To be mad with my friend and want to end our friendship altogether ?

[thingsthatrhymewithorange]

My friend has had three terminations in the past 5 years.
After each one she has said she never wants to go through it again
She hasn't waited to have sex for the 2 weeks your supposed to, to prevent infection the past two times, therefore risking getting pg again.

She phoned last week to say she thinks she may be pg again as she has been having unprotected sex since she came off the injection about six months ago.

I wanted to hang up on her I was so angry. She's an idiot and i cant be arsed with her anymore.

WIBU of me to try and drift away from her She's been such a twat I don't know if i can hold my tongue any longer. So its either say what i think and loose the friendship or try and distance myself and save the arguement.

No I'm not, I said we do not know with any certainty that the feotus doesn't feel pain. That is one tiny aspect of the larger picture/my own view.

I believe that the continuous use of abortion as a contraceptive is wrong on many levels, wasting the time and money of NHS, endangering the woman, an indicator of deeper problems, etc etc. That is my view, I was answering in response to op and I think most people would agree 3,4,5+ terminations is 'wrong'.

Once the foetus has developed a central nervous system, then I imagine it's pretty conclusive it can feel pain.

But as I said earlier, once the pro lifers demonstrate as much concern and interest in the living unwanted and abused children as they do with an embryo, I will listen to them with a degree of respect and interest which I admit is entirely lacking at present.

Yes its the silent scream. The most ridiculously scarmongouringly bias video I have ever seen and stupidly out of date too.

What Anyfucker said

I don't believe using abortion instead of contraception is sensible or desirable, particularly if you expect the NHS to pick up the tab.

But I am sad to read the kind of language directed at this woman and the amount of venom and disgust expressed. I think it far more likely she is very unhappy and not looking after herself than she is simