Stanek weekend question: Who’s to blame for abortion regret?
This weekend question comes via abortion apologist Amanada Marcotte, who wrote at RH Reality Check on March 3:
Iowa is now considering a bill that would allow abortion patients to sue a doctor for abortion regret, even if they received counseling and signed informed consent forms prior to the abortion. The bill gives women a ten-year window to come to the conclusion that they regret their abortion and to sue. Since none of us really knows where we’ll be in ten years, this opens abortion providers up to all sorts of unfair lawsuits, since there’s no way to know that the 21-year-old women’s studies major with a pro-choice button on her bag getting an abortion today is going to get married and join a fundamentalist church and decide she must produce “abortion regret” in penance before she’s 30.
More to the point, the bill shows how cynical and insincere anti-choicers are when they pretend to care about women experiencing abortion regret. If they actually cared about women who are suffering from abortion regret, they wouldn’t blame the doctor. They would blame the people who actually caused the regret. For instance, you would be able to sue a partner or parent who shamed you, or your church for telling you that your past behavior was sinful, or your local anti-choice organization for provoking these feelings of shame and regret. That makes a whole lot more sense that blaming the doctor.
If you read the abortion regret stories that proliferate in anti-choice circles, what comes across loud and clear is that the feelings of regret owe far more to the pressure from churches and right-wing organizations and other people in the community who shame women than to doctors – who in many cases were the only people who were generous and non-shaming to the women.
Thoughts?
[Photo via Slate]
Jill Stanek is a nurse turned speaker, columnist and blogger, a national figure in the effort to protect both preborn and postborn innocent human life.
Fact: you can’t make me feel guilty for doing something I don’t already think is wrong.
The bill sounds odd to me, especially the statute of limitations attached to it. However, the question is a good one. Women who are pressured or shamed into abortion have definitely been wronged–especially since coercion is illegal.
As for the provider, consent needs to be taken very seriously (throughout the medical industry, btw, not just in abortion mills) by all parties involved.
What stories is she reading?? Because the ones I read are pretty uniform in their condemnation of doctors who hid the truth.
Lol their walls are cracking! I could think of at least 10 women who would sue….maybe more! They are doing this to themselves! The abortion industry with filth death toll of women rising the botch jobs…just met a 26 year old with a pending lawsuit against Preterm..botched abortion resulted in a hysterectomy.
The whole discussion is absurd. Who’s to blame for abortion regret? You can start with the abortive parents who chose to pay a hit-man to murder their own child. They should sue themselves. They know full well what they are doing when they go to have an abortion. If this passes, then perhaps Iowa should pass legislation that allows people who pay to have their spouses killed sue the hit-men they hired. Or the government for making them feel guilty about hiring the hit-man. The fact this stuff is taken seriously is a cultural indicator of how ignorant we have become.
Jon I can meet you in the middle. I believe IF this were to ever happen the women should have to donate their winnings to a pro life organization. I dont think they should get to keep the $. Weve had this discussion before and some people agreed with me and some did not. Oh well.
Heather, they shouldn’t win their case. Paying money out for a service successfully rendered implies contractual agreement. The woman who pays for an abortion is just as guilty as the one who actually does the slaughter. At least, that’s how it has always been understood in murder cases where conspiracies are concerned.
The real news story here may be that elements of the pro-life movement don’t consider abortion to be murder.
Jon anything to get abortion off the table is a start. Im just saying that any winnings should go to a charity or pL org. It would be a start.
For instance, you would be able to sue a partner or parent who shamed you, or your church for telling you that your past behavior was sinful
Does she mean this just for when someone is murdered?
Or can I sue my mom for making me take back the nightlight I stole from a vacation cabin when I was eight? Could my son sue me for taking away his play station when he called me a vile name? Could my other son sue me when I took away the car keys when he broke curfew? Could the drug dealer sue the police officer who found the drug under his car seat? Could my ex sue me for yelling at him when I caught him with another woman? Could I sue a priest for telling me to “go and sin no more.”?
This could be fun.
It probably wont work anyway. Too many abortions and too many years gone by. There wouldnt be enough $$ to pay for all the suits.
