Abortion and Mothering: Research, Stories, and Artistic Expressions

By Demeter Press

Abortion and Mothering: Research, Stories, and Artistic Expressions is a collection of academic research, personal narratives, and art that comments on different perspectives on abortion and mothering. Scholarly research is balanced with voices and experiences from outside of academia, through the inclusion of personal narratives, poetry, and art. The collection is rooted in the idea that there are not 'women who have abortions' and 'women who have babies,' but that they are the same women at different points in their lives. By considering the intersection of abortion and mothering, and the liminal spaces in between, the reader is challenged to explore some of the culturally and socially constructed complexities that surround the decisions that people make about to their reproductive lives.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Demeter Press
• Release date: Nov 15, 2021
• ISBN: 9781772583656

Book preview

ABORTION AND MOTHERING

Research, Stories, and Artistic Expressions

Edited by

Heather Jackson and Jessica Shaw

Abortion and Mothering: Research, Stories, and Artistic Expressions

Edited By Heather Jackson and Jessica Shaw

Copyright © 2021 Demeter Press

Individual copyright to their work is retained by the authors. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form by any means without permission in writing from the publisher.

Demeter Press

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Demeter Press logo based on the sculpture Demeter by Maria-Luise Bodirsky www.keramik-atelier.bodirsky.de

Printed and Bound in Canada

Front cover image: ‘Reproduction Maze’ 2018, by Winnie T. Frick

Cover design and typesetting: Michelle Pirovich

Proof reading: Jena Woodhouse

eBook: tikaebooks.com

Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication

Title: Abortion and mothering : research, stories, and artistic expressions / edited by Heather Jackson and Jessica Shaw.

Names: Jackson, Heather, 1982- editor. | Shaw, Jessica (Professor of social work), editor.

Description: Includes bibliographical references.

Identifiers: Canadiana 2021029485X | ISBN 9781772583557 (softcover)

Subjects: LCSH: Abortion. | LCSH: Abortion applicants. | LCSH: Motherhood. | LCSH: Mothers.

Classification: LCC HQ767.A26 2021 | DDC 362.1988/8—dc23

For Lyric, as always.

And for all the abortion providers, with love, solidarity, and respect.

—Heather Jackson

For Nana, and for all the other women who have mothered me without ever having given birth.

—Jessica Shaw

Acknowledgments

To be a mother and have frank, honest conversations about abortion is important. That’s how we felt about this book. We wanted this book to encompass all the conversations about motherhood and abortion. It’s not an oxymoron. It’s the same people at different times of their life. Being a mother does not mean that you will not have an abortion, just as having an abortion does not mean that you will not become a mother. Sometimes being a mother means that you are more willing to have one. Sometimes it means you need to have one so you can care for the children you already have.

We want to thank abortion providers everywhere; abortion pro-viders who work within the system and out of the system; abortion providers of the past, present, and future; abortion providers who risk their lives to provide a basic human right, which is still illegal in many parts of the world, and ensure it is safe.

This book would not exist without Andrea O’Reilly and everyone else at the team of Demeter Press, new and moved on. Thank you!

Lastly, thank you to the authors and contributors of this book. Thank you for being patient. This collection has had a few changes through the process. We know that books can take a long time to publish. We felt this one took a little longer than usual. Thank you for sharing your important work, experiences, and dedication to such an important topic.

Contents

Acknowledgments

Introduction

Heather Jackson and Jessica Shaw

1.

Mi Cuerpo, Mi Decisión

Shaun Slifer and Rebecca Susman

2.

Abortion: Mothering, Unmothering, and the Liminal Space Between

Miriam Rose Brooker

3.

Protection

Victoria L. Poole

4.

Abortion Providers as Mothers, with Mothers

Jessica Shaw

5.

Trust Women

Shaun Slifer and Rebecca Susman

6.

Goddess Recovers a Mistake

Alison Ojanen-Goldsmith

7.

Our Bodies, Our Rights

Meredith Stern

8.

Relief or Regret: The Emotional Implications of Abortion

Meredith Navarro-McCullar

9.

Never Again

Shaun Slifer and Rebecca Susman

10.

Abortive Subjectivity

Laura Major

11.

