Passing it on

[catsittingstill]

I got this from a friend's blog post. She was writing about an article in Shakesville on the costs of abortion vs adoption, from the perspective of a woman who has done both.

I have given a baby up for adoption, and I have had an abortion,....Believe me when I say that of the two choices, it was adoption that nearly destroyed me - and it never ends.

 

Powerful article.

Comments

Strange how peer-reviewed studies are near non-existent

[bigbumble.livejournal.com]

This is probably her best point. A single anonymous post makes for an interesting discussion, but clearly some serious investigation is in order.

Re: Strange how peer-reviewed studies are near non-existent

[catsittingstill.livejournal.com]

I agree.

I think such a study would set off a veritable firestorm, though.

[randwolf.livejournal.com]

That makes it the more worth doing, though. That was, wow, a heartbreaking essay. I know that adoption is hard on the birth mother, and usually the child, but that's the first time I've ever seen anyone write or talk about her feelings at length.

More to say about this perhaps, when the project I'm presenting tomorrow is done, and my teeth stop gnashing.

[catsittingstill.livejournal.com]

I agree that it is worth doing. I just think that the psychologists who might otherwise be interested in doing it might be scared off by the crazies.

Re: Strange how peer-reviewed studies are near non-existent

[bookwyrm-com.livejournal.com]

I expect there are going to be serious confounding factors, though, in terms of how stable the woman's life was beforehand.

Unplanned pregnancy is generally linked to high-risk behaviour; I'd really like to see how "aftermath" studies of abortion and adoption choosing women account for the fact that it's the women they would measure as at-risk for mental health issues beforehand who are getting into a situation where they need to make that choice.

I'm a bit troubled by the magic in the author's assumptions that a bundle of cells is nothing, but at birth it's giving up a real child. It doesn't seem much more based in sense than any other arbitrary marker of, "Now it's real." A small seedling is a real tree, even if it doesn't give shade yet, and my understanding is that for several months post-natal fetuses aren't big on reciprocity, either.

Of course, my perspective is that of a woman who wants a child very much and isn't at all sure it will be possible. This biases me in favour of the "what a waste of potential!" view towards discarding a healthily developing fetus.

Re: Strange how peer-reviewed studies are near non-existent

[catsittingstill.livejournal.com]

If I understand your contention, you're saying "the type of people who engage in high risk behavior likely to result in unwanted pregnancy are also likely to become depressed." I agree this may be true but don't see the point unless you're also advancing to "so we shouldn't consider whether giving a baby up for adoption (one solution to unwanted pregnancy) is more likely to cause depression than having an abortion (another solution to unwanted pregnancy)."

I think that people at risk for depression have a right to know which actions are likely to bring on depression, and if giving up a baby for adoption is more likely to cause depression than having an abortion, they have a right to know that before they have to make that decision.

I'm a bit troubled by the magic in the author's assumptions that a bundle of cells is nothing, but at birth it's giving up a real child.

I see no magic here. There are plenty of situations where one state shades into another state that is different (consider a rainbow--blue shades into green, with no defined line between them; does that mean blue *is* green?). So the fact that an single cell zygote (definitely not human as far as I'm concerned because it has no human mind) shades into a just-pre-term fetus, perfectly viable outside the womb, and probably possessing the first flickers of sapience, does not mean that that the single cell is a human being. I don't see anything "magical" about that.

Indeed, with all the slow gradual changing of a single cell into a just-pre-term fetus, there is one state that is not changing; the fetus is parasitizing a real human being to get its nutrients and get rid of its wastes. The change brought about by birth is that the entity is not a parasite anymore. This strikes me as an enormous change in moral status, which I think is an appropriate time to change legal status too.

At any rate, the entity's emotional importance to the woman who is writing seems to have changed enormously with its birth. Labor and delivery coincide with hormonal changes that seem to have to do with mother-infant bonding and I think it would be kind of surprising if she felt the same way about a fetus and a baby.

Discarding a healthily developing fetus is a waste of potential and I can understand why it must be frustrating to people who want children. There are children out there who desperately need to be adopted and can't find a home; hopefully two needs can answer each other.

