My Life’s Work Unravels

 In 1967 the birth control pill became legal for single women. I was seventeen. Three years later I got on the pill. It was too late I was pregnant the first time I did it. My two female roommates assured me this couldn’t happen. I believed them then it happened to me.

I was lucky, through a network of women I knew a doctor who did abortions. I lived in Hawaii one of three states that just months before passed laws legalizing abortion. This was before Roe vs Wade. I was lucky I went to Plan Parenthood to get birth control. The world was on the brink of reproductive rights for all women.

I was lucky I didn’t have an illegal abortion. I had a safe abortion by a certified doctor. I was not added to the list of women who were found in a dumpster; found bleeding to death in a hotel room; found in a taxi on the way to someplace unknow after a blotched abortion. The women’s reproductive rights movement was already mobilized. The network of women calling themselves “JANE” was aiding women to find safe abortions in places where abortion was illegal.

After my abortion my longing for reproductive rights got more desperate. By now I was living in New York City. I went to get an IUD at a clinic in Spanish Harlem. I was barely able to make rent at the time. They promised complete reproductive health for $10. I believed them. For some reason I still had some trust brought about by all those years of conditioning by the male establishment.

When I got to the clinic, I laid down on the exam table while the doctor took his time to get ready to insert my IUD. He started stroking my leg. Asking me personal questions. I looked at the nurse she wouldn’t look at me. Finally, I moved my leg away. The doctor continued asking me personal questions but at least he stopped stroking my leg. Finally, the doctor inserted the IUD. I clenched the table having no idea what he was doing.

No one every explained what they were doing when they did a pelvic exam. A pelvic exam was just something women didn’t talk about because it might educate us on our sexuality, might give us some control over our bodies. We don’t talk about women’s labia either. You don’t see pictures of women’s labia in the movies, or even in pornography. We hide our labia not only from everyone around us but from ourselves too.

Years later I found out the copper IUD I got inserted was experimental. I don’t remember this ever being explained in the paperwork I signed. Soon after getting the IUD I went back to the clinic for a follow-up exam that was included in the $10. The clinic gave me a clean bill of health. I questioned this because I could feel something was going wrong in my vagina. They kept the truth from me. The clinic, the doctor, the scientist had me right where they wanted me. They wanted me to doubt myself. They wanted me to believe them, count on them to keep me healthy, to keep me from getting pregnant. I was serving their purpose. Later I learned not to believe them.

Later I joined a Self-Help Health women’s conscious raising group.  I learned to do a speculum exam on myself and on other women. I got a look at my genitals for the first time. It was obvious I had some kind of an infection. This moment was not a moment of shame, it was a moment of power. That first meeting I realized the impact that a group of women can have. I got new ways of thinking about my body. That’s right “MY BODY.” For months after this I tested the medical establishment to see where the weak spots were. I looked for all the places I could grab more control.

This control didn’t always come without harassment. I found this out when I went down to a medical supply store and asked to buy a metal speculum. The man behind the counter asked for my medical credentials. I told him I didn’t have any. I asked him if I needed a prescription from a doctor. He said no but they only sell to doctors. I told him I have a right to buy a speculum and that I already owned a plastic one but wanted something of better quality. He sold me that metal speculum. I have now officially joined a new wave of women’s liberation.

This new wave of women’s liberation gave me the courage to say out loud “I want birth control on demand.” “I wanted total control over my body.”  “I wanted to help other women get the same.” I was lucky, abortion had become legal during my fight. Clinics for women; controlled by women; started up all across the country. I moved to Seattle where there was a network of women’s clinics. Fremont Women’s Clinic, which I was a founding member, was one these clinics. There was Aradia in Seattle too. It lasted thirty years, longer than any other women’s clinic in the nation, closing its doors in 2007.

Through these clinics we educated ourselves and the women who came in about reproductive rights and how to take control their bodies. We made a network of doctors that were allies. We made ourselves known to the medical establishment that served women and let them know we were watching. We were not alone. The second wave of women’s liberation swelled into millions of women, breaking out of the old mold. Reproductive rights were a critical piece to free women.

I continued my work for reproductive rights even after I came up of the closet as a lesbian. My daughter was conceived through alternative insemination in 1984. I was part of the first wave of Lesbians having children. We first coordinated with Fremont Women’s clinic until the Seattle Times got word of what we were doing and wrote an article about lesbian’s inseminating to have children. Afraid of backlash, we immediately left the clinic, took the network underground.

To avoid the healthcare establishment and to have control of my body, I gave birth to my daughter at home. A friend of mine who was about to sit for her midwifery license helped me through the birth. Her and I were comrades in our goal to create reproductive freedom for all women. When I tell people I had a home birth, they look at me like I some kind of fanatic. I’m not a fanatic, I just want healthcare my way. A way where I am a participant, not a bystander. This has been one of my life goals.

Today I’m unlucky. Reproductive rights are being taken away. I remember thinking the start of this was in the 80’s when pro-lifers started disrupting women’s reproductive health establishments by blocking abortion clinics, degrading women trying to get in those abortion clinics to the point women turned away out of shame. Pro-lifers got more aggressive over time. They seemed to be taking their playbook from historical events like the 1916 raid on the first birth control clinic established by Margaret Sanger and her sister Ethel Byrn. This clinic only lasted nine days before it was raided, shutting it down. Both women were charged of crimes related to sharing birth control and abortion information.

Today my daughter is unlucky. She can see abortion rights going backwards.  Her future is reflected in the past. Starting with the 1821 Connecticut law outlawing abortion after “quickening.” Onto 1860 when twenty states limited abortions.  Then in 1873 the Comstock Act made it illegal to share birth control information with the public. We’ve seen hints of this in the Bush and Trump policy known as “the gag rule.” 

Texas has taken the time line further backwards with its newly enacted anti-abortion law. This law empowers ordinary citizens to police all aspects of women seeking abortion. Doctors, nurses, an Uber driver who takes a woman to an abortion clinic and even a person who shares abortion information with another woman could be at risk of a law suit as of September 2, 2021. This gives all pro-life groups who have been bombing abortion clinics, blocking access to clinics, and murdering abortion doctors, the green light to openly organize vigilante groups to police Texas’ anti-abortion law.

My daughter has taken note; this is her future and her children’s future if something isn’t done. Reversing Roe vs Wade was not the final blow. The guerilla warfare against women’s reproductive rights has rallied today State after State. Today three states don’t protect abortion rights, twelve are hostile to abortion rights and in twelve states abortion is out and out illegal. That’s a total of 27 states where it’s dangerous to seek an abortion. That’s over half of the states.

All these anti-abortion laws have deteriorated Planned Parenthood’s capacity to provide reproductive services. They have had to close clinics in rural America. It breaks my heart to see this backward motion. I worked so hard to get women their reproductive rights. This impacts women’s access to birth control and other reproductive health. This is not the age to be a young woman and I’m afraid for my daughter’s future and her daughter’s future.

Now at age 72, my life’s work is dismantling. Brick by brick, state by state. All the women-controlled clinics have long disappeared. I have no idea on what to do. I don’t know what to tell my daughter to assure access to reproductive rights. Maybe smuggle the day after pill to women in restrictive states, organize transportation networks for abortions. I look around, I no longer have a network of likeminded women. That kind of network started in the universities back in the day. Today I can’t think of one alternative organization to turn to besides Planned Parenthood. I feel more helpless than I have in a long time. I know this is not a good place to leave you but I hope you will be moved to find something to turn the tide of reproductive rights around for all women.