Ireland: Narratives of Motherhood and Abortion

Christina Quinlan

12.

Teaching daughters (and sons) that abortion is good

Heather Jackson

13.

I Want to Get My Education Straight: The Impact of Contemporary Cultural Expectations on Teenage Pregnancy Decision Making

Sarah Bekaert

14.

Light at the End

Victoria L. Poole

15.

Bad Mothers and Staunch Feminists: Selective Abortions in Martha Beck’s Expecting Adam and Ayelet Waldman’s Bad Mother

Mary Thompson

16.

Teaching Students Abortion Rights Leads to More Rights For Them

Crystal D. Michels

17.

the story of how i got pregnant

Heather Jackson

Notes on Contributors

Introduction

Heather Jackson and Jessica Shaw

There are not women who have abortions and women who have babies.

They are the same women at different points in their lives.

—Rachel Atkins

Although the above quote is often attributed to Rachel Atkins, thinking about the complexities of motherhood and abortion is relatively universal, and while the framing of the quote is gendered, we can expand its understanding by ungendering it. There are not people who have abortions, and people who have babies: They are the same people at different points in their lives. Thinking through what this means is the aim of this book.

Research by the Guttmacher Institute (2019) notes that many women who have abortions are mothers, and we are heartened by the way that the media has discussed abortion and mothering in recent years. For example, in The Atlantic story Three Children, Two Abortions: What a Woman Chooses to do With Her Body Should Not be up for Debate in 2018, Deborah Copaken eloquently describes her abortions at various times in her life—one time was when she was a teenager and another time when she had children and was in her thirties. In the magazine Parents, Phoebe Zerwick has a conversation with five mothers who had abortions at one point in their lives. The article begins by highlighting how 6 in 10 women who have abortions are mothers and includes honest conversations with mothers about why they chose to have an abortion. Even the magazine Cosmopolitan has published articles in print and on their website about mothers who have had abortions (Filipovic). We also know that many people’s abortion and motherhood stories are not told and that there are a variety of social and systemic reasons for that.

We understand the complicated feelings that can come from becoming pregnant, regardless of whether the pregnancy was planned or not. Being pregnant can bring up a lot of emotions, and trying to decide what to do next can be scary. Having a child changes your life, and having to decide whether or not to add a new person to the family can require deep thought and conversation. Women often cite one or more of the following reasons as to why they need an abortion: They are already parenting children; they have financial concerns; the timing is wrong; they do not feel that they have a stable partnership; or they do not want to be a single mother (Chae et al.; Jones, and Frohwirth, and Moore; Kirkman et al.; Biggs, Gould, and Greene Foster). Abortion is often less related to whether or not a woman wants to have a child than it is to the circumstances surrounding a pregnancy.

We envision a world where equitable access to healthcare and financial security are universal and where people never have to decide about whether or not to end a pregnancy based on access to resources. We also envision a world where abortion is destigmatized to the extent that people who have access to resources may still choose to end a pregnancy for reasons of their own choosing. Access to resources should not dictate whether a person feels they must end or must continue a pregnancy. We respect and honour the ability of each person to decide if and when their body is used to sustain life and, by extension, if and when they choose to become a mother.

The Creation of Motherhood and Abortion

As we prepared to submit this book for publication, we were reminded of the dramatic changes to abortion at a global level since this project began. Abortion is now legal in Ireland, and when we initially did a call for submissions, it was illegal. There have also been several abortion bans across the United States, and the Donald Trump administration reinstated the global gag rule, which requires that international or-ganizations not provide abortions, or even a reference for one, if they want to receive financial aid. As we celebrate the progress of some places to affirm abortion rights, we are also deeply concerned about how policies like the global gag rule will impact people, especially women and mothers, worldwide.

An early complication to this book was that one of the original coeditors could no longer be a part of the project. Heather Jackson continued the project, and Jessica Shaw replaced the other editor. This change added a new perspective. As we came to know each other as coeditors, we also came to know and appreciate each other as people. Jessica learned that Heather used to volunteer in North Dakota as a clinic escort. At her former university campus, she gathered others and convinced them to become clinic escorts and organized a prochoice student group. Heather is passionate about reproductive issues. She was a teen mother who had considered abortion and adoption when she became pregnant. Heather currently works as a licensed mental health therapist and a doula in Rhode Island, and in both roles, she works directly with people who become pregnant, choose abortion, experience miscarriages, and have difficult times while parenting their children.