Re: Strange how peer-reviewed studies are near non-existent

[bookwyrm-com.livejournal.com]

I contended, "The type of people who engage in high risk behaviour likely to result in pregnancy are also likely to be vulnerable to other stressors in their lives, which may also trigger depression." The largest clump of women experiencing unplanned pregnancy are under 18; the second-largest clump is over 40. The young women who become pregnant accidentally tend to be lower-income, performing less well in school or have dropped out of school, more likely to use recreational drugs (including alcohol and tobacco), lower self-esteem, and fewer hopes for the future. Women in their 40s will have their own stressors, though I haven't found the reams of risk factors for them.

I am not arguing that we should not consider whether abortion or adoption is more likely to trigger depression. I am concerned that it will be hard to see past those other risk factors for unplanned pregnancy to say that it is the abortion or the adoption that caused the situation -- especially given that the cultural background pushing a woman towards adoption may be more shame-based. That wouldn't be depression as a result of adoption, but depression and adoption sharing a common cause.

Blue is not green, but teal may be. I can't argue with the zygote, and in fact emergency contraceptives are available to people whose possible conception is that recent. I can argue with the pre-term infant, since a caesarian delivery would have a high probability of allowing the fetus to survive as well as removing the parasite from the woman's womb.

In middle cases, I get hung up on how exactly the parasite got in there without the woman noticing. If it was through deliberate inaction or carelessness . . . I am less sympathetic with a problem that will resolve itself in a few weeks or months. (Would caesarian delivery also cause less psychological harm to the woman carrying the fetus, by not triggering the hormonal changes related to post-partum depression? I tend to think that one needs to balance the needs of the person and the thing-that-will-become-a-person-real-soon-now; I'd obviously prefer both parasite and carrier emerge from the situation physically and mentally well.)

I suppose much of my feeling on the topic is a knee-jerk response to what might be considered a straw man: I don't like the idea of abortion being used as a form of birth control. I don't understand why one would wait to take steps to avoid having a baby until one knew one was pregnant.

Re: Strange how peer-reviewed studies are near non-existent

[catsittingstill.livejournal.com]

Well, it seems to me that the way to see past the other risk factors would be to compare abortion outcomes to adoption outcomes. Regarding the shame-based culture being an issue, you could compare the outcomes of adoption vs keeping the baby.

Emergency contraceptives work by preventing ovulation. So if they work at all, there never is a zygote. Please pass it on; the in sorrow shalt thou bring forth children crowd is trying to muddy the waters on this, but there is *zero* reason to believe that they cause failure of implantation.

Caesarian delivery is the medical term for having a hole cut in your belly big enough to pull a baby through. It's a big deal. A woman can choose to undergo that, but it shouldn't be forced on anyone, ever. If women planning to give a baby up for adoption were warned about the possibility of depression and chose to undergo Caesarian in an attempt to circumvent the hormonal cascade and thus possibly reduce the risk of depression, I'm perfectly okay with that.

how exactly the parasite got in there without the woman noticing
? I don't understand. Anybody who goes for abortion goes *because* she noticed the parasite.

I am less sympathetic with a problem that will resolve itself in a few weeks or months.
I don't think one can reasonably call a problem that makes you vomit your way through pregnancy and scream your way through labor a problem that "resolves itself."

Using abortion as a form of birth control is indeed a straw man. First, that is *not* what the article discusses. The article is about the emotional costs of giving a baby up for adoption vs the emotional costs of abortion, and the lack of support for a woman suffering from the former. Second, nobody would use abortion as birth control in the first place unless they have no other alternative (for instance, if the in sorrow shalt thou bring forth children crowd has managed to make it impossible for them to get birth control); abortions are painful, inconvenient, and expensive. It would be like using root canals as a way of cleaning your teeth.

