I had surgery for an ectopic pregnancy a few weeks ago. I am physically recovering well after a simple procedure, but admittedly having a tougher time mentally - its been very distressing losing the baby.
I have been doing the standard googling everything, and I keep finding lots of references to ectopic pregnancies being abortions. Not from official sites mind, just from people chatting and usually making the point that anti-abortion laws would prevent ectopics from being treated (I'm not sure that's true). My mum also made a reference to an ectopic being an abortion which did make me feel very upset.
I am pro-choice and remain so, thats not really up for debate here. But i find the idea of what I went through being an abortion really quite painful and insulting. Everyone on the internet and in real life has only suggested that it is an abortion in a positive sense I.e no one has said that I shouldn't have been treated. It's just upsetting to be lumped in a group of pregnancy terminations which will have ended for a variety of reasons and many will have been because the woman did not want a child. I desperately wanted my baby and I feel incredibly lost without it.
In my mind, it's not an abortion because the pregnancy was never going to be viable and may well have already died - I feel it was much closer to a miscarriage. But technically the treatment was the termination of a pregnancy (again I am not sure if my baby was still alive before surgery) and I think(?) abortions can be treatment for other pregnancies that aren't viable though I don't know as I couldny tell you a single diagnosis where that would occur.
Am I just doing logical cartwheels to avoid admitting that technically what i went through was like an abortion? even though its certainly treatment for a condition which would have ultimately killed me and pro-life orgs do not count as abortion and therefore do not oppose. Am I being a bit silly to get upset by any implication that this was an or like an abortion?
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Miscarriage/pregnancy loss
upset that people refer to ectopic pregnancies as abortion.
17 replies
lilseb · 07/10/2018 23:03
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user838383 ·
07/10/2018 23:07
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