Who is to blame? Last time I checked we were all accountable for our own actions. The only time I cant say this would be in a case where a teen was pressured by her parents. Grown women …not so much. OR sometimes it is the fathers fault or BOTH!
I find it odd that we’re totally capable of totally controlling how women think and feel AFTER the abortion, but are totally incapable of controlling them BEFORE the abortion.
They know full well what they are doing when they go to have an abortion. Mr. Jon Speed
Define “informed consent.”
Amanda would define it. Mr. Jon Speed would define it.
I could define it from my experience of 23 years ago.
But I want the truth.
What “informed consent” form are women signing that states they “might one day feel regret??”
Does “informed consent” today include risks of depression? Suicidal thoughts and attempts? Increased drug or alcohol abuse? Subsequent abortions? Nightmares? Difficulty bonding with other children? The physical risks of hemorrage, infertility, PID, breast cancer, a trip to the ER to have a total hysterectomy to stop the bleeding and remove the rest of the dead baby, death?
Are women signing the form saying they are ok risking death for their abortion? Are they signing it after this consent form has been explained to them in detail? Or are we still being told abortion is “a gentle suctioning out of the uterine contents?”(Which I found on a Planned Parenthood website describing the procedure) That a “clump of cells” is removed thus “terminating the pregnancy?”
Somebody get ahold of the consent forms from a mill please.
And you are DARN RIGHT I would sue!! (And many of my friends would. I hope they do!!) But my statute of limitations has passed. My forms have all been destroyed.
Allow me to clarify. I would not sue for abortion REGRET. I would sue for lack of informed consent. For all of the things I might experience AFTER abortion that I never knew
I might experience. I was never told. I signed a form that said I might have a headache, a fever or bleed excessively and to call the mill if those things happened. I was told
to take aspirin and that a feeling of relief is normal.
I will carry my regret the rest of my days.
Many women going to have an abortion lack the information to understand the choice they are making. That was more true in the past, when not a whole lot was known about fetal development, but it is still true now. When the “counselor” in the clinic tells you that “it’s just a blob of cells; it doesn’t look like a baby and it isn’t a baby,” are you really and truly making an informed choice when in reality your baby has a bearing heart, arms, legs, fingers, toes, and a brain? It is a doctor’s job not to lie to a patient about the risks and consequences of a medical procedure. Failure of informed consent could be a cause of action, I would think.
The question is good but her argument assumes a whole different understanding of the source of shame and guilt. She believes shame is a socially created reality, whereas traditional minded folks believe shame stems from our conscience. Our view of shame related to abortion is the awareness of the act of abortion as killing a person. Marcotte obviously does not believe, or simply won’t accept that an unborn child is a person. So, she won’t believe that we can develop develop a conscience regarding the matter if she believes in conscience at all.
As far as blaming the doctor, I don’t see how easily there would be grounds for malpractice. There is negligence when there’s failure to provide accurate information for informed consent, but then there’s a need to establish post-abortion stress syndrome to help enforce these judgements. ultimately as long as the law says its a choice not a person then there seems little basis for a woman to blame a doctor for her choice.
Shame comes from a wrong action. There is shame in drug addiction abortion theft gossiping homosexuality..not so much anymore but there IS shame in wrong choices. My husband was ashamed of his revolving door of being in and out of prison.
Can a woman sue the plastic surgeon who deforms her face and breasts? I don’t understand the basis of this… but I will always always always support anything that puts a dent in an abortionist’s profits. I will always support anything that makes the pro-aborts squirm.
Interesting how Marcotte leaves out coercing parents, boyfriends, and pimps. Abortion clinics’ staff and doctors know full well that some abortions are coerced. They accept the sham consent forms anyway, thinking they are covering their liability.
Women should absolutely be able to sue doctors who give sham consent forms and do not give accurate information regarding risks of abortion.
Why prolifers don’t follow this trail more often is beyond me. Why supposed feminists don’t care is obvious- their personal access to abortion means more to them than their sisters who were coerced into an abortion or given incomplete information. Marcotte is one of these- forgetting the pain of her sisters to advance her defense of abortion. Pathetic.
Pathetic times a million.
The Democrats know woman are being coerced and forced to abort. Their own Representative Alvin Holmes from Montgomery has admitted it.
