Recently at a family wedding, I had the opportunity to give my voice for Choice. It was not the first time. As a Republican candidate for state representative over 10 years ago in my little conservative hamlet, I was then too, the voice for Choice. Standing on a stage at a local community college with two other candidates from that party trying to win in the primary, I was asked the hot button question, “What is your stand on abortion rights?” As each candidate scurried to make their anti-choice stand, I stood up and said, “I am pro-choice and I am proud of it.” Yes, there was some applause along with the gasping.

As we sat around the table with family members, some being religious conservatives, the opportunity to make some political headway presented itself. The discussion centered on the fertility difficulties that three of us who had children experienced.  There was no question that each of us had desperately wanted children and that our bodies were not cooperating, probably due to a common disease link, polycystic ovarian syndrome, that is now apparently linked to our hereditary diabetes. One exclaimed that her three children cost her over $100,000 to bring to fruition. We had all paid a great deal both emotionally and financially to achieve a pregnancy.

At 37 I was diagnosed with a severe gall bladder problem and was scheduled for surgery. When the pre surgical tests were completed, it was announced that I was pregnant. My old family doctor suggested we could go ahead with the surgery and that as a result I would no longer be pregnant. He suggested it might be possible to maintain the pregnancy because hormonal activity of pregnancy caused openings to stretch and this gall bladder issue would possibly be stayed.  This same doctor who I had known since childhood pre Roe V Wade; as a young resident had witnessed the aftermath of illegal abortions on women and their deaths in the emergency room of a major hospital as a result of sepsis.

So in all this discussion of fertility I launched my story of CHOICE. I said “Yes, the reason I am Pro-Choice is because I chose to have my daughter when given the opportunity to terminate my pregnancy for medical reasons. I made the choice. I am just too stubborn to have anyone tell me what to do with my own body.”  At the conclusion of the pregnancy, with the decline in hormone levels, I would again experience the drastic gall bladder symptoms and require surgery. (It was the second largest in the history of the hospital.)

That determination to Trust Women, as Dr. Tiller said, goes back long before he verbalized it, we lived our stubbornness in bringing abortion rights forward for women, because they should have that right.

Issues of privacy, medical history, and ideology are the foundations of why some women are pro-choice. Whatever that choice may be, it should be our own.  Advocate with like minded thinkers at NCJW.

 This post was submitted to the NCJW Blog Contest regarding Choice and the landmark ruling of Roe v. Wade. It was one of the ten finalists and excerpts from it were seen on the NCJW website. You can see it here:

 http://www.ncjw.org/content_8249.cfm?navID=409

The winning entry can be seen here: 

http://www.ncjw.org/insider/client/index.cfm/2012/1/26/Reproductive-care-before-Roe-v-Wade 

You can read more about the links between infertilitiy from Polycystic Ovarian Syndrome and Diabetes here:

 http://www.a-diabetic-life.com/diabetic-polycystic-ovarian-syndrome.html

 Copyright 2012 by SheilaTGTG55