An abortion ban turned a grieving Allie Phillips into a candidate

By Molly Hennessy-Fiske, Washington Post
January 25, 2024

CLARKSVILLE, Tenn. — Framed ultrasounds hang next to Allie Philips’s mantel, a shrine to the child she never had: delicate silver necklaces and receiving blankets embroidered with the name Miley Rose, beside a tiny pink urn containing fetal ashes.

It’s here, by the fireplace, where Phillips runs her in-home day care, greets her mechanic husband at the end of his workday and watches their daughter play with the family’s pit bull rescue. It’s also here where she’s coordinating her campaign for state legislature, motivated by the trauma of seeking an abortion while pregnant with Miley Rose.

Continued: https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2024/01/25/allie-phillips-tennessee-abortion-ban/

25.01.2024

Commentary

Allie Philips

Center for Reproductive Rights

What It’s Like to Be Denied an Abortion in Your State

By Nancy Davis
1/18/2024

When Nancy Davis was denied an abortion for a nonviable fetus in her home state of Louisiana in 2022, she took her story to media outlets in an attempt to draw attention to what she sees as a fundamental injustice that disproportionately affects Black women like her. Davis, the mother of an 18-year-old, a 14-year-old, and a 2-year-old, is now an outspoken advocate for reproductive justice. She formed the Nancy Davis Foundation to help other women in similar situations. As part of that work, she has organized the upcoming Voices For Change March on Baton Rouge, which falls on Jan. 21, a day before the anniversary of Roe v. Wade.

Davis told us about the trauma of being denied critical healthcare, what it was like to travel out of state to obtain her abortion, and why she continues to use her voice for others. Read it all, in her own words, below.

Continued: https://www.popsugar.com/fitness/travel-for-abortion-nancy-davis-49330698

18.01.2024

Commentary

abortion story

Nancy Davis

Nancy Davis Foundation

Planned Parenthood of Greater New York

The Brigid Alliance

Voices for Change March

women's abortion stories

Meet 18 women who shared heartbreaking pregnancy journeys in post-Roe world

On the Brink: Women detail impact of abortion restrictions on their health care.

By Nadine El-Bawab, Tess Scott, Christina Ng, and Acacia Nunes
December 16, 2023

…In a monthslong investigation, 18 women from across 10 states shared their deeply personal stories, chronicling their heartbreaking journeys and how, in some cases, they were brought to the brink of death because they couldn't access timely care in their home states.

The women appeared in a companion broadcast, "Impact by Nightline: On the Brink," with exclusive interviews by Diane Sawyer and Rachel Scott, which looks at the hidden health care crisis playing out in clinics and exam rooms across the country. So many families posing the question: is this what lawmakers intended? "On the Brink" premieres Dec. 14 on Hulu.

These are their stories.

Continued: https://abcnews.go.com/US/meet-18-women-shared-heartbreaking-pregnancy-journeys-post/story?id=105563366

Some Republicans Were Willing to Compromise on Abortion Ban Exceptions. Activists Made Sure They Didn’t.

ProPublica reviewed 12 of the nation’s strictest abortion bans. Few changed in 2023, as state lawmakers caved to pressure from anti-abortion groups opposing exceptions for rape, incest and health risks.

by Kavitha Surana
Nov. 27, 2023

After the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, ending nearly 50 years of federal protection for abortion, some states began enforcing strict abortion bans while others became new havens for the procedure. ProPublica is investigating how sweeping changes to reproductive health care access in America are affecting people, institutions and governments.

State Rep. Taylor Rehfeldt was speaking on the floor of the South Dakota Capitol, four months pregnant with her third child, begging her Republican colleagues to care about her life. “With the current law in place, I will tell you, I wake up fearful of my pregnancy and what it would mean for my children, my husband and my parents if something happened to me and the doctor cannot perform lifesaving measures,” she told her fellow lawmakers last February, her voice faltering as tears threatened.

Continued: https://www.propublica.org/article/abortion-ban-exceptions-trigger-laws-health-risks

25 MILLION WOMEN NOW LIVE IN STATES WITH ABORTION BANS OR TIGHTER RESTRICTIONS AFTER FALL OF ROE

Sep 18, 2023

More than one year ago, the U.S. Supreme Court rescinded a five-decade-old right to abortion, prompting a seismic shift in debates about politics, values, freedom, and fairness.

