Today’s Post contains this piece about a woman who had 15 abortions and wrote a memoir about it. I had already heard of this through thoughtful readers who sent me the link about her soon-to-be-released book, Impossible Motherhood: Testimony of an Abortion Addict. But I didn’t post about it because it’s been a busy week; that said I was also slightly reticent to read about this strange and deviant case.
Indeed, it’s not easy to read about. But here are the interesting points to me:
Firstly, she has tried to kill herself several times. Secondly, she writes that motherhood made her feel accountable for her actions.
The first part is a sad, sad note on what abortion does to a high percentage of women, who can’t cope, can’t escape and try to kill themselves as a result or spend many years imagining they should.
The second part about motherhood making her take note of her actions is interesting insofar as I have heard about this from several post-abortive women: When the do have a child or get pregnant and that child is wanted, even if they did not feel bad about the prior abortion (or did not realize they felt bad) becoming a mother brings all sorts of problems with the thing to the surface.
This speaks to the long term outcomes of abortion. The highest percentage of abortions occurs before the age of 30. Many women do see it as a solution in the short term and feel a sense of relief. The reality is that short-term “solution” comes back to visit them later in life.
Yesterday I heard a very wonderful woman speak at the de Veber conference. Her name was Teresa Harnett, and wow, I just found her captivating and inspiring for her strong compassionate presence, her words, her expertise in counselling women considering abortion. She’s been doing it for over 20 years at Birthright Pregnancy Services in Hamilton.
She spoke of her work as making a bridge between that catastrophic moment for a woman when she realizes she is pregnant and considers it truly to be the end of her own life and later on, to a future she can’t yet see. She can’t see it in her fear and concern. But Teresa spoke of making this bridge–to the point where she could see that her life will not end, that there is support, that there are true and meaningful choices.
All this rambling post to say I’m distressed when I read about someone having 15 abortions–and I’m sorry it takes a trigger like childbirth for many women to realize the fullness of their actions. But then there are women like Teresa, many, many women like her, doing great work as a bridge between a terrible present and a more hopeful future. And then I feel encouraged.
(More on the de Veber conference later. It was a really inspiring day.)
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What jumped out at me from that story was Ms. Vilar’s personal history. Her father and brothers suffered from addictions; her mother committed suicide. She couldn’t have had an easy, stable upbringing.
There are plenty of people out there who would say that it would be a mistake to bring a child into a home that is filled with these kinds of problems, that many of the people who emerge from these environments are not fit to be parents.
But it seems to me that to counsel a woman who comes from these circumstances is to add another hurt to an already-large pile of pain. I don’t know what the answer is , but Andrea’s axiom “we don’t kill to solve our problems” seems to apply.
A woman who had an abortion, and is now fully healed and helping others, told me that we have to consider the future babies. They have to develop in an environment where a killing has occurred. Perhaps you think that is too spiritual or beyond the realm of fact-checking, but consider whether you would purchase a home where someone had been murdered?
A child has to grow and develop in a uterus where killing has occurred. Surely this place is not the place of safety that it should be for that child. And how do we know these children don’t carry that “ghost” with them into their lives? Dr. Philip Ney has concluded from his work as a child psychiatrist, that they do in fact suffer from “survivor syndrome”.
Vilar’s mother was forcibly sterilized. Voluntary sterilization can be a blessing, but having it foisted upon you is an act of profound, life-shattering violence.
Vilar grew up in a family atmosphere poisoned by this act of violence. Abortion often needs to be considered in a multigenerational perspective, as part of a cycle of violence. So please no one be so quick to judge her…even as there are 15 spirits that didn’t get to be born in this world.