Now let’s see him join forces to outlaw abortion. Or is he under the same Dead-Babies-No-Matter-What spell that Marcotte is under?
MOST abortions are done under duress, the girl/woman is being forced by fear and coerced by parents/boyfriend/husband/boss, not with a gun to her head but with a threat over it and she feels abortion is her only option (especially if the abortion provider does not give in depth details of the other options), then yes, sue the bastards…sue the parents/boyfriend/husband/boss and doctor!
When I had my abortion I was given a 5 minute counseling session and was never told of the risks of depression, infertility, abusive behavior and shame and guilt that could and did follow.
Today abortion clinics are suppose to inform the girl/woman of these risks, sadly they give them the information over the phone when the appointment is made…imagine yourself being scared out of your mind and all you want is for it to be over, you would do anything, say anything just to make it go away. These clinics know most girls/women called are completely freaked out.
Years ago my father signed a contract with someone right after my mother passed away. He was able to get out of it because he was not in his mind frame of mind. Abortion clinics are taking advantages of girls and women not being in their right frame of mind. I know I wasn’t.
Any woman like AM has thrown all of her sisters under the bus. I tried to post a polite PL comment on her blog and IMAGINE that! It was awaiting moderation and NEVER went through. She will not hear you or welcome your input unless you accept birth control abortion or Plan B. Whatever Amanda. Youre a joke!
Totally agree Ann Marie. Fear, desperation, anxiety……not a good place to be to make a “choice” that will affect you for the rest of your life.
And do 24 hour waiting periods help with any of that?
WHO signs an informed consent form and the next minute is undergoing the procedure? In what other procedure is this done? Under duress.
Anywhoooo……the abortionist did not talk to me. It was the “counselors” that spewed the lies. Sue them.
I am all for this can of worms to be open. But we seriously need to understand/consider which can. Which worms.
Women should be able to have access to legal counsel and/or recourse after abortion. Maybe it is time to SERIOUSLY consider this.
Amanda Marcotte is a demon. A truly evil person.
Amanda Marcotte is a demon. A truly evil person.
So now demons are persons but preborn humans are not?
Confusing.
LOL. How American. Rather than solve a problem, hold ourselves accountable for our own decisions or actions, and deal with regret with action and introspection, lets SUE AND GET LOTS OF MONEY!!! Because nothing says “I genuinely want to heal from the regret of an abortion” like “sweet, I can get rich!!”
I love the precedent this would set too. Can I sue an ex boyfriend I regret spending a year of my life with because he lied to me about being a good person? Can I sue a dentist I regret doing work on my teeth because 8 years later I realize I was just being vain?
The “problem” of unplanned pregnancies can be “solved” by pulling up our big girl pants and helping our fellow women with support, help and hope. Not killing.
And since we are talking about abortion regret Amanda and not your ex boyfriend or your dentist……um. No precedent would be set for that would it?
A precedent for the suing about the very real risks of abortion….yes.
And yeah. Totally rich. LOL
Grief is innate. People who survive situations in which others die can experience feelings of guilt even when they were not in the least responsible. How much more can we understand the guilt of a post abortive mother. I struggled too, with feelings of guilt, grief, anger. I even told myself I must be weak for not “handling” it better. I don’t know whether it’s true or not that an abortionist can’t stop the procedure once its started (I suspect it can be stopped and an ultrasound performed to see if the little one has survived intact). But after my experience, I would like to it tested in court. If a feminist like Marcotte agrees that a woman can back out of a sexual experience at any moment, then it would be the height of hypocrisy to deny an abortion client the right to back out at any time, even in the stirrups. I would have sued the ghoul myself, but I was a coward and could not bring myself to even speak of my experience for years afterward. But I have a glimmer of hope: though Marcotte denies any innate guilt or shame, she has at least clued in other abortion advocates that regret stories exist.
AM is indeed demonic. Every day she opens her pie hole women die babies die abortionists get rich but lose their souls.
Jon, I have to agree with you. I guess we are both “bad” prolifers because while I believe that SOME women are coerced, many are not. I can’t believe that in the age of the internet, women do not know about fetal development nor have they taken basic biology classes. They simply do not wish to be pregnant at the time. And while I respect Carla and all of those women who regret their abortions, many women, like Christine who was here yesterday, do not and even think of it as something positive. I am sorry, but not everyone is a victim.