Re: Strange how peer-reviewed studies are near non-existent

[bookwyrm-com.livejournal.com]

I wonder how much of what the article attributes to giving the baby up for adoption is actually a result of going through a Catholic adoption agency when the writer was not Catholic. It sounded to me like most of the issues were a fundamental mismatch between the beliefs of the woman affected and the agency whose 'assistance' was so counterproductive. This certainly points to problems with the way some agencies handle the needs of the mother, but I'd really like to see the non-existent peer-reviewed studies before accepting this anecdote as strong evidence of a problem with the unwanted-pregnancy outcome of adoption.

That aside, carrying an infant to term, whether or not it is in the mother's custody, may trigger post-partum depression. This may, when the mother retains custody, be partly or completely blamed on the stresses of having a newborn in one's care. Another problem with comparing unwanted-pregnancy outcomes; whenever they do get around to evaluating them, they will have quite a challenge doing so. Procedural difficulties mean that a lay person may find it easy to exclude whichever studies don't fit their beliefs.

Emergency contraceptives work by preventing ovulation. So if they work at all, there never is a zygote.

Odd. Planned Parenthood does list only an 89% effectiveness rate for "Plan B" emergency contraception started within three days of intercourse, for the reason you stated, but they do claim that having a ParaGuard IUD inserted within five days of intercourse is 99.9% effective. (http://www.plannedparenthood.org/health-topics/emergency-contraception-morning-after-pill-4363.htm (http://www.plannedparenthood.org/health-topics/emergency-contraception-morning-after-pill-4363.htm#effective))

Are they incorrect, or am I misunderstanding?

Anybody who goes for abortion goes *because* she noticed the parasite.

Clearly, but why didn't she notice when she was infected with it? Early treatment, if the 99.9% statistic for an IUD is correct, would sidestep the whole issue of the painful, inconvenient, and expensive abortion. If it's a subtle contraceptive failure, where the woman has every reason to believe she cannot be pregnant, wouldn't she be less likely to notice it (attributing early pregnancy symptoms to a viral infection rather than a parasite) until the fetus is theoretically a viable person if you could just get it out of where it's encysted without hurting either it or the host?

Nobody would use abortion as birth control in the first place unless they have no other alternative; abortions are painful, inconvenient, and expensive. It would be like using root canals as a way of cleaning your teeth.

I agree with you fully on the "conceived on purpose and born in joy" aspect. I am very much in favour of reducing elective abortions by increasing the availability of birth control and accurate sexuality information. That's part of the reason that when I hear of a woman getting into a situation where she needs an abortion, I want to know how she got there. What can we do to prevent other women from falling into the same traps?

Abortion is harmful to a fetus and also to a woman. The original article argues that adoption is also harmful to a woman. Unprepared parenting is harmful to a woman. Restricting female sexual behaviour is harmful to a woman. We've got a whole frustrating boatload of sexuality-resulting situations that conspire to be harmful to a woman, and a handful of basic preventative measures that are minimally so. Yes, sole responsibility for contraception is, on a level of liberty and dignity, likely to be somewhat harmful to a woman, but all the other options look worse from here. :-/

Re: Strange how peer-reviewed studies are near non-existent

[bookwyrm-com.livejournal.com]

(Appended, since LiveJournal considered having it all in one reply too wordy)

It does seem, since removing the encysted parasite without harm to woman or fetus is not a real possibility, that we will not agree on whether or not a viable-but-encysted fetus should get any consideration. Having researched it further, it seems that recovery time for a caesarean section is about twice that for an abortion of a similarly-aged fetus, though of course getting actual numbers proves difficult. This would be an additional hardship, but I hold that reasonable people may argue that the benefits to the pre-person of requiring this degree of hardship outweigh harm to the woman.

The details of undue hardship are complicated enough when dealing with accommodations for people with disabilities in places of public accommodation, though; you probably have an even stronger argument that a woman's womb is not a place of public accommodation by any definition.

On the other hand, if the invader in the womb was initially invited by the womb's owner, there may be a moral argument about evicting that guest for problems that are not willfully caused, at least until said no-longer-wanted guest has somewhere else to go.

