How My Friends’ Pregnancy Experiences Changed My Mind About Abortion
Chad Felix Greene @chadfelixg
January 22, 2018
I changed my views on abortion the year my best friend became pregnant. Although cliché, the experience was profound, and shaped how I see the world. Until that point I had moved ideologically from radically pro-choice in my college years to a more libertarian approach, where I justified my ambivalence through the limitations of my sex.
I argued in favor of choice as a principled position of freedom. I believed that my role was to support the views of the women around me. But all of that changed.
My position on abortion was one of the last liberal ideals to go when I found myself aligning with the Right. I had been fully convinced that women require the freedom to choose all aspects of their pregnancy. I felt it was unreasonable for conservatives to so heavily oppose what I viewed as a personal medical decision. The transition was not swift.
Reality Changed My Determination to Remain Pro-Choice
When my friend became pregnant, she was extremely excited. I remember feeling a sense of excitement myself, not only for the event but for the opportunity to validate my worldview. I was determined to prove wrong the idea that witnessing a pregnancy would create doubt in my ideology.
The beginning of her pregnancy felt strange, as the fetus’s development happened so rapidly. I was surprised when she showed me photos of the fetus at what I believed was the “clump of cells” stage. I remember audibly gasping at the detail of the tiny body in the image and trying to understand how it was possible so early.
I tried using the correct terms at the correct times, but found myself unable to keep up with the fetus’s rapid development. I quickly found myself feeling silly referring to it as a “fetus.” My friend called it her “baby” from day one, and so did everyone else, including her doctors.
As I watched her pregnancy develop and witnessed in awe the steady stream of images of her baby, I discovered that my previous sense of certainty was fading. At no time could I reasonably argue that it was “okay” to end its life. Before their second trimester, I had witnessed breathtaking images, listened to her describe the baby’s heartbeat, and began reading about the baby’s development.
I felt discomfort as a new paradigm began overriding my previous and strongly held moral belief in the supremacy of choice. I supported abortion because I believed it was vital that a woman have the freedom to determine her own future and what happened to her body. But I was now faced with the realities of what an abortion would entail. Within the first few weeks of her finding out, letting us know, and getting ultrasound photos, there was no clear-cut line in which I felt comfortable saying “an abortion is acceptable now.”
My inner conflict featured a confrontation between an idea and a reality I was experiencing. The further the pregnancy progressed, the more deeply connected I felt to the child I was witnessing develop before my eyes. Naturally, when I felt her kick for the first time, my self-doubt was nearly gone completely. How could it be reasonably asserted that this being was anything other than a growing human life?
This Tiny Baby Changed All of Our Lives—For the Better
The child was born prematurely. As I supported my friends through uncertainty, sleepless nights, and an endless stream of hospital visits, the significance of this little life became clear. She had changed all of our lives, and we found such joy and hope in seeing her slowly grow and thrive. I had never felt such care, protective instinct, and compassion. Recognizing this tiny life had been developing inside my friend’s womb mere days before being born forced me to challenge everything I believed made me an educated and socially appropriate person.
Often the abortion debate relies on the argument of what happens before pregnancy and immediately after, in care for the child. But for me the realization was deeper that just recognizing a new and surprising love for this child. An entire world of possibility opened inside me when I reflected on the development, from conception to birth, and failed to see any period of time when the child I loved ceased to be that child. The distinctions were arbitrary, and the value placed on this child’s life was equally as arbitrary….
https://thefederalist.com/2018/01/22/friends-pregnancy-experiences-changed-mind-abortion/