The Great Macy's Fourth of July Abortion Sale: Get 'em while you can! (offer valid only in Mississippi until 7/11/2012)

This is actually a breadline, not a bank run or a premodern Black Friday. But when I thought about it, the breadline matched the vibe of the clinic waiting room better than those. People are there -- with their spouse, mom, kid, infant -- because they really need to be. 

So...

Remember my last post, where I was kinda sick and tired of legislators playing doctor (and not in the sexy way) (but also, is playing doctor actually sexy to anyone?), and I was writing about the last abortion clinic in Mississippi being legislated out of existence, and about Rep. Bubba Carpenter, and how he was talking in what I imagine is a too-bad-so-sad wah-wah voice about how the other side talks way too much about "some poor pitiful women" who might risk their health and lives trying to end their pregnancies by any means available, and I think I might have blacked out shortly after that as an internal defense mechanism?

Yeah, I know: oof. But let's talk about Mississippi some more!

So the bill passed and was signed by the governor and its stipulations include that abortion providers must have hospital admitting privileges -- something Bubba Carpenter noted was notoriously difficult for anyone to obtain, not just abortion providers -- and that means that this last clinic in Mississippi, which has not been able to secure admitting privileges, will have to close. But then, since as Bubba Carpenter noted this law is not trying that hard to be constitutional, a judge stayed the new law until a court hearing planned for July 11 -- giving the clinic a reprieve of, uh, about a week.

And here's something that interests me as an abortioneer.

But it has also created a rush of women from across Mississippi wanting to have abortions. The clinic's three doctors normally perform about 40 abortions a week, but received more than 100 calls in one day last week from women trying to schedule appointments. Two of the doctors live out of state and will fly in to perform abortions this week, said Diane Derzis, the clinic owner.

"What women are hearing is, You may not be able to have an abortion soon," she said. "If you're pregnant and you don’t want to be, you’re thinking, 'By God, I've got to get in there fast.'"

Seems kind of weird, doesn't it? Like a run on the banks, as my arm candy quipped. You'd think that the need for abortion care is pretty much static over the course of a year, since pregnancy can occur in any season and any abortion clinic is the potential provider for at least several million people of reproductive capacity. But demand for services really does seem to have a certain flux to it. While I can't remember hearing of a run on the clinics (though I guess it's not hard to understand), I have noticed other ups and downs and maybe patterns.

I've mentioned before that I had many clients who were able to finally secure their abortion care when their tax refund came back -- and even some who specifically filed early in order to make sure they raised enough money before they reached 12 weeks when the fee would start progressively increasing. Those patients were very resourceful and very on top of it. And I sympathized with their certainty that they made little enough to be owed a refund -- my full-time job qualified me for both a tax refund and assistance from an emergency abortion fund should I ever need it.

But demand also seems to drop on holidays, especially big ones. It's hard to seek an appointment while hosting extended family, driving to grandma's, juggling your parents' or grown children's multiple Thanksgivings after a divorce, entertaining your school-aged kids at home, or arguing with your teenager about sharing the family car over winter break. You don't have as much privacy, time, or energy for taking care of yourself. Shit's hectic.

Then, weeks after a holiday, demand bounces back to levels even higher than before. Phones ring off the hook at the emergency abortion fund, they ring all day although you have multiple phone lines and someone answering every line. Same thing happening at the clinic, which is also jam-packed with people -- you have to bring more chairs into the waiting room -- and clients want to know what is the point of making an appointment if you still have to wait all damn day. (The answer is you struggle with turning people away from care, and wish there was such a thing as walk-in care, but in your state there's a law requiring advance appointments so pregnant people can take time to "cool off" and think hard about their impulsive and flighty decisions. As Sarah Silverman says, maybe they're not as hungry as they think they are.)

