Abortion, regret and the right to decide | Letters

Well done to Roe McDermott for saying what is rarely said – that abortion doesn’t lead to inevitable regret (Abortion trauma is a myth. Irish women don’t need laws to make them ‘reflect’ on their choices, 26 May). My own experience of one, many years ago, was that it was in fact a very straightforward decision – I didn’t want to become a mother, so I didn’t. End of.

What was maybe most confusing about it was that I somehow felt that I should feel more hesitant and conflicted than I actually did, that I wasn’t a “proper woman” because I wasn’t more upset about it all.

Many years later, having a cancerous tumour removed from my colon felt very much the same: something was growing inside me that I really didn’t want there, that would cause major impacts on my life if not removed, and it was a great relief when it was gone.

The main difference, of course, was stigma. With cancer you get sympathy and casseroles; with a termination you have to be cautious who you even tell. Imagine phoning your work and saying you won’t be in for the next couple of days because you’re recovering from an abortion and need to rest. You just wouldn’t; you’d plead flu instead. Am I asking for this letter to be published anonymously? No. It’s time we let go of this false shame.
Sylvia Rose
Totnes, Devon

I wholeheartedly agree with the message of Roe McDermott’s article. However, I would like to add some further nuance. I agree with fighting for abortion rights; I did it – and still do it – myself (both before and after my own experience of abortion). But I am sad that it is so necessary.

We only ever talk about abortion in a moral or ethical framing, something to be debated in a courtroom. I do not regret my decision to have an abortion. But it was painful, heart-wrenching and represents a loss that I will carry with me for the rest of my life. This experience was made harder by the fact that I felt I shouldn’t or couldn’t talk about it, for fear of it being used as fodder for anti-abortion groups or dismissed as “not real” by others. My grief felt like it wasn’t allowed, because it didn’t fit neatly into a legalistic narrative.

To be clear, I am firmly pro-choice and extend my gratitude to all the activists who have fought – and will continue to fight – for the right for women to choose. I am against the three-day waiting period, for the reasons given in McDermott’s article. But I want people with experience of abortions to know that how they feel is OK: it’s OK if you felt no attachment; it’s OK if you felt ambivalent; it’s OK if you (like me) cried at a makeshift grave on the darkest days. It’s OK if you’re somewhere in between. As Amanda Palmer put it in her song Voicemail for Jill: “You don’t need to offer the right explanation / You don’t need to beg for redemption or ask for forgiveness / And you don’t need a courtroom inside of your head / Where you’re acting as judge and accused and defendant and witness.”
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Having had three abortions myself, I think it’s more complex than Roe McDermott suggests. Women choose an abortion and may never regret that they aborted, but may also be traumatised by the pregnancy loss.

Being pregnant, even for a few weeks, changes your body, flush with hormones and deep instincts. To deny that is a disservice to women. Somehow we must fend off the anti-abortion crowd, while acknowledging the humanity of the loss.

After my first abortion I felt like an alien – stressed, fearful, changed and in hiding. How much better I would have felt if support groups for abortion women were as normalised as alcohol or PTSD support groups, without the social judgment. Hell, it would have helped if I’d been able to tell my friends.

Eventually I had a child, and now I viscerally understand motherhood. I’d made sense of my abortion trauma and put it behind me. But life likes its little jokes. I tried for a second child, only to return to abortion for chromosome abnormalities. Flooding back came the same sadness, engorged on my new mother’s body and brain, and also the same 100% certainty that my choice was correct. I didn’t need three days to think. I had been thoughtful and I was certain.

Imagine the outcry if men had a mandated wait of three days to get erectile dysfunction medications or vasectomy. And if you’re experiencing post-abortion trauma which sent you into the anti-abortion ranks, please do work to heal your own psyche, but get your hands off my body.
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