Abortion is a sub-optimal solution to a problem in all situations. Yeah, I said it, but not for the reasons that some of you started to cheer. The common reason is the unwanted pregnancy. Instead of taking a few basic steps and primary care to provide contraceptives and women’s health, we choose a surgical procedure because, insurance, religion, or the government think it is wrong for women to have contraceptives and women’s health care in almost every sense other than to function as a sentient human incubator. So, women feel stuck when pregnant and feel that abortion is the only way out. So, with their back to the wall women are forced to choose surgical intervention as opposed prevention. Please tell me how that makes sense?

The fetus is no more alive than a tumor until it reaches viability around 26 weeks. Yes, I said tumor. It is a rapid, uncontrolled growth of cells, which is the technical definition of a tumor. Yes, I know when it comes out of a woman’s body it is a baby. I did go to school. Please don’t treat a fetus like a magical being if you refuse to take care of the child afterward. It’s the worst kind of hypocrisy I can think of.

Late term abortions don’t happen, they don’t. After 26 weeks if the fetus is not viable or there is a danger to the mother, labor is induced, and the baby is delivered vaginally or is removed via C-section to save the mother and with the hope of saving the fetus too. This is a drastic step but seems to be glossed over or gaslighted by anti-abortion folks. They make it seem as common as a change of underwear, that it’s done because the mother forgot, or that every OB/GYN does them. You’re doing a disservice to reproductive health by continuing to spread lies instead of the truth about this procedure.

How about the danger to the mother? There are places in this country and around the world where a woman is not allowed to have an abortion even if the pregnancy is a danger to her life. It’s true, and in fact, Ireland just repealed a centuries-old law that literally prevented saving the mother’s life over the fetus. This is completely ridiculous. Why, does any of this makes sense? No seriously, tell me.

Here’s another thing we are scared of, how about, comprehensive sex education? Maybe we should teach our children, at a young age, about reproductive systems, diseases, sexual urges, and how to navigate all of them in their lives. The would be better than telling them to not have sex. I have said this before, and I will say it again, “your children are screwing like rabbits.” I sat in a school board meeting ten years ago and listened to parents say that all the school should tell their children is to abstain from sex, and that sex education should be taught by the parents at home (which rarely happens). This was right before a disease investigative specialist presented to the school board about the findings of a Chlamydia outbreak in the town’s eighth graders. Approximately 22 eighth graders developed Chlamydia after an oral sex free-for-all in the bathroom at a school dance and then at a party at the home one of the teenagers. If that is how parents teach sex education, I think I’ll pass, Karen. If you don’t take the time now, you could end up with a pregnant teenage girl, who has to deal with it all by herself. A girl, trying to abort a fetus because she wants the life ahead of her, not a shunned and difficult existence on the fringes of society who is viewed as a welfare queen. Because, oh yes, we still mock and shun teenage girls who get pregnant and yet hail the boy as a man’s man for doing something irresponsible and firing his DNA inside of her, right? Clap him on the should and tell him to git’er done…

We are too damn casual about rape. The things that I have heard politicians and religious leaders say about rape is disgusting. A politician said, “it is a gift from God.” I am pretty sure an unwanted pregnancy is off most people’s Christmas lists. Another politician said, “a woman’s body knows it’s rape and the body stops it from getting pregnant.” Yes, these are things were really said, and people continue to vote for them because somehow it is healthier for a woman to have idiots like that making and setting guidelines and laws regarding healthcare than someone with actual medical knowledge or a vagina. There must be a reason that people vote for someone who is clearly against their best interest, like Stockholm Syndrome. There is more damn manipulation in the Senate cloak room that at Karen’s Home for Borderline girls.

There are a lot of things that we can do instead of abortion. However, we also choose to make any kind of healthy choices before becoming pregnant either difficult, illegal or hide accurate information and we leave one last option. We shouldn’t be a single option society. Whether Nursie poo agrees with abortion on a moral level, doesn’t matter, since I will never have an abortion. I will counsel women who are left with that option. It is their decision. It is their body and their decision to remove an object from their body. I will always offer the best care in the forms of referral to a competent counselor and assist with her follow up care.

Everyone balks at birth control. I’m sorry that your religion doesn’t like it, but we need it. Despite the fact, your faith tells you that every time you have sex God gets to decide if you have a child or not, the rest of us do not believe that. Sex, as many people discover, is quite pleasurable and every time we have it, we don’t need your morals forced upon us. If you choose to roll this way, by all means, but every time you get laid you have a good chance of getting knocked up. I’m sorry to be blunt about this, kinda, but I think it needs to be said this way. I really believe that over three-quarters of unwanted pregnancies would be solved with good contraception and better sex education.

I realize I may have lost a portion of my blog audience. Sorry, not sorry. This is the kind of conversation that you should have with your provider. Yes, it’s uncomfortable but necessary. If you are ill-informed, it is my job to educate you and to help you make healthy choices with the best medically correct information at my fingertips. Like it or not, this information is accurate. I honestly don’t think anyone wants to see abortions all the time. I think everyone just wants to see them when they’re necessary. If we want that we must make some reasonable choices for women’s health issues. We also must plan, if we are going to ban abortions, on how we are going to take care of all those kids. Everything has consequences and abortion is a consequence of poor planning.

In next week’s podcast, we will be discussing OB/GYN care with a few brave women willing to tell you about their experiences and their fears.

I hope you’ll stick with me; we have a lot to learn.

Well, the sun is starting to rear its ugly little head, and it is time for me to pet the hounds and set the boiling oil for those who might try to storm the castle after this post.