Heather learned that Jessica is a full-spectrum doula, a member of the National Abortion Federation, and that she works closely with people across the globe who self-manage their own abortions and who provide abortions outside of legal and medical systems. She has a PhD in social work and her dissertation focused on the experiences of abortion providers, many of whom are mothers.

Collectively, we know that reproductive choices are much more complex than whether a pregnancy is planned or desired. Sometimes wanted pregnancies make women mothers, and sometimes unwanted pregnancies make women mothers. Sometimes abortion is a desired pregnancy outcome, and sometimes abortion is an undesired pregnancy outcome. Both mothering and abortion can involve feelings of hope, happiness, sadness, and grief. Rather than thinking of them as being opposing experiences, we understand abortion and mothering to be two converging experiences, among the many that can make up a woman’s reproductive life.

Although we attempted to include experiences of transgender and genderfluid people, we were unsuccessful in attracting a submission that specifically addresses abortion and parenthood at the intersections of gender, which is a notable absence in this collection. More work must be done to understand and honour diverse pregnancy experiences, and as ciswomen, we can and must do better to affirm our solidarity with transgender and genderfluid people. Gender is fluid and complex. We acknowledge that people who become pregnant do not always identify as women, girls, or mothers or use the pronouns she/her/hers. We know and understand that sometimes men and genderfluid people get pregnant, have abortions, and/or become parents. In alignment with our personal and professional pursuits of deconstructing gender and patriarchal assumptions, we note that the term mother is highly gendered, and we use it to refer to people who self-identify as mothers. We encourage and look forward to future publications that explore how abortion is experienced by people who are not ciswomen as well as how it intersects with parenthood more generally.

We also acknowledge that race, class, and sexuality affect abortion and motherhood. While none of the chapters focus specifically on those issues, they are intertwined throughout the chapters, just as they are intertwined throughout people’s lives. We are mindful that as white editors, it is not our role to speak for women of colour but rather to amplify the work that is being done by individuals and collectives, such as SisterSong Women of Color Reproductive Justice Collective and the Native Youth Sexual Health Network—collectives that challenge us to think about reproductive issues through an intersectional antiracist, anticapitalist, anticolonialist, and environmentally conscious lens.

We also acknowledge and appreciate that clinical abortions—those done under the supervision of licensed medical professionals—are not the only kind of abortions that people have. Sometimes people have abortions outside of legal and medical systems, supported either by community-based providers or self-managed by themselves, and those abortions can be safe. Sometimes people obtain abortion services within legal and clinical settings and those abortions are not always safe physically or emotionally. Just as there are complexities between abortion and motherhood, there are complex ways that legal and medical systems intersect with people’s abortion experiences.

Although our initial ideas and thoughts around the intersections of motherhood and abortion are not all addressed in this book, we still attempt to fill in certain gaps in the literature, such as the role of abortion providers and mothers, how to normalize abortion with children, the role of abortion doulas, current issues related to the state of abortion, legislative concerns, and abortion as art.

Chapter Overview

Each chapter in this book provides a unique perspective on mothering and abortion. We were surprised and excited at how many chapters we received that brought forward a new idea. We brainstormed potential themes for the collection but concluded that each chapter relates to the overarching theme of abortion and mothering so uniquely that they can and do stand on their own. We also have several art pieces that we felt were important to include in this collection—from artists who desired to share their understanding and experiences of abortion, motherhood, and activism.

Reproductive Maze, by Winnie T. Frick, graces our cover. We felt this was an appropriate cover to describe the book, as it visualizes the complication of reproductive choices, and how oftentimes people are met with barriers related to making their choices (e.g., resources, laws, access, identity, politics, and more).

Artists Shaun Slifer and Rebecca Susman contributed beautiful pennants that we placed throughout the book. Each pennant is accompanied by a phrase in both English and Spanish.