I say "weeks" after a holiday but we'd often remark that it seemed to be about four to six weeks after a holiday. Kind of joking, because that's how long it takes from fertilization (four) or last normal menstrual period (six) to the earliest point in pregnancy that most clinics are able to offer abortion care. Kind of not joking, because it really happened. At least three years I noticed that after a December-January lull, we'd have the most insane February and March. That's the time of year that I first became an abortioneer, actually. At first I thought that was just how it was -- that we'd have 100 appointments per day forever. (On the plus side, a lot of those were double-bookings or ambivalent patients who ended up going to another clinic for prenatal or abortion care. We didn't actually check that many patients in per day.)

I could surmise that stereotypically hectic and overburdened times (Thanksgiving/Christmas) or stereotypically romantic times (New Year's/Valentine's) or stereotypically hedonistic times (spring break, New Year's again) lead to unintended pregnancy. And surely the delaying of one's own needs during family-heavy holidays would explain part of the resurgence of appointment requests afterward. But I don't really know and I don't think there's any way to find out on a large scale. It'd be interesting, though, to ask individual women to recount the story of what prompted them to seek abortion care when they did, and why. If only such questions weren't so politically loaded, so likely to suggest there's a right and a wrong answer, maybe we'd hear a lot of honest and interesting stories.

Remember Roe v Wade

Sunday is Roe v Wade. For abortioneers, it is a holiday sort-of. The big celebration of gaining our federal right to decide when - or if - we want to become mothers. Doing direct service work, we see women on a daily basis benefitting this historic decision; yet it feels like many of our patients are unaware of the political climate we find ourselves in currently, always fighting just to keep clinic doors open.

Sometimes, I want to tell patients (especially on Roe v Wade day) that without that decision, they wouldn't be in our clinic. They may be trying to obtain an unsafe, illegal abortion. Or maybe the 15 year old girl who was raped, would be forced to carry an unwanted pregnancy to term.

Sometimes I think there is more we could do to raise awareness of the importance of Roe v Wade to our patients on this day. I mean, I know a lot of clinics won't be working on Sunday, but maybe there is something we could do on Monday. Or Saturday. Maybe your clinic can make Roe v Wade ribbons that all the staff wear and give out to patients. Maybe you can leave colorful flyers in the waiting room for support people to read about how their loved one wouldn't be having an abortion without Roe v Wade and how this very sacred right is currently threatened.

I think this starts with staff, though, too. Employers need to really recognize Roe v Wade as a special day so that the staff can be educated, too...and then, hopefully, pass that onto the patients they see or speak with.

In the very least....without Roe v Wade, none of us would even be working as abortioneers. At least not legally.

We have a lot to be thankful for...

Because I'm Blessed

Often times we talk about the challenges we face in our jobs. We shed light on the difficulties we face in the world due to our jobs. Sometimes we write about funding and policy. We write about patients' joy and tears, we write about our own tears. I would like to take a moment to acknowledge some of the things in my life that make me thankful to be an abortioneer:

• I feel needed every time I make an appointment for a woman and/or help her figure out how to make the logistics of state laws and clinic schedules work for her needs.

• I sort of get off on the "shock value" of saying exactly where I work and what I do, especially when the shocked individual is someone who annoys me anyway.

• I'm working in a field where I see room for professional growth and I am learning valuable skills every day.

• I learned to speak spanish with some fluidity through work in abortion care.

• I figured out that I have a strong interest in health sciences, when I spent most of my life scared to attempt any academic coarse in the physical/biological sciences.

• I am more in touch with my own body, sexuality, and health because of the knowledge I have gained working in abortion provision.

• I'm thankful for each and every patient because I am constantly learning life lessons from each of those women.

• I like my job, each day I go to work with out dreading the day ahead of me.
  

I'm sure I could find 100 more blessing that are related to or because of my job. Its so important to count our blessings every day, especially when you live a life that is so scrutinized by so many different people.

What are you thankful for?

