{"id":304511,"date":"2024-01-03T14:41:11","date_gmt":"2024-01-03T20:41:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.liveaction.org\/news\/?p=304511"},"modified":"2024-01-08T21:46:22","modified_gmt":"2024-01-09T03:46:22","slug":"woman-claims-ectopic-pregnancy-surgery-abortion","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/archive.liveaction.org\/news\/woman-claims-ectopic-pregnancy-surgery-abortion\/","title":{"rendered":"Woman claims her ectopic pregnancy surgery was an abortion. It wasn’t."},"content":{"rendered":"
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In an op-ed<\/a> published by STL Today, a woman named Kristina Stierholz makes the erroneous claim that she ‘had an abortion’ when she underwent emergency surgery for an ectopic pregnancy 34 years ago. However, treatment for an ectopic pregnancy is not an induced abortion.<\/p>\n

She writes, “I recently realized I had an abortion 34 years ago. I never knew it before. It’s a weird shift of mindset and strange rethinking of my past.”<\/p>\n

It is<\/em> a shift of mindset, but it’s legally inaccurate and caused by the mass confusion pro-abortion groups<\/a> and media outlets<\/a> are stirring up. This confusion has misled many women to believe that they, too, have had abortions \u2014 when in reality, they have never sought to intentionally, directly kill their preborn children.<\/p>\n

What happened<\/strong><\/p>\n

In 1989, Stierholz was recently married and pregnant. She admits she wasn’t sure if she was going to “keep the baby” for financial reasons so she hadn’t told anyone except her husband that she was pregnant. She explains, “My father was stridently pro-life. He was a doctor and belonged to several organizations that worked to limit the availability of abortions. We had multiple arguments on this and he was immovable on the subject.”<\/p>\n

But before she could choose to abort her baby, her gynecologist told her that she may have miscarried. After her stomach began to get “puffy,” Stierholz returned to the doctor. It was discovered that she was “bleeding from my fallopian tubes into my belly.” Stierholz was sent to the ER for emergency surgery for an ectopic pregnancy.<\/p>\n

“Just before I took a taxi to the emergency room, I finally called my parents to let them know what was going on. My dad was a wreck with worry. After many misfires in the emergency department, it was midnight and I was lying on a hospital gurney waiting for the surgical theater to be available when my doctor told me that my dad had called her. I have no idea how he found her in the hospital. He just wanted to know I was going to be safe,” she writes.<\/p>\n

Doctors carried out the surgery and were able to repair the fallopian tube. Her parents were relieved, she said, and her father sent “the biggest fruit basket I’ve ever seen to my doctor’s office.” She and her husband went on to have three children.<\/p>\n

“My dad later died, unchanged in his beliefs about abortion,” she writes. Her father knew the truth: surgery for ectopic pregnancy is not an induced abortion<\/em>.<\/p>\n

The fall of Roe v. Wade<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

Thirty-two years later, after the overturning of Roe v. Wade<\/em>, Stierholz says she has “come to understand that I had an abortion back then.”<\/p>\n

She adds, “I would never have said that before. My pro-life dad never considered it an abortion. It was midnight surgery to ‘save the life of the mother.’<\/p>\n

“I try to imagine my scenario if it happened in Texas today. […] Would they need affidavits and court rulings to allow me to end that dangerous pregnancy?” she wondered. She questions what her father would think about “this new definition.”<\/p>\n

But surgery for ectopic pregnancy was not an induced abortion in 1989 \u2014 and it’s not an induced abortion today, either. So, the answer \u2014 would she be able to end her pregnancy in such a scenario in Texas today? \u2014 is yes<\/strong>. As Live Action News has reported numerous times, pro-life state laws (including those in Texas) do not outlaw treatment for ectopic pregnancies<\/a> or miscarriages, which are not induced abortions.<\/p>\n