Why I Had a Second-Term Abortion

Everyone's talking about the murder of George Tiller, the Kansas doctor assassinated because of his work providing late-term abortions to women (and, it must be said, girls). Much of the talk, on television anyway, centers on political questions: Will the Tiller murder reignite abortion as an issue at this delicate moment, just as a new justice is being considered for the Supreme Court? Will conservative pundits bear some responsibility for their characterization of the doctor as "Tiller the killer"? Does criticizing those who demonized him amount to a call for censorship?

The questions I would ask are different: Will someone else take over Tiller's practice? How many places are left that will offer the service he did, terminating pregnancy in the second and even third trimesters? Who will take care of these mothers when they find themselves facing the worst choice ever?

Choice isn't just a euphemism for abortion, and it's not a political term of art either. The women who went to Dr. Tiller weren't seeking to abort pregnancies they hadn't chosen in the first place; they went to him because of wanted pregnancies that had gone terribly wrong, because they and their wished-for children got stuck with the worst luck ever - because they found themselves in situations they never, ever would have chosen. I know because I could have been one of them.
I hadn't expected to be pregnant again. Our son was only eighteen months old, and at forty I wasn't sure I was all that fertile. But my period was late and as I remembered our kid-free weekend getaway a few weeks earlier, I immediately used the last in an old boxful of pregnancy tests, left over from our days of trying to conceive our son. When it came up positive I was shocked, then thrilled - then worried, since it was an oldish test, possibly expired. My husband was out of town so I dragged the toddler off to the drugstore to buy some newer tests - these, too, showed the pale blue crosses. I called my husband's cellphone. Out with friends, he shared the news right away; they all drank to our great good fortune.

Because we'd had a miscarriage before conceiving the toddler, and because of my age, I got an early ultrasound at eight weeks. I took the pictures - the baby looked like a child's drawing of a teddy bear, circles etched in white, floating in a dark sack - when I traveled to my hometown for my father's retirement party. After I returned, around eleven weeks pregnant, we heard the baby's galloping heartbeat via the Doppler listening device.

"Nice strong heartbeat," the doctor said. "You can relax now." I started to take her advice. I thought, having had a miscarriage before our son, that I had already been through the worst my reproductive life had to offer, and was now getting to the good stuff. I was wrong.

To read the rest of the article, go tobabble.