Grandbabies: Abortion Reality Check

I compartmentalized my voluntary pregnancy termination so many years ago while in college. Now as I was holding this wee little bundle of a grandchild I was hit with emotion I didn’t know how to handle.

Working with women who reach a new level of reality concerning the deep dark secret of their abortion choice, I never cease to be amazed at how the birth of that first grandchild can be an incredible trigger. On one hand I am always comforted that I am not alone in this place of pain. On the other hand, I never cease to be amazed at how much buried angst resides in the hearts of women who’ve made a choice decision.

I accomplished some level of healing over a period of years. But abortion is (I say probably much too often) the gift that keeps on giving. I was visiting my son and his wife after the birth of my first grandchild. I was excited about the visit. I thought the plane to Ft. Lauderdale from Colorado would never get there. I thought I was prepared for seeing Collin Grant. The name fits him appropriately now. But at the time, I thought it was an awfully grown up name for a brand new baby. I imagined that “first hold.”

But in retrospect there was no way to fathom what looking down in that little face wrapped in the soft flannel blanket would mean to me. Words can’t describe the emotion that welled up strong inside of me.

I thought I was prepared, but I wasn’t. This is often the reaction I hear from other ladies who also go through the experience of that “first grandbaby hold.” The impact of the generational flow of life is beyond comprehension and very powerful. When you add the component of grief surrounding your own decision for voluntary pregnancy termination, the experience is a double edged sword. The little bundle is a reminder of the hope of the future and a reminder of things not meant to be from the past.

Future and past meet and even collide. Women of choice are often overcome with an unexpected flow of happiness and grief when they meet their first grandbaby. If you have chosen a voluntary pregnancy termination you need to know that grief after an abortion choice is real. While our culture says that abortion is the closure, what I see from my personal vantage point and also the professional venue, the abortion is a start of a long process to resolution.

Tomorrow I will give you things to consider if you are a Grandmother with a volutary pregnancy termination in your past.

Common Ground

In his controversial speech to Notre Dame this year, President Obama challenged us all to find common ground on the abortion issue. Our culture needs to understand: letting women talk about their abortions is the common ground that each side can embrace.

The "A"- word (abortion) incites an incredible amount of political and religious rheteroic. In the meantime, women of choice sit silently with no venue to grieve. Women don't talk about their choice decisions for fear of risking rejection, condemnation, misunderstanding or invalidation of the pain they might feel.

Glamour Magazine courageously offered an article (February '09) that will be the catalyst, I believe, for revolutionizing the way women process their choice decisions. You can read the article titled, "Abortion: The Serious Health Decision Women Aren't Talking About Until Now" here: Abortion: The Serious Health Decision Women Aren’t Talking About Until Nowhttp://www.glamour.com/sex-love-life/2009/02/the-serious-health-decision-women-arent-talking-about-until-now

Thirty Years of Tears

Just yesterday I had a woman on my couch (literally) who wept and wept about the abortion she had 30 years ago. She was only 16 at the time of the "vpt". She had never talked about the abortion, much less cried in front of anyone. This wasn’t anything about the legalities of abortion. This was one woman’s heart that needed to let out the grief she had felt so long.

We’ve taken the issue of “choice” off the streets and out of the back-alley. It is now time to let those who have made the choice grieve their loss without the spotlight of political or religious dialogue. Women who’ve made the choice shouldn’t have to risk rejection, condemnation, misunderstanding or disapproval just because at a later point in time they are searching for resolution to their loss.

"Now We're Talking!"

Abortion or "voluntary pregnancy termination" is not anything we set out to do as a “goal” per se. It was never any of our basic desires to have to choose. Just like we were all on different roads and now we are here at this intersection, so are the choices we’ve made. Every choice, every decision has its own unique set of circumstances.

For women of choice our commonality is the same. There are other choices we could have made. Single-parenting, “having to get married,” adoption or in the case of a tough medical outcome…none of the options available provided perfect answers. For many of us perfection was demanded from us, either by ourselves or by others.

Choices, decisions are hard. There is never any easy answer. Every single one of the roads we could have chosen involve loss and grief. In abortion decisions we take the solitary road. If feels like we are alone. We don’t talk…until now!

Legal Right to Cry

I didn’t realize until I began studying grief in my chaplaincy program that there are several types of grief. What I was feeling and what other women with a history of “vpt” are experiencing is something called disenfranchised grief. The word disenfranchised means to “deprive of a legal right, or of some privilege or immunity.”[1]

Isn’t it interesting that we are given the right to legal termination of a pregnancy but we are not given the right to grieve the loss of the pregnancy when the time comes for us to do so. As someone who made a choice in a difficult situation, I know the pain of “not being allowed to grieve” my loss. The grief is there but we do not give ourselves permission to “go there.” Imagine that getting license to cry could actually be a privilege!

[1] Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary http://www.merriam-webster.com/