Critical Thinking: Abortion to Save Mother

This lay person's perspective: easily attained abortion to save the mother's life allows physicians to dodge liability for a potentially difficult pregnancy. The innocent child always pays the price for their doctor's caution. There is no possibility for a double blind research study to verify that abortion, indeed, saves mother's lives. Although the procedure is regarded as a positive medical outcome, no one can ever know the genuine result of such a pregnancy.

Pre-legal abortion era true experience: At an impossible moment during my mother's birth, the doctor asked her father to choose between the life of his wife or his baby. Gramps asked the doctor to do what he could to save both, that he would bear the consequences of the decision. My grandmother did die -- in 1998 at age 97. My mother became the mother of 7 children, overcoming her difficult birth without lasting consequences.

Legal abortion era true experience: I became pregnant two months after losing a child in mid-term to placenta previa. The doctor advocated terminating the pregnancy to "possibly save my life". Because I probably would survive the abortion, both my doctor and I would have thought the procedure a success, further reinforcing the myth.

I was still mourning the death of one child. I wanted to give this one every chance at life. I refused to sign the surgical release. The doctor was extremely frustrated at my insistence at continuing the pregnancy. Finally, he reluctantly allowed a "trial pregnancy" where I could not travel and must visit the office biweekly. Laughing at the idea of my very real pregnancy being termed "trial," we breezed through the next 7 months. My healthy daughter was born 3 weeks early with minor problems -- a positive outcome that my doctor would have not witnessed if I had assented to the D&E.

My daughter's birth caused the OB to rethink his practices. He apologized for making me endure the pregnancy in fear for my life. Every precautionary abortion he had previously performed had reinforced his belief system that abortion was good, necessary medical practice. When my daughter was born, he got a taste of overcoming the odds to deliver a healthy infant. That must have been so much more rewarding!