My Late-Term Abortion That Never Was

With the confirmation hearings for Amy Coney Barrett starting today, something has been weighing heavily on my heart. No matter what anyone tells you, this confirmation is about abortion. It’s about solidifying the ability to strip women of their right to choose what happens within their own bodies.

Very few people in my life have heard this story, but now feels like the time to tell it. I know this will be long, and I know this will be political. I know I won’t accurately characterize how everyone feels about the topic of abortion — there is nuance and there is subtlety that I can’t begin to claim I fully understand. But I have been personally affected by the limits being put on a woman’s right to choose. And because of that, I can no longer stay silent.

Many people claim abortion is about getting rid of unwanted mistakes. “If you don’t want a baby, you shouldn’t have sex.” But what about the women facing devastating diagnoses for themselves or for babies they desperately want?

I came very close to having an abortion. Not when I was young, trying to finish college and start a life. Not when I was unmarried, having sex with some guy I knew I didn’t want to spend my life with. I almost had an abortion in 2019, when I was married and pregnant with our very loved, very wanted, very planned for daughter.

It would have been considered a late-term abortion, which is a political term rather than a medical one. I was 20 weeks pregnant when we were agonizing over our future and how it would be impacted by the political decisions of people I would never meet.

When I was around 12 weeks pregnant, we had genetic testing done, screening for potential abnormalities. It’s optional but was recommended by our provider, so we did it. Those results came back with a 90% probability for Trisomy 18, a condition that comes with a very low probability of live birth and an even lower probability of survival past 30 days. Over the next few weeks, we met with specialists and had multiple ultrasounds to determine the actual chances of our baby being born with severe physical and mental disabilities.

We knew that if our baby was diagnosed with Trisomy 18, our choice would be termination. That was a choice my husband and I made together, and I am forever grateful to live in a state where we had the option to even consider late-term abortion.

However, because the specialists we visited were located in Missouri, they had very delicate conversations with us about our options. Abortion laws in Missouri are much stricter than our home state of Illinois. If we chose termination, we would not be able to have the procedure done by the specialists who had been taking such wonderful care of us, but instead we would have to go to a clinic across the river in Illinois. It was heartbreaking to consider — these men and women had held our hands and made us feel safe, and we would not be able to trust them to complete our care. Still, I was eternally grateful for the existence of that clinic.

I know that some women would make a different choice. They would choose to carry a baby to term when they know the outcome will be. And yes — if our baby was positive for Trisomy 18, there would have been a chance he or she would survive the pregnancy and even survive into childhood. But through discussions with our doctors and our own research of the condition, that survival would include a shortened life filled with pain and suffering — not a life we wanted for our baby.

After our third ultrasound, we decided to have an amniocentesis: a procedure that is itself not without risk. We wanted to know for certain what our baby’s diagnosis — and our future — would be. Four specialists crowded into the small exam room. They inserted a long needle through my abdomen to take amniotic fluid from our precious baby. The process was terrifying and painful. I was on two days of fairly strict bed rest to ensure the baby’s safety. I felt pain at the insertion site for months after.

The wait for the results was agony. Every time my phone rang, I jumped, not sure if this would be the call that changed our lives. The preliminary results took 2 days, with full results not finalized for 2.5 weeks. When they came, everything was normal. Not a single genetic abnormality. The future we’d imagined was intact.

To say we were lucky would be the biggest understatement of my life. We didn’t have to make a gut-wrenching, life-altering decision that would have stayed with us for the rest of our days. Our baby girl turns 1 in a few days, and we get to know her love and smile and laugh and sweetness.

So to the so-called single issue voter, I tell you my story and ask you this: if banning abortion is about protecting the sanctity of life, what purpose would be served by forcing a woman like me to continue a pregnancy where the baby would almost certainly die? Would you choose to protect the life of a baby who hasn’t lived a single day, hasn’t breathed air or felt sunshine or known the loving embrace of her parents, over the lives of my husband and me, lives that would be shattered by grieving the loss encompassed by carrying that baby to term and watching her die a painful death?

At the time, our son was almost 2 years old. He knew we were having a baby and was thrilled about being a big brother. How would his life be improved, having to watch his mom and dad suffer through the grief of a pregnancy that was almost guaranteed to end in sorrow? To ask when the baby would come, only to be met with the far-off stares of parents who don’t have the words to explain? To meet a baby brother or sister and have to lose them within days or weeks or months? Would banning my late-term abortion help make his life better?

I am a privileged white woman with access to incredible medical care and a job that provided the flexibility to attend multiple specialist appointments in a different state than where I live. I am in a stable relationship and have family support to make incredibly difficult decisions. If not for those anomalous test results, I would not be affected by a ban on abortions.

But it is for that reason that I share what happened to me. Because I know there are countless women out there who find themselves in need of an abortion for any number of reasons. Those reasons are none of my business. The nomination of Amy Coney Barrett to the Supreme Court of the United States threatens the safety of women across the country. Banning abortion doesn’t eliminate abortion, it simply makes abortion more dangerous, a fact that disproportionally affects women of color and women in poverty.

Late-term abortions especially are not procedures undertaken with frivolity. They are heart-breaking decisions that shatter the future you longed for while you cling to a shred of hope that you’re making the right decision for a baby you will never truly know.

If you support banning abortions, I hope that my story has touched your heart, even in the tiniest of ways. I hope this glimpse into a late-term abortion that never happened can open your eyes to the fear that families feel at the possibility of someone else choosing their outcomes for them.

And to the maternal fetal medicine specialists at Barnes-Jewish Hospital, thank you for treating me with dignity and caring for me when I was at my most vulnerable. I will be forever grateful.