Hi PM I agree. I know women who have seen and kept their ultrasound pics and went ahead with the abortion anyway!
If your intention is to sue to get rich then Im not agreeing. If you sue and give it to needy kids or a pregnancy crisis center then yes!
Marcotte doesn’t care one bit about a single woman, just “women”. She’s a truly ugly, vile thing. (And that’s not considering her looks one bit, BTW.)
MM no AM only cares about pro abortion women!
Well Phillymiss Im with you. Im not bad pro life either. I have stood in front of those clinics and taken abuse. It almost became physical one day as one woman told me “I will beat your behind”! I really cleaned that up. Without losing eye contact I told her to go ahead. Instead she jumped in her car…she was pretty big…and smoked the tires and drove off. I do not take their garbage. I know they might be in pain or angry but Ive been in pain also yet they show no compassion. If they ever were to put their hands on me they sure would get it back.
And I have a friend who is like Christine. She brings it up once in a while. She does not regret her abortion and she will tell you so. On that note should I try to brow beat her and tell her “Aammm yes you DO”! It was done in 96 or so.
also, how do you prove regret? What stops a woman who is perfectly content with her abortion from putting on her best performance in the courtroom, sobbing and weeping for a nice pay day?
and Carla, I don’t think you understand what precedent means in the legal sense. If you can sue for “regret of X”, it opens up lawsuits for ANY kind of regret, using that initial case as a basis (or precedent) for a similar lawsuit. And unless a woman can convince a judge she thought that being pregnant meant there was a stuffed bunny inside her, and that was pushed through clinic doors at gunpoint, it would be very very difficult to justly make the case that a doctor misled her in to the procedure.
All this does is contribute to outrageous medical lawsuits, outrageous malpractice insurance costs, which contribute to overall outrageous healthcare costs, all without doing a single thing to reduce the number of abortions.
Amanda you do have some good points. Abortionist Martin Ruddock was sued for 1 million $ for leaving a woman sterile. Again Im sure lawyers took their cut but she ended up with a pretty good pay day. However you were at the abortion clinic doing something you shouldnt have been doing to begin with.
This is what Id written about the girl in NJ who had an abortion a few years ago and almost died herself. I said she had done the wrong thing. Should she be able to sue and win? My answer was no BUT if someone wants to prove to me that they have regret then sue them and give the $ away. Give it to a pregnancy center or a pro life organization. Give to foster children but dont keep it. The girl I know suing Preterm just had her botch job in October. She told me she was transported to Metro ( a hospital that performs abortions ) and I had my kids there. She passed out and was in her words ” bleeding to death.” She told me ” Im going through menopause at 26 years old.”
Hi Amanda,
You make excellent points. Its easy to see how this is opening a can of worms. Life is full of decisions, and I’m sure we all have plenty we would change if we could.
People make the wrong decisions, foolish decision, bad decisions. Some pay a terrible price for making those decisions. Its called life. Sadly, we can’t always change the consequences of our decisions or be compensated for making them.
My former brother in law wants to file a wrongful deathsuite on behalf of his brother and his Suboxone OD. I said “Good luck because it wont get you anywhere.” My husband did not take the med as ordered and he died.
I thought everything wrong in America was Bush’s fault? No?
Hi heather,
An 11y/o boy in our town lost his legs several years ago when he played too close to the railroad tracks. The parents tried to sue the railroad, stating they should post guards! OK, how far apart should they post guards? 1 mile, 1/2 mile, 100 feet? Any idea how long railroad tracks extend? Folks, how about keeping a closer eye on your kid? Better yet, understand that children do dangerous and foolish things, because they’re well, children. Some may pay a terrible price, some may walk away unscathed.
We had 3 teenage girls killed in a drunk driving accident. The girls stopped at a restaurant after drinking then drove and were killed. The parents actually tried to sue an off duty police officer who was having his dinner at the same restaurant for not recognizing the girls were intoxicated and taking their keys!! Why not sue everyone else in the restaurant? Does he have some magical ability to look at people and know their blood alcohol? Especially when their behavior seems normal? Chances are he just had his dinner, read his paper, and did what most of us do in a restaurant, which is pay little attention to other patrons.
