Aborting because of mild disability

[Myrrhine1]

I don't feel remotely comfortable with the judging tone this thread has gone into. But despite that, I feel the need to offer my opinion for some strange reason.

Like Dr. Tiller, I trust women.

I had my abortion four years ago on my birthday. It was a devastating experience and a decision that I do not regret. I've always wanted to be a mother and still do. I didn't choose to get an abortion because I didn't want to have a baby; I chose to get an abortion for many reasons, and the most important pearl of wisdom I got from that experience is that carrying a pregnancy to term is the first and most important decision a parent can make.

Sure, there is adoption. For some people, that works just fine.

I have lived with what some might call a mild disability for most of my life, but I'm really lucky because nobody really sees it and lately I've been mostly fine. I've had GAD and Depression since I was seven years old. At times, I'm highly functional. There have been times in my life where I could not leave my house for two weeks, or get out of bed for more than basic life functions. If not for the ability-access program at my university, I would have been kicked out of my BFA program this year for having a panic attack on presentation day. I've quit jobs on a whim just to prove I had control of my life. I can't count how many times I've self-harmed to establish that sense of control, or how many times I've wished myself out of existence to make the pain stop.

Here's a little of my family history with the illness:
My mom also has had GAD and Depression for most of her life. My dad was diagnosed with Depression a few years ago, but he's probably had it since childhood and has medicated with drugs and alcohol to the detriment of his family.

My oldest brother tried to kill himself when he was 22-23. About the age I was when I had my abortion. He slit his wrists and lost most of his blood. He was in and out of rehab for most of his young adult life. He died when he was 24 in a drunk driving accident. He had Depression for most of his life.

I've never met my other brother, but from what my mom has told me, he's probably also suffered from the illness. I know he's an alcoholic and has been arrested for DUI. My paternal grandfather has also struggled with the illness for many years of his life. He was an alcoholic and used to beat my dad when he was a kid.

Now, four years ago, I was in a horribly abusive relationship, trying to work my way out of a string of horribly abusive relationships (serial monogamy really with BAD BAD taste in people). I was fighting as hard as I possibly could have just to stay afloat, just to keep my job and stay in school. The man I was dating was a recovering alcoholic and addict, a pathological liar (which I sadly didn't recognize until far into the relationship), with Bipolar Disorder and a family history of the illness.

At the time, I barely had the means to take care of myself, let alone the man I was dating and a child. Forget all the genetic possibilities of GAD, Depression, Bipolar Disorder, etc... I could barely take care of myself back then. There were many reasons I made my decision, but I don't regret it. I honestly don't think I would have survived to term.

And for those who are wondering, yes I did get on meds, yes my ex is very very much an ex, and I'm really a lot better now. My fiance is fantastically supportive of me in every way, and we're looking forward to being parents together.

 

[highlivin229]

A Choice Between Four Outcomes

Hypothetical: You are pro-choice and pro-disabled people in equal measure. You are pregnant. You want an abortion. You discover that the fetus is disabled. So do you a., abort the fetus (because you didn't want a baby) or do you b., not abort (because you value disabled people)?

This choice—to abort a disabled fetus or not to abort a disabled fetus—has four outcomes.

If you abort the disabled fetus, your actions are identical to eugenic selectivity—in other words, Nazism.

If you do not abort the disabled fetus and keep it, you will have to care for a disabled person who will unavoidably have a negative impact your life. (All children have needs that drain resources from their family. But by definition, a disabled person has more needs than an able-bodied person. Hence they have a greater negative impact than able-bodied children.)

If you do not abort the disabled fetus but instead of keeping it give it up for adoption, it will either a., be adopted by a couple who will have less quality of life because of the unavoidable negative impact of the disabled fetus's needs, or b., not be adopted, and thus the disabled fetus will have a horrible life.

So of the four outcomes, which is the least worst? This is the question that has to be answered.

Just my opinion.

 

[kdt26417]

Re:

"If you abort the disabled fetus, your actions are identical to eugenic selectivity -- in other words, Nazism."

Quibble: While the Nazis did practice their own version of eugenics, they remain far more infamous for carrying out the Holocaust. They did murder 275,000 people under the eugenic banner which is a crime often grouped with the Holocaust, but not everyone would say that abortion is a proportionate evil.

What I understand of eugenics is that it is the practice of artificially manipulating the gene pool, in such a way as to theoretically improve the gene pool. If this is the case and I am of a pro-disabled mindset, then the abortion I intended to have, before I learned of the unborn child's disability, must be carried out, or else I'll be practicing the eugenics of trying to increase the amount of disability in the gene pool.

That aside, I agree that the scenario has four possible outcomes:

• The fetus is aborted and a disabled life is snuffed out.
• I bear and raise a disabled child at the cost of my own time and resources.
• Whoever adopts the disabled child raises him/her at the cost of their time and resources.
• The child might end up being raised by the State without loving parents.

Considering my original intention was to abort before I found out about the unborn child's disabled status, I tend to favor the choice of going through with the abortion; the alternative would be unfair to the hypothetical albed fetus I might have been carrying.

Perhaps the best of the four outcomes is the one where someone (who really wants and loves the disabled child) adopts the child. If only there was a way we could be certain of that outcome. But then if that were true, then carrying an abled fetus to term would be just as ideal if we could be sure good parents would adopt the baby. In which case, only mothers whose lives are threatened by the pregnancy would have due cause to abort.

There are a number of reasons why I'd support a woman's choice to abort; fear that the child wouldn't be adopted into a loving home would be just one of those reasons.