{"id":315402,"date":"2024-07-11T06:39:04","date_gmt":"2024-07-11T11:39:04","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.liveaction.org\/news\/?p=315402"},"modified":"2024-07-11T09:12:05","modified_gmt":"2024-07-11T14:12:05","slug":"mothers-dark-secret-miscarriage-compassion-women-crisis","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/archive.liveaction.org\/news\/mothers-dark-secret-miscarriage-compassion-women-crisis\/","title":{"rendered":"Her mother’s dark secret and her own miscarriage cemented her compassion for women in crisis"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Sixteen-year-old Clarissa Carruthers-Dodsworth was riding on the school bus one day when she met her soon-to-be boyfriend. He fell in love with her, but Carruthers-Dodsworth didn\u2019t have reciprocal feelings for him. The couple became intimate and a year later, she discovered she was pregnant.<\/span><\/p>\n

Carruthers-Dodsworth told Live Action News, \u201cI didn\u2019t even know I was pregnant. I thought it was the flu; I was in denial. But the nausea was unrelenting, making my mom suspicious. She took me to the nurse\u2019s station at school where I found out I was expecting.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Her mother presented her with two options: keep her baby or place the child for adoption. Abortion was never mentioned \u2014 and at the time, Carruthers-Dodsworth didn\u2019t know about a secret her mother had been hiding.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cI wanted to keep my baby, so my mother took me to the obstetrician she worked for,\u201d Carruthers-Dodsworth said. \u201cWhile they didn\u2019t accept my insurance, they agreed to take me as a patient me as a favor to my mom.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

As the pregnancy progressed, Carruthers-Dodsworth experienced several medical issues and was diagnosed as high-risk. <\/span>\u201cI was put on bed rest and told never to get pregnant again. The day I was scheduled for a Caesarian, my baby only weighed two pounds, so the surgery was re-scheduled,” said Carruthers-Dodsworth. “I lost so much blood that I kept passing out. It was a very challenging time.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

The dark secret comes to light\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

But seven years later, still with her boyfriend, Carruthers-Dodsworth again became pregnant. Her desire for her young daughter to have stability was instrumental in her decision to remain with him. But when he started selling drugs, she finally left.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cLuckily, my mom took care of my daughter while I attended college, which was a stipulation when I chose to raise my child,\u201d Carruthers-Dodsworth said.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

During this time, she and her mother became active with their parish\u2019s pro-life ministry and participated in a rose procession to commemorate babies who perished through the years since Roe<\/em> was instituted. <\/span><\/p>\n

It was then that the secret her mother had been harboring came to light.<\/span><\/p>\n

Carruthers-Dodsworth said, \u201cWhen my mom was asked to stand in the procession for someone who was absent, she began crying. That\u2019s when she told me about her unplanned pregnancy and that she was forced by her parents to have an abortion. She never wanted me to experience the same lifelong grief she had. It was an emotional moment for both of us. I think helping to raise my baby was therapeutic for her.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

A natural miscarriage provides a glimpse into the horror of chemical abortion<\/b><\/p>\n

Years later, now married with seven children, six of whom were girls, Carruthers-Dodsworth was carrying her eighth child, hoping for a boy. Her pregnancy seemed to be progressing normally. But at 11 weeks, she went for an ultrasound, and she was informed she wasn\u2019t as far along as she had estimated.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cI knew when I had gotten pregnant so that was confusing,\u201d Carruthers-Dodsworth said. \u201cWhen I went back a week later, I was told I had a subchorionic hematoma and not to lift anything.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

The following Sunday at church, she picked up both of her crying toddlers to take them out of the service. Afterward, she began spotting. A subsequent ultrasound two days later failed to detect the baby\u2019s heartbeat. <\/span>\u201cIt was heartbreaking. I had never lost a baby before and didn\u2019t know what to expect,” she said. “I was told when my body began to expel my baby it would be like having a period.\u201d <\/span><\/p>\n

It took three days before she started to experience spotting and bleeding. She felt well enough to go to the grocery store \u2014 but while there, felt a sudden gush.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cI went into the bathroom while my son pushed the kids around the store in the cart,\u201d Carruthers-Dodsworth said. \u201cMy two oldest daughters went with me. Everything seemed to come out at once. It looked like a murder scene with blood everywhere and my children handing me paper towels.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

As she instructed one of her daughters to get heavy duty sanitary pads, she felt a second rush of blood. <\/span>\u201cThe toilet water turned black and there was blood spilled on the bathroom floor. I couldn\u2019t get up without blood pouring out,” said Carruthers-Dodsworth. “Employees were coming in and out of the restroom. It was such a horrific time.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

She was eventually able to get home, and believed the worst was over. But then, as she drove her son to tutoring, she again felt ill.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cI drove to the library, which was the nearest place, because I had an urge to push while in the car,\u201d Carruthers-Dodsworth said. \u201cAs I ran to the bathroom, we noticed a police officer standing nearby. When I expelled a huge blood clot, I asked my daughter to look for the baby and to ask the police officer for a bag for the baby\u2019s remains.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Carruthers-Dodsworth likened her experience to unsuspecting women who swallow the abortion pill without being fully informed of the sometimes severe after-effects. She said, \u201cMy mind kept going to the chemical abortion scene in the movie, \u2018Unplanned.\u2019 More women need to speak out about the pain of miscarriage and the ugliness of chemical abortions. I think it would deter women who think the abortion pill is the answer to unplanned pregnancies.\u201d\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n