Sorry folks, as a parent I feel for you and your loss, but your daughters made the foolish decision to drink and drive, they paid the ultimate price, and there is no one to blame but them.
You can technically prove if the PTSD caused by abortion is legitimate, it is the same brain scan they do on vets and it proves that the experience is not manufactured by bystanders second hand pandering but experienced 1st hand. The many i know who regretted their abortion were horrified, not by what any one person said to them afterwards, but by the callouss physical torment inflicted upon them by the procedure.
“Women denied abortions & who keep their babies eventually come around to accepting and even embracing their status as mothers. Only 5% say they still regret having to deliver their baby. Nine percent ultimately choose adoption.” (article by JOSHUA LANG, June 12, 2013, NY TIMES, ClickHere to read). However, women with no history of mental illness, will have a 70% higher rate of deliberately self-inflicting harm after having an abortion (than after delivering a child), according to a 1995 study by A.C. Gilchrist as reported in the British Journal of Psychiatry. They have a 6 times greater suicide rate, according to a 1996 study conducted in Finland by pro-‘choice’ researcher Mika Gissler, (released in the British Medical Journal). Helping mothers will annually increase the number of adoption-available newborns to over 65,250. Pro-‘choice’ Amanda Marcotte states: “It’s no doubt tempting for abortion opponents to cite the many stories of turnaway mothers [women denied abortions] who grew to embrace motherhood as a way to make their case for banning abortion. But bluntly put, what other option do these women have?” (article by JILL STANEK, ClickHere to read). Ads in magazines, billboards & Church bulletins direct women to provisions, security shelters, a surplus of life-giving options & facts soothing all concerns. Abortion is not liberation. Modern household appliances have done more to ‘free’ women that have abortion & abortifacents. Women have a 95% success rate of not only adjusting, but of benefitting from unintended pregnancy. “Choice” is antithetical to a woman’s life-giving infrastructure, & essential sexual core.
As PL people, we have no problem accepting that women may experience post partum depression and even psychosis. At one time this condition, referred to as the “baby blues” was not taken very seriously, mainly by male doctors who would of course “know” better than women. I haven’t heard any PL people in a state of vehement denial about the existence of this condition.
So why is it so difficult for PA people to accept the possibility that women might, just might, experience post abortion depression or emotional trauma from their abortions?
I regret getting married. I now know I was not fully informed and that the pre-marital ‘counselling’ was in part misleading.
Who can I sue?
It would be cleaner to eliminate the demand and the availability of abortions in a more straightforward way, but fighting the pro-aborts using their own processes seems like the expedient thing to do.
We could get laws passed, in all the states, to allow suits for abortion regret and to allow families of deceased to sue for physician assisted suicide regret. (There are many hungry lawyers to feed.)
Then, after these laws had done their work, we we could trade them in to make wrongful life lawsuits illegal.
These laws would do the same thing to the death industry that Obamacare is designed to do to the private health insurance industry, as well as health care in general.
Bucket of duh, Reality, it’s called divorce.
If it can be shown that a consent form was signed under duress, and that the abortion patient was coerced in any way into a medical procedure to which she did not give full consent, and that the doctor or her staff knew about it, then there exists grounds for a lawsuit.
If it can be demonstrated that the consent forms lacked pertinent information regarding the procedure and its risks, etc., then there could be grounds for a lawsuit.
No one claims that all post-abortive girls and women are victims. Marcotte and other abortion defenders are ignoring the true and painful stories of women and girls who have undergone coerced abortions, forced abortions, and abortions without full knowledge of the procedure. Maybe they think they are shielding the abortion docs and staff. But their words on the subject are (no surprise!) NOT pro-woman.
Pre-marital ‘counselling’ and a marriage ceremony isn’t a divorce 9ek!
If I apply your approach to the topic of abortion it would be ‘Bucket of duh, it’s called abortion’.
Divorce used to be very difficult to obtain, then it became on-demand.
This isn’t about whether we think post abortive women are victims or not. I refuse to get into that discussion.
This isn’t about post abortive women who DON’T regret their abortions and what we think about that.
