The Reality of Having a Third Trimester Abortion

All people could agree that one of mankind’s top priorities in life is to maintain a great quality of life, meaning to be able to enjoy life’s events, be healthy, and comfortable. Many citizens of different countries could have their own definition of their own quality of life based on the culture that they live in in their country. When talking about the moral issue of abortion, woman could say their decision to have an abortion could affects their quality of life. According to Understanding Abortion: From Mixed Feelings to Rational Thought, woman who believe that abortion does not violate any morals, feel as though having an abortion causes you to have a better quality of life than if you were to give birth. However, one’s quality of life is diminished if they choose to have an abortion rather than carrying the baby for all three trimesters and giving birth. There is a huge misconception that abortion during the third trimester is ok and harmless, when in reality, getting an abortion in the third trimester is super gruesome and hard. 

Society has taught many young women, especially those of the left, that woman should feel empowered by our right to be able to get an abortion during our third trimester. They support abortion so much that they always have left me with the impression that abortion was positive and all great. Abortion-rights advocates have stated that abortions after 20 weeks in the womb are performed because of health complications or lethal baby anomalies discovered late in the pregnancy.  However, data from the medical literature and late-term abortion providers, some planned parenthoods, indicates that most of these procedures are not performed for these reasons. It is usually done to woman because the baby would have affected relationships status’ and work related status. 

Therefore, for some woman, abortion works out for them in the long run, but you cannot deny the fact the possible trauma woman go through while actually having it done. Abortions that are performed after 20 weeks of being in the womb, when not done by induction of labor (which leads to fetal death due to prematurity), are performed by having the woman go through the “Dilation and Evacuation” procedure. These gruesome and horrid surgical techniques include crushing, removal, and dismantlement of a fetus from a woman’s uterus, weeks before, or after the fetus reaches the developmental age where they could survive without the mother according to The Reality of Late-Term Abortion Procedures. In some cases, especially when the fetus is past the stage of being healthy enough to live on its own, late term abortion may involve the lethal injection into the fetus’ heart to ensure that the fetus is alive when it is pulled out or has the ability to survive. That means that without a lethal injection, when the baby is taken out of the woman’s vagina, it has a possibility of surviving. However, according to E. Johnson, that is very rare. This means that when the fetus is extracted from the women’s vagina, there could be developed parts of the baby that the mother herself could see. This can be fairly traumatic if the women are not informed that there is a possibility for her to see a dismantled baby. Especially since it could have been her own. 

A 35 year old woman named Elizabeth had to go through an abortion at 32 weeks because her baby had complications. In the interview reported by Jezebel, she explained that since the fetus was so developed, they had to inject a lethal injection inside the baby. Once the abortion-doctor had done that, she had contractions and had to push what was left of the baby out of her vagina. 

“It was a delivery. I felt every body part coming out. I felt the whole thing.”

            She also states in the interview that it was horrific for her to do that since she knew she was giving birth to a dead child. She said it was painful not just physically but mentally. Like she said, having a late term abortion is traumatic and no where near being “easy”.

To continue, there are so many other complications that you can get from this procedure that you wouldn’t have if you gave birth to the child. These complications include:

1. Spontaneous rupture of membranes 
2. Onset of labor and fetal expulsion before surgery
3. Dilators migrate into uterine cavity
4. Allergic reaction
5. Toxic Shock Syndrome
6. Uterine hemorrhage
7. Perforation of the uterus
8. Tissue remaining in the uterus (incomplete abortion)
9. Injury to the bowl or bladder
10. Scar tissue in uterus or cervix
11. Placenta Previa in future pregnancies
12. Infertility due to the consequences of infection or damage to cervix
13. Pulmonary Embolism
14. Amniotic Fluid Embolism

Woman are not informed on the matter of late-term abortion and how you can contract many mental health issues and physical effects on the body. Giving birth instead of getting an abortion is a much safer route because most of the time, natural childbearing does not cause PTSD, or any other physical issues compared to having an abortion according to Understanding Abortion. Having the fetus’ body parts ripped out of your uterus according to Elizabeth’s story seemed so real and gruesome that it is so hard not to picture. No woman going into an abortion should think that the process is easy and will be fast. The effects of an abortion out run the procedure itself. Based on this information, woman will have no choice but to not think about the consequences and experience of this procedure. Many pro life supporters would probably tell you to just practice abstinence, but if that isn’t an option and you become pregnant, all of this information should lead you to conclude that giving birth while putting the baby up for adoption is a strong alternative to having an abortion. All of this to say that abortion is not as easy and positive as some people may say it. 

References

Johnson, E. A. (2015, January 20). The Reality of Late-Term Abortion Procedures. Charlotte Lozier Institute. https://lozierinstitute.org/the-reality-of-late-term-abortion-procedures/

Schwarz, Stephen D, Stephen D Schwarz, and Kiki Latimerm. Understanding Abortion: From Mixed Feelings to Rational Thought. Lanham, MD: The Rowman & Littlefield Publishing Group, 2012. Print.

Tolentino, J. (2019, January 22). Interview With a Woman Who Recently Had an Abortion at 32 Weeks. Jezebel. https://jezebel.com/interview-with-a-woman-who-recently-had-an-abortion-at-1781972395