I am here making the assumption that a woman who was not willing to have sex but does so anyway will be able to act immediately to receive emergency contraception; I am told that political realities may mean this is not the case. I see these political issues as ones that obviously should be addressed by anybody who claims to be in favour of restricting abortion; I admit that I can't understand the no contraception / no abortion mindset at all. :-/

Re: Strange how peer-reviewed studies are near non-existent

[catsittingstill.livejournal.com]

we will not agree on whether or not a viable-but-encysted fetus should get any consideration.

I simply oppose giving fetuses rights we don't give to born people. No born person is allowed to enslave another for purposes of hijacking her metabolism. No born person is allowed to decide that another person will have a hole cut in her belly big enough to pull a baby through. Not even if the life of the born person is at stake.

I see a strong urge in some people to extend extra rights to fetuses. It looks to me like this is contemplated because being impregnated against your will is something that can only happen to people who have sex while female, and both females and sex come in for more than their share of hostility. I don't share that hostility so I find it hard to muster any sympathy for this point of view.

I hold that reasonable people may argue that the benefits to the pre-person of requiring this degree of hardship outweigh harm to the woman.

(blink) So you'd be okay with requiring by law that you donate a kidney to someone who needed a kidney and had your tissue type? Since the benefit to the recipient would outweigh the harm to you? You're a generous soul. Or would that not count since the recipient would not be a fetus?

you probably have an even stronger argument that a woman's womb is not a place of public accommodation by any definition.

(boggling at the thought that a woman's womb could for one second be considered a place of public accomodation) You correctly anticipate my position.

On the other hand, if the invader in the womb was initially invited by the womb's owner, there may be a moral argument about evicting that guest for problems that are not willfully caused, at least until said no-longer-wanted guest has somewhere else to go.

Regarding the moral argument; if you have no problem, morally, with enslavement, I don't have enough common ground to offer a moral argument. However 1) those women who "invite" a fetus into their womb (by having sex for the specific purpose of conceiving a child) almost never choose abortion unless there are pressing health reasons to do so. Why would they? A baby is what they *wanted*.

And even supposing that we were talking about the unusual circumstance of a woman who deliberately conceived choosing to abort in the absence of health reasons, legally a person who invites another person onto her property is free to withdraw that invitation at any time and require that the former-invitee leave. She is allowed to get outside assistance to enforce her wishes. So I don't see the problem. Unless, of course, we're going to extend special legal rights to fetuses that born people don't get; in that case a woman who deliberately conceived might find her options more cramped.

A woman who was impregnated against her will, of course, didn't "invite" anything; that's like having a stranger force their way into your house when you opened the door to let the cat in.

And no, I don't see having sex as "inviting" a fetus, anymore than driving a car is "inviting" an accident or letting the cat in is "inviting" forced entry by someone or something else.

Re: Strange how peer-reviewed studies are near non-existent

[bookwyrm-com.livejournal.com]

(blink) So you'd be okay with requiring by law that you donate a kidney to someone who needed a kidney and had your tissue type? Since the benefit to the recipient would outweigh the harm to you?

*reads a little about the after-effects of living kidney donation*

Congratulations; you found an excellent analogy, especially in terms of recovery time, health risks, and long-term effect.

Thinking about it . . . yes, I think that would be a good law. It's not about generosity; it's about life and its value. As a society, we have a collective responsibility for the health of the members of our society; therefore, as an individual I have a responsibility to support the health of other members of society in what ways I can.

Philosophically, I would support the proposed, "You don't really need two kidneys" legislation more strongly than I would oppose completely open access to abortions.

Re: Strange how peer-reviewed studies are near non-existent

[catsittingstill.livejournal.com]

Okay, I guess we're going to have to agree to disagree on this one.

Personally, while I'm not opposed to the idea of kidney donation, I think it should be a free choice on the part of the donor.

Re: Strange how peer-reviewed studies are near non-existent

[catsittingstill.livejournal.com]

Emergency contraceptives work by preventing ovulation. So if they work at all, there never is a zygote.

Odd. Planned Parenthood does list only an 89% effectiveness rate for "Plan B" emergency contraception started within three days of intercourse, for the reason you stated, but they do claim that having a ParaGuard IUD inserted within five days of intercourse is 99.9% effective. (http://www.plannedparenthood.org/health-topics/emergency-contraception-morning-after-pill-4363.htm)

Are they incorrect, or am I misunderstanding?

