregnancy, and the fact that she won't be raising a child at the end of this difficult nine months doesn't make this process easier on her. It makes it much, much more difficult.

When Initiative 26 supporters ask women to carry these pregnancies and to choose adoption, they don't think about the pregnancy. They don't think about the physical, emotional, and financial commitments the women are making. Because, of course, they aren't thinking about the women at all. But let's talk about the women being forced to carry unwanted pregnancies. And while we're at it, let's talk about the other women we aren't taking care of: the women who want their babies, the women who are working round the clock during the last months of pregnancy to make up for the unpaid time they are facing, the women who are running themselves ragged to be both parents and workers.

Before we force more women to work and live while pregnant, let's take care of the women who are choosing to work and live while pregnant, and let's give them some support.