Twenty-five million women of childbearing age now live in states where the law makes abortions harder to get than they were before the ruling.

Continued: https://www.milwaukeeindependent.com/newswire/25-million-women-now-live-states-abortion-bans-tighter-restrictions-fall-roe/

USA – Malpractice lawsuits over denied abortion care may be on the horizon

Sunday, June 25, 2023
Harris Meyer

A year after the overturning of Roe v. Wade, many physicians and hospitals in the states that have restricted abortion reportedly are refusing to end the pregnancies of women facing health-threatening complications out of fear they might face criminal prosecution or loss of their medical license.

Some experts predict those providers could soon face a new legal threat: medical malpractice lawsuits alleging they harmed patients by failing to provide timely, necessary abortion care.

Continued: https://www.capradio.org/articles/2023/06/25/malpractice-lawsuits-over-denied-abortion-care-may-be-on-the-horizon/

Dallas mom tells first lady of ‘demeaning’ ordeal with doomed fetus, Texas abortion ban

As the post-Roe vs. Wade era nears one-year mark, White House is prodding Congress to restore abortion rights.

By Todd J. Gillman
Jun 20, 2023

WASHINGTON — Two Texas women whose doctors refused to perform legal and medically urgent abortions met Tuesday with first lady Jill Biden, recounting their ordeals as the White House pressures Congress to codify rights the Supreme Court erased nearly a year ago.

“Even prayed-for, planned pregnancies can end in abortion,” said one of the women, Austin Dennard, a Dallas physician with two kids and a third due in August. “The state of Texas should not be making these decisions for me or for anybody else.”

Continued: https://www.dallasnews.com/news/politics/2023/06/20/demeaning-first-lady-hears-dallas-moms-ordeal-with-doomed-fetus-and-texas-abortion-ban/

20.06.2023

USA – “We backslid”: Doctors talk about how abortion care changed in 2022

"We backslid": Doctors talk about how abortion care changed in 2022
The Dobbs decision was devastating — but not all the news was bad

By MARY ELIZABETH WILLIAMS
DECEMBER 26, 2022

It came as a shock, in spite of everything. Halfway through the year, we knew it was coming. We knew from the years and years of laws systematically chipping away at abortion access. We knew from the closed clinics. We knew, weeks before, when the Supreme Court's draft opinion was leaked in May. And yet, as I sat in the Salon studios on a Friday in June and a female colleague looked over and said, "They overturned Roe," I felt the immediate sense of free fall terror. The impact was immediate and chilling.

In states with trigger laws, the sense of urgency among patients and providers kicked in right away. Rachel Lachenauer, the Director of Patient Experience at the National Abortion Federation, told Salon last June following the decision, "We're getting absolutely inundated today with callers who are saying 'I just got a call from my facility, or I just called them to check in and I've learned that I'm no longer able to access care in my state."

Continued: https://www.salon.com/2022/12/26/we-backslid-doctors-talk-about-how-abortion-care-changed-in-2022/

No Matter Where You Live, New Yorkers Can Help You Get an Abortion (And We’ll Pay for It, Too.)

By Claire Lampen, a staff writer for the Cut.
Dec 5, 2022

Nancy Davis found herself living what she called “a mother’s worst nightmare.” Around ten weeks into her pregnancy, an ultrasound detected that the fetus had acrania, meaning it was developing without a skull. Davis lives in Louisiana, and acrania doesn’t appear on the list of “medically futile” conditions that allow for an exception to the near-total abortion ban the state implemented after the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade.

“Louisiana doctors, they were scared of prosecution; they were scared of being fined,” Davis says. “So I went somewhere the laws were clear and they were confident they could give me the care that I needed.”

Continued: https://www.thecut.com/2022/12/new-yorkers-can-help-you-get-an-abortion.html

I Write About Post-Roe America Every Day. It’s Worse Than You Think.

Nov. 5, 2022
By Jessica Valenti

Despite Republican‌ assurances that their draconian abortion bans wouldn’t hurt women, a flood of heart-wrenching accounts from across the country prove otherwise. Yet even with that outpouring of stories, plus polls showing broad opposition to the bans and an increase in women registering to vote, it’s still unclear if the issue will be the deciding factor for voters in the midterm elections on Tuesday.

It should be.

05.11.2022

pregnancy complications