My Grandmother's Desperate Choice

[mopinko]

9. i remember when the hyde amendment was passed.

i was politically active, and being next to hyde's district, it was personal. that, and the fact that cook county hospital then stopped doing them.
we were already a hotbed of resistance here, and a lot of the women who were fighting had been part of jane.

one of the activists said that we should all ask our grandmothers about abortion. many people had stories.
many like this one, about someone lost.
many had harrowing stories, but they survived.

another story that went around locally was jeannie morris (?) who was a local newser that was married to a famous football player.
the marriage went south, there were already 3 or 4 kids, and she found herself pregnant and on the verge of divorce.
she went to mexico and got an abortion.
she told her story in those days, on the teevee, w her head held high and no tears.


this has always been the antidote to the hairsplitting about who can have one and where and how safe it will be.
people really need to understand that having an unexpected pregnancy is always a sad story, w a lot of complications, and a simple rule will always be WRONG.