{"id":323120,"date":"2024-12-15T13:26:33","date_gmt":"2024-12-15T19:26:33","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.liveaction.org\/news\/?p=323120"},"modified":"2024-12-15T22:01:06","modified_gmt":"2024-12-16T04:01:06","slug":"what-pregnancy-miscarriage-taught-about-abortion","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/archive.liveaction.org\/news\/what-pregnancy-miscarriage-taught-about-abortion\/","title":{"rendered":"What my pregnancy and miscarriage taught me about abortion"},"content":{"rendered":"
<\/div>

I lost my first baby, Jack, at a day shy of eight weeks gestation<\/span>, but I didn\u2019t realize his soul was no longer earthside until 10 weeks and two days. <\/span><\/p>\n

I should\u2019ve guessed something was off since I started to feel less nauseous on Thanksgiving. But I was too happy to be able to eat to think it could possibly be for a tragic reason.<\/span><\/p>\n

I\u2019ve always been pro-life. It\u2019s never ever made sense to me that there\u2019s a single, legitimate excuse to kill an innocent child just because he isn\u2019t born yet, no matter how dire the circumstances might be. If there isn\u2019t the most basic human right to not be killed when you don\u2019t deserve to be, then all other human rights are moot. We all started out as embryos; what if someone had killed us? My time working in the pro-life movement has only added to this conviction, as I\u2019ve learned the devastating nature of every form of <\/span>abortion<\/span><\/a>, marveled at what science shows us of <\/span>prenatal development<\/span><\/a>, and heard the <\/span>heartbreaking stories<\/span><\/a> of men and women who don\u2019t go a single day without mourning the babies they\u2019ve lost to this terrible act of man.<\/span><\/p>\n

But losing Jack opened my eyes in a whole new way \u2014 in a few ways, actually.<\/span><\/p>\n

Compassion for moms considering abortion<\/strong><\/p>\n

First, pregnancy is no joke. Every single woman who has ever sacrificed her body to grow a baby is a warrior. I was sick almost immediately after finding out I was pregnant, and I couldn\u2019t get over how out of control I felt \u2014 like my body was no longer my own. I know some women love being pregnant, but my short, yet life-changing experience carrying Jack increased my compassion for moms in early pregnancy, especially those considering abortion. <\/span><\/p>\n

In addition to being scared or broke or alone or all of the above, women who feel abortion is their best option may often feel sick, a state that leaves them all the more vulnerable. This is critical to remember as we consider the best ways to reach moms in their time of need and empower them to choose life.<\/span><\/p>\n

We know preborn children are real and alive<\/strong><\/p>\n

Second, when you find out you\u2019re pregnant, there are about a hundred different apps you can download that walk you through your pregnancy week by week. These are secular apps without any explicitly pro-life bent. Their assumption,<\/span> I<\/span><\/i> assume, is that the women downloading these apps want their children to live. From day one, these apps congratulate you on your \u201cbaby,\u201d describe \u201chis\u201d or \u201cher\u201d ever-growing features in detail, using both medically accurate and humanizing words to enlighten the expectant mother on the precious happenings inside her. <\/span><\/p>\n

This, in contrast to how the abortion industry describes pregnancy and fetal development, became more jarring when it could\u2019ve been my baby they were describing. I was struck anew by the subjectivity and callousness with which abortion supporters describe what is a very <\/span>objective, biological process<\/span><\/a>. When people \u2014 even apps \u2014 are celebrating each critical, incredible stage of your embryo\u2019s growth if he\u2019s wanted, while the abortion industry poised to profit if you kill him describes him as a \u201cclump of cells,\u201d the \u201cproduct of conception,\u201d or \u201cpregnancy tissue,\u201d it makes the hairs on your neck stand up. Or it should\u2026<\/span><\/p>\n

Former abortionist, <\/span>Bernard Nathanson<\/span><\/a> \u2014 who committed and oversaw 60,000 abortions before his conversion to Catholicism \u2014 describes in his book, “<\/span>The Hand of God<\/span>,” that if humans grew at the same rate of development throughout the entire pregnancy as they do the first two weeks in utero, \u201cwe would each weigh twenty-eight thousand pounds at birth.\u201d What led to Nathanson\u2019s conversion in part was seeing what he was doing during an abortion to a growing baby via the ultrasound. He could no longer deny that he was killing a very-much-alive human person. <\/span><\/p>\n

I don\u2019t know why my Jack\u2019s life ended so soon, but what I do know is that when he died, his 1.5cm body already had a beating heart, forming fingers, nerves, organs, eyes, and a little nose. And aside from what ultrasounds and science show us, I <\/span>knew<\/span><\/i> he was alive, was real, and was mine.<\/span><\/p>\n

Having a miscarriage made me more strongly opposed to abortion<\/strong><\/p>\n

Finally, miscarrying Jack made me even more against the <\/span>abortion pill<\/span><\/a> than I already was. I was told leaving the ER before completing the miscarriage to expect bleeding and cramping \u201clike a period,\u201d which is often what women who take the abortion pill are told they will experience. In reality, losing Jack was a physically and mentally brutal process that resulted in me hemorrhaging clots the size of tennis balls, losing consciousness multiple times, contracting a UTI and a uterine infection, and the ongoing effects of low blood pressure from blood loss. <\/span><\/p>\n

Though my Jack died for reasons unknown, the FDA\u2019s own <\/span>reporting<\/span><\/a> on the abortion pill \u2014 mifepristone \u2014 shows that at least 5.9 million babies in the womb have been killed by this deadly drug, now comprising nearly <\/span>two thirds<\/span><\/a> of abortions committed in the United States each year. Adding to the devastation, at least 32 women have died* taking the abortion pill since it was approved by the FDA in 2000 under the Clinton administration. Hundreds more women have experienced complications similar to my miscarriage, or worse, often alone in their dorm rooms or on their bathroom floors.<\/span><\/p>\n