Should post abortive women be able to sue over abortion regret? I say NO.
Regret is the consequence of my sin. The sin of promiscuity, the sin of abortion. I regret the self destructive behavior that led up to my abortion. I regret my abortion. I will live with it.
BUT if it can be proven that the very real risks of emotional, physical and psychological damage that abortion brings to the lives of women was NOT on that consent form we should be allowed to sue over it. Damn straight.
Is there informed consent with abortion? THAT is the question. The risks are so great and EVERY single post abortive woman that regrets her abortion that I have talked to has stated, “I never knew…….” She never knew she might have her bowels and intestines pulled out through her uterine wall. She never knew she might get PID. She never knew the powerful suction of the vacuum could so twist her fallopian tubes that she might be rendered infertile. She never knew that her babies dead body might float around in her uterus and cause a raging infection. Real stories. Real people. Real risks of abortion.
And I need all of you to be aware of something. When prolife legislation comes up post abortive women are called upon to testify. Called upon to stand in front of total strangers and tell of the psychological, emotional and physical damage that abortion has wrought in their lives. They stand and they testify the truth of what abortion has done. WHY? So that other women do not have to endure it. Our stories matter. Our voices matter. And we care enough to try and WARN others of the very real risks of abortion.
You have post abortive women to thank whenever prolife legislation is passed. If we are not there testifying in person then our stories are being filed as friend of the court briefs. Again. You have us to thank.
IF the very real risks of emotional, physical, psychological risks of abortion are explained in detail and a woman given the time to decide and signs that form and she has full informed consent, NOT under any duress and free from coercion or force of any kind and the procedure explained in detail of what will happen to her baby during abortion, and that she see that ultrasound and hear that heartbeat we would not be having this discussion.
IF she doesn’t she should be allowed to sue. And the form that she signs is key. The words that are used to describe the risks and procedure are key.
Amanda Marcotte does not get to decide that. Amanda Marcotte gets to stir up her minions with lies and half truths. I expect nothing less.
Her voice means nothing to me.
Signed,
One who testifies.
Sue your boyfriend. Sue your dentist. Get divorced.
Bunny trails. Indeed.
Well said, Carla.
Right. I have never seen an abortion consent form but I do believe they have to tell you about some of the risks. My friend who aborted in 96 told me she signed a stack of paperwork prior to her abortion. Did she read it? Idk. Will I ask her? No. I had a uterine polyp removed and uterine perforation and a lot of other things were on my forms as far as risks. I cant recall if death was one of them. I do see the abortion clinics dropping and closing. More lawsuits ARE a good idea!
BC is also on the rise for causing breast cancer. Depo Provera made the list. I was not told this by the NP @PP and took it for 14 years. I doubt any class action lawsuit would work. The abortion industry is killing women yet the blinded women believe its helping us. ANY BC is murder too.
sue the bunny?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rabbit_test
hoppity hop :-)
“IF the very real risks of emotional, physical, psychological risks of abortion are explained in detail and a woman given the time to decide and signs that form and she has full informed consent, NOT under any duress and free from coercion or force of any kind and the procedure explained in detail of what will happen to her baby during abortion, and that she see that ultrasound and hear that heartbeat we would not be having this discussion. IF she doesn’t she should be allowed to sue. And the form that she signs is key. The words that are used to describe the risks and procedure are key. ”
I stayed out of the discussion because I didn’t want to sound callous towards regretful post-abortive women, but I completely agree with this. No, regret in itself isn’t something anyone can sue over. Otherwise I could sue my old drug buddy over a terrible tattoo he gave me when I was fifteen or so (actually I think giving under-agers tattoos is illegal so maybe I do have a case haha). BUT if the informed consent forms that the woman signed did not contain information about the real risks of abortion, or if the woman can prove she was under duress or coercion and the clinic/doctor/etc was aware of that, I think that’s a case for a lawsuit. I’m certainly no expert on medical malpractice or stuff like that, but I think that if a doctor or clinic is deliberately withholding information or is aware a patient is getting a procedure under duress or coercion that there is a case for a lawsuit.
Right Mary and Jack…just read your posts. BTW nobody could sue Houdari…he chucked everyones medical records into a dumpster along with dead babies!