I don't understand the question; the numbers are perfectly consistent with Plan B preventing ovulation and not implantation (those 11% of women it doesn't work for have already ovulated; implantation takes place as normal) and the IUD preventing implantation, thus working for more women.

Clearly, but why didn't she notice when she was infected with it?

Uh, what? I don't understand the question. Are you holding a woman impregnated against her will responsible for not noticing a single cell? Single cells are very small and hard to notice without a microscope, especially when they're hidden inside someone's body. Are you holding a woman impregnated against her will responsible for having sex in the first place? I need you to be more clear here before I can answer.

That's part of the reason that when I hear of a woman getting into a situation where she needs an abortion, I want to know how she got there.

Hmm. I understand the desire to know what circumstances brought a bad situation about. Knowing the causes of a bad situation can help individuals and society reduce its frequency. Plus, feeling like you know what caused a bad situation can give you a feeling of control: "oh, she did X and that made the bad situation more likely--I just won't do X and I'll be safe."

The down side of this is that it easily tips over into blaming the victim. "It's HER fault she got pregnant; she didn't use birth control during her period." Which very quickly shades into "She doesn't DESERVE help; enslaving her to produce an unwanted baby is okay."

Rightly or wrongly, I'm seeing some of this in your "why didn't she notice" and "less sympathy for a situation that will resolve itself" and "using abortion as a form of birth control" and "undue hardship" and "if the invader in the womb was initially invited in." If you don't intend these to imply that you are blaming the woman impregnated against her will for her situation, it would be good keep that in mind as you frame further points of your discussion. Because I *certainly* don't blame a woman impregnated against her will for her situation, and I hope most other people reading this will feel the same way.

Abortion is harmful to a fetus, of course--that whole obligate parasite thing means it can't be removed without killing it. It is minimally harmful to a woman, but much less so than labor and delivery. And, at any rate, leaving the choice up to the woman involved is much less harmful to a woman than forcing her into labor and delivery. At least in my eyes.

Re: Strange how peer-reviewed studies are near non-existent

[bookwyrm-com.livejournal.com]

I don't understand the question; the numbers are perfectly consistent with Plan B preventing ovulation and not implantation (those 11% of women it doesn't work for have already ovulated; implantation takes place as normal) and the IUD preventing implantation, thus working for more women.

The confusion seems to be that I'm counting implanting an IUD as emergency contraception, whereas you understand the term to only refer to hormone pills like "Plan B"?

Abortion is harmful to a fetus, of course--that whole obligate parasite thing means it can't be removed without killing it.

Yes, you're right. And this conversation has shifted my view regarding abortion of a fetus between a few weeks and twenty-five weeks from conception -- the period during which it is an obligate parasite.

Are you holding a woman impregnated against her will responsible for not noticing a single cell? . . . Are you holding a woman impregnated against her will responsible for having sex in the first place? I need you to be more clear here before I can answer.

Yes, I am holding the woman responsible for willingly engaging in coitus in the first place. I'd hold the man responsible, too, but he has a head start by the time the problem is noticed.

Coitus is a behaviour that carries with it a risk of pregnancy and other sexually transmitted infections. I find that I do expect people who engage in coitus to be aware of this and take precautions to prevent it, just as I expect people who ride roller-coasters (another optional, pleasure-granting activity) to wear their seatbelts, or make sure that the bar is in the locked position, or both.

If a woman finds that she has neglected to take precautions beforehand, there are treatments available immediately afterwards that significantly reduce the odds of pregnancy. If a woman engages in coitus without taking steps to reduce the chances of her becoming pregnant either before or shortly after coitus, it does strike me as if she is being irresponsible.

And, though I don't doubt you are aware of this, a woman also has a suite of non-coital options for sex.

There may be cultural factors; I am told that in the United States, access to comprehensive and accurate sex education in the public school system, or even preventative health care, is not guaranteed. This would make, "She didn't know any better, or did not have a choice," a much more plausible argument.

