More on Abortion, The Janes

The Janes is a documentary about seven women who were part of an underground network that provided safe, affordable abortions for women in the 1960’s, right before Roe v Wade when abortion became a constitutional right. They interviewed many of the women who were involved. I am thrilled to see this film and others on the subject start to fill the theaters and our televisions.

My grandmother had an abortion. She had a terrible first pregnancy. She had a hard time being a mother. It wasn’t in her nature.  She came from Europe during the war. She was the youngest of 6 with a nasty mother. She was beautiful and a survivor. She got to America, met a man, and got married.  I didn’t know my Grandfather that well because he died when I was six but from everything I heard he put my Grandma on a pedestal. When she got pregnant the second time she wasn’t ready for another kid.  She had a back-alley abortion in the 1930s.  I can’t imagine how scary that must have been.

Eventually, she had my Mom putting ten years between both kids.  I am sure being a warm understanding giving mother was not in her DNA and she felt that she needed an abortion. It was suitable for her and it was suitable for the family. It was her right to choose as it should be.  

As a nation, we should deal in reality. People have sex. Women sometimes get pregnant by mistake and for whatever reasons, they aren’t ready, they can’t afford it, they were raped or abused, and they want an abortion.  Carrying a child does not happen to men. It only happens to women. What is the purpose of bringing an unwanted child into the world?

Women started going to college in droves by the 1950s. Expecting them to expand their minds to become homemakers would and did not continue. Women now have children and raise families, have jobs, run companies, and compete almost equally at all levels. Women are the support system of the world. There should be unrelenting support for women. 

Forcing women from a legal perspective to commit a felony by getting an abortion is insane. Making sure safe abortions can be done including education and access to birth control is smart. Historically rich white girls could always figure out how to get an abortion because they have the means, hence my Grandma. What is the point of keeping women without cash and access down? One word, control.

It’s criminal what we have done to women. It wouldn’t have happened to men. To return to the suffering and shame my Grandma had would be horrific

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