You've got mail

Dear Patients,

Maybe I met you years ago or days ago, and maybe I'll meet you tomorrow or years in the future. I hope I made or will make a positive impact on you, but your abortion experience really wasn't or isn't or won't be about me. And that's one of the things I want to say to you. Your abortion is YOURS--your story to tell, your experience to shape. You have no obligation to justify your decision to anyone. You have a right to be informed, even when it means asking uncomfortable questions like, "What happens to the fetus afterward?" You don't need to be sad if you're not, nor do you have to be happy just because you exercised bodily autonomy. We might talk about how we'd like you to be grateful and advocate for others, but my wish is that you will make the choice for you and you will honor yourself and your choice in the best way for YOU. You have every right to be scared, and you also have every right to the safest and most caring healthcare, which is what we want to give you. You are strong enough to do this, whether "this" is having an abortion or not having one. You are allowed to dwell in as many gray areas as you'd like. We, as staff, might bristle when you ask things like, "Are your instruments clean?" but you have a right to wonder and to ask and to use your voice in whatever way you can or want. You do have a voice, but your abortion doesn't have to be a political act, either. You can be selfless or selfish or both at once. You can yell at me or hug me, and I will find some part of you, large or small, to care for. Your privacy is protected and so is your dignity, and we wish for the clinic to be a safe space for you. You might have just one abortion or just fourteen, and there is not a thing wrong with either one. There is nothing wrong with YOU.

Again, this isn't about me. But I want you to know that I don't forget you, and I am so very honored to be a part of your choice, process, justice, and life.

All the best,
Desembarazarme

Thanksgetting

I don't do it for the thanks. If I did, there are plenty of days that I might have quit! I've had women shout at me, swear at me, tell me I wasn't a good feminist, I hadn't secured enough financial assistance for them, I didn't answer my phone often enough, I wasn't checking them in fast enough, doing enough, caring enough. When in fact I care really hard and I try really hard. Sometimes I'd hear a coworker have a similar interaction -- maybe just an abrupt goodbye after she phoned to delivered news of a donation toward a patient's abortion costs -- and hang up and mutter, "A little gratitude would be nice." Idunno, I say screw that. Women have a right to choose abortion; I don't have a right to clients' gratitude just for providing their care. It's a matter of social justice that women have access to abortion, and they don't owe me thanks for their rights. They weren't mine to give anyway.

Don't I appreciate a word of thanks from a patient who, by all rights, ought to have her mind on anything but my feelings? Of course--quite a bit. It's wonderful to hear, "You all have been so kind and so professional; thank you for making this so much less stressful and scary than I expected." It's wonderful to get letters that read "This means the world to me. God Bless and may heaven smile upon you guys. Thank you."

But it's the part that comes before it that keeps me doing this work: "Due to my pregnancy I was discriminated against at work, they cut my weekly hours from 40 to 15 and I could barely afford rent, let alone paying for an abortion or even having a baby."
"I'm involved in domestic violence and have had no one to turn to. You have saved my life from eternal abuse and my child from growing up with violent torture."
"This year I earned a sports scholarship to go to college, but when I found out I was pregnant I was afraid I wouldn't even get to graduate high school."
[Excerpted to protect privacy, but these are women's own words.]

Those women don't owe me thanks! We, as a society, owe them all that we can do to reverse workplace injustice, end domestic violence, increase educational opportunities, AND make reproductive freedom a reality. And I thank them: for not giving up, for seeking to make their own life, for being patient with the unfairly long process of seeking a provider, an appointment, the money, the ride, the babysitter, the day off to recuperate.

Thank you, so much, for the compassion and companionship that I hear you offer each other in the waiting rooms and the recovery room.

Thank you for the times I was training and you consented to have me in the room, even though my presence was of no particular use to you that day. Thanks for everything you continue to teach me and my coworkers as we strive to support you and connect you with what you need. In short, thank you for the privilege of being involved in your care -- I will try to earn it.