Re: Strange how peer-reviewed studies are near non-existent

[catsittingstill.livejournal.com]

The confusion seems to be that I'm counting implanting an IUD as emergency contraception, whereas you understand the term to only refer to hormone pills like "Plan B"?

Oh, I see the issue. Yes, in my experience, "emergency contraception" has meant Plan B, which prevents ovulation. There is a practice, among some anti-contraception groups, to claim that hormonal methods that prevent ovulation, like Plan B and the pill, work by preventing implantation and that they are thus "abortion drugs." From my point of view this looks like an attempt to persuade people who feel as you do (contraception great, abortion bad) to 1) not use the most effective forms of birth control themselves and 2) make the most effective forms of birth control more difficult for other people to get.

I was not familiar with emergency insertion of IUDs to prevent implantation. I kind of went off IUDs in high school when (in a real sex ed class you apparently don't find much anymore, thanks in no small part to the efforts of the anti-abortion crowd) I learned about the advantages and disadvantages of various forms of birth control and discovered that IUDs tended to make for heavier periods with more cramping. Since I already had those two problems in spades, I crossed IUDs off my list and quit following developments in that area :-) I am interested to learn that this is a viable method of emergency contraception in the larger sense.

Yes, I am holding the woman responsible for willingly engaging in coitus in the first place. I'd hold the man responsible, too, but he has a head start by the time the problem is noticed.

I think we're just going to have to disagree on the whole "you had sex while female; you deserve to be pregnant" issue. People have sex for a wide variety of reasons, and I consider that perfectly legitimate, and don't think anyone deserves to be pregnant against her will. Saying "if you don't want to have a baby you shouldn't have sex is like saying if you don't want both legs broken in a car accident you shouldn't drive." Except that giving up driving is actually healthy.

And I *certainly* don't think it's fair to hold the woman responsible and let the man off scot-free because "he had a head start." Good grief.

And there seems to be an underlying assumption in your writing that every woman pregnant against her will is pregnant because she made an informed choice not to use easily available birth control. I think that assumption is unwarranted. Yes, in the US, I am embarrassed to admit, we do not have publicly funded preventative health care. Before I had sex for the first time I had to save up for my birth control, and I was comparatively comfortably off. And for that matter (and arguably principally), birth control can *fail.* What then--is it still "her fault" she's pregnant?

[randwolf.livejournal.com]

Avedon Carol, who first brought this issue to my attention, weighs in.

[Further thoughts] I notice that Avedon says, "never"--that adoption is always hard on the mother. The plural of anecdote isn't data, of course, but that is experience speaking, which is the best we can do until real studies are undertaken.

[catsittingstill.livejournal.com]

She seems to feel the same way I do, though she doesn't seem to be speaking from personal experience either. I'm not sure from her brief piece how much contact she has had with women who gave up babies for adoption--though it sounds like she has had some.

[kittyguitar.livejournal.com]

I can easily understand why adoption might be more traumatic than abortion for some people. When someone has an abortion, that's it. No child, the end.

They never have to wonder how that child's new parents are going to treat it. They never have to wonder if it's happy. They never have to worry about its coming back in 20 years and demanding to know why they didn't keep it. They never have to think about how they'd handle that if it happened.

I remember a case that was in the news several years ago about a child who had been adopted by the lawyer the birth mother hired to handle the adoption. The said lawyer then proceeded to abuse and neglect the little girl to death--she died at the age of six. The birth mother fought for custody of the child's remains--don't remember how that turned out.

The world is a big, scary place, and sending a helpless child out into it without you is not for the faint of heart.

[catsittingstill.livejournal.com]

I hadn't considered before the idea that a child one gave up for adoption might actually be *abused* by its new parents. That's appalling. I suppose that most adoption agencies have policies in place to try to prevent that as much as possible, but still, that's pretty chilling.

Adoption vs. Abortion

[(Anonymous)]

Your adoption may have "killed" you, but, your abortion actually did kill someone. At least your adopted child got to live, and not die a tortured death by having limbs ripped off or being burned to death.