Miriam Rose Brooker interviewed twenty-three Australian women on their experiences of their abortion in her chapter, Abortion: Mothering, Unmothering, and the Liminal Space in Between. Most of the women who were interviewed were mothers. The interviewees also created artwork and were asked to describe it and how it related to their experiences. Most mothers chose abortions for their work and felt they were being responsible mothers for having an abortion, while others felt they simply did not want children. Brooker highlights the experiences of these women through the semi-structured interview and art sessions with participants.

Victoria Poole’s embroidery artwork embodies working together and working towards the light at the end of the tunnel. As our rights and lives often depend on access to services, it was helpful to remember the light and support from others.

Jessica Shaw interviewed family physicians for her chapter, Abortion Providers as Mothers, with Mothers. Shaw explores one of the central themes of this collection: Abortion is about the same women at different times of their lives. She also highlights the importance of sharing stories to combat stigma and humanize the people who work as abortion providers.

Alison Ojanen-Goldsmith’s poem, Goddess Recovers a Mistake, is about having an abortion. The poem has a unique perspective on choosing an abortion, as she describes some of the feelings and thoughts she had as she made this decision.

Meredith Stern’s relief print, Our Bodies, Our Rights describes and captures what we want in this world. Stern describes the many things humans need in order to have a decent life. She also incorporates statistics on who tends to have abortions.

In ‘Relief or Regret’ The Emotional Implications of Abortion, Meredith Navarro-McCullar interviewed six women who had under-gone at least one abortion procedure. The interviews produced several different themes. She found that none of the women expressed any regret postabortion, while arguing that women deserve to have agency over their bodies and decisions.

In Abortive Subjectivities, Laura Major examines the relationship between maternity and creativity by analyzing the way in which the childbirth metaphor manifests itself in abortion poetry. She considers how abortion poetry often reflects an atypical disembodiment, which influences how subjectivity is constructed.

In Ireland: Narratives of Motherhood and Abortion, Christina Quinlan uses narrative analysis to discuss abortion in Ireland and abortion. At the time this chapter was originaly written, abortion was still illegal in Ireland. Quinlan provides a unique perspective on narratives of motherhood and abortion in sample opinion pieces.

In Teaching daughters (and sons) that abortion is good, Heather Jackson describes her own journey to motherhood and how it made her passionately and unapologetically proabortion and prochoice. She describes how her prochoice politics influenced (and were influenced by) her pregnancy and how they influence the way that she parents her daughter.

In I Want to Get My Education Straight: The Impact of Con-temporary Cultural Expectations on Teenage Pregnancy Decision Making, Sarah Bekaert describes her research into the experiences of teenagers who chose to have an abortion and then choose to carry a subsequent pregnancy during their teenage years to term. Woven through some of the stories are the relationships that the teenagers have with their own mothers—a complicating factor in their own determination about whether they want to become mothers themselves.

Mary Thompson explores abortion decision-making processes in mommy memoirs in her chapter, "Selective Abortions in Martha Beck’s Expecting Adam and Ayelet Waldman’s Bad Mother." Each memoir she analyzes has women who chose to have abortions at different times in their lives and for different reasons. She uses an intersectional feminist lens as she interprets each story and experience.

In Teaching Students Abortion Rights Leads to More Rights for Them, Crystal Michels, a teacher and mother, analyzes how states regulate education and how teachers teach based on that (or not). She summarizes her findings to abortion rights in various states which are an interesting perspective on how to continue to fight for access to abortion.

Heather Jackson’s photo the story of how i got pregnant concludes the collection and captures a common experience: You can get pregnant while using preventative measures (and that is how Heather got pregnant), which is why all choices need to be accessible and safe.

Conclusion

Abortion and Mothering is a collection of academic writing, personal narratives, and art, which presents different perspectives on abortion and mothering. We included chapters that help us think about how to approach this topic with our children, friends, students, coworkers, and ourselves. Although we wanted to include scholarly research, we also wanted to centre voices and experiences outside of academia through the inclusion of personal narratives, poetry, and art.

Even though there is still much to learn and to know about how people experience the intersection of motherhood and abortion, we feel able to make at least the following conclusions: Mothers have abortions; women have abortions and become mothers; and women have