Money is about survival. Money determines the choices we make in life, which choices are available to us, which option we decide, and how the choice is carried out. In anyplace, USA, money is a huge factor in any choice big or small.
We often tell stories of rescheduled appointments, missed appointments, and pregnancies unwillingly carried to term. Of course, that story often ends here with us: we support women who can find a way to handle most of the factors in choosing to have an abortion or not, and the saga can end there. She is then just another women who did, or did not have her abortion. I have helped a friend pay for her abortion, and another friend's birth control, and emergency contraception for another. However, my social network only reaches so far, so it's still important for me to support funds that reach out to women I'll never know.
We can all be abortioneers: supportive sisters and people who help facilitate sexual and reproductive health and care. There are lots of abortion access funds, often 501(c)3, that accept donations. These funds often make the difference for women who need it most. They are able to offer the last $75, $100, or even $150 for a woman who might otherwise have to postpone or cancel her appointment. But they literally exist through support from people like us -- not from the government, and very rarely from official grants.
It is incredibly important that each of us support both local and national funds so they can offer financial support to women who direly need it. To raise money in a public and fun-type fashion, the National Network of Abortion Funds is holding a bowl-a-thon! The nice part is, for those of us who aren't all in one place or anywhere near a bowling alley, there is the Blogger Bowl-a-thon: We write, you donate, and we stop pestering you when the goal is reached.
The Abortioneers have a team, and our goal is to raise at least $1000 of the entire goal of $125,000. This is only a small fraction of the entire goal but I'm confident we can raise $1000 plus some. The National Network of Abortion Funds is a network of many of the local grassroots organizations that help women pay for abortions in their prospective areas.
Please go and support local funds all over the country by making a donation, even if you have to wait til payday! Every dollar counts, literally! Additionally, if there is a bowl-a-thon team playing at your neighborhood lanes, you can support them too and help NNAF meet their total goal.
This would not be such an issue if Medicaid/Medicare and private insurance covered reproductive services. Unfortunately, others' religious fanaticism undercuts our access to health care.
ReplyDeleteAnd, Bob R, that religious fanaticism cuts across comprehensive and age appropriate sex education, contraception, family planning and abortion, of course. If the religious fanatics had their way, we'd be living the life of Margaret Atwood's dystopia, the Handmaid's Tale.
ReplyDeleteBut that is the oligarchal way of controlling people. . . keep people in debt, beholden to lots of kids, undermine job security, etc and they cannot buck the system.
ReplyDeleteI am old enough now not to have to worry about getting pregnant. But I can tell you that wasn't always the case. I am also lucky that I have had a job, a career, an education and the means to care for myself. For all that I have, all that I have earned, means nothing if I can't pay it back, if I can't make a sister's life a bit easier.
ReplyDeleteThis morning I read The Abortioneers blog about money matters. It moved me to make a contribution. I challenge all like-minded people to take the time to send a contribution, to make a difference in the lives of women in this country. Do it. Do it Now. Do it for your sisters you don't even know.
@Bob R. - even in states where medicaid does cover abortion services (in Massachusetts it does, under a court order) there are still women who are not covered. So, you are right, we need Medicaid to cover abortion, but then we need to go further. until everyone has comprehensive health care, there will be folks who cannot access the reproductive care that they need, when they need it.
ReplyDeleteFor example, the EMA Fund (www.emafund.org) regularly talks to women who are undocumented immigrants who don't have access to Medicaid that covers abortions, the recently unemployed who will not be able to get on Medicaid for up to 4 weeks (a long time to wait if you're pregnant - sometimes too long) and college students who are covered under their parents' insurance - and so can't use it if they want to avoid having their parents find out about the abortion. That's just a few examples...
So yes! Bowl-a-thon! (billiards-a-thon for us) - we need to help these women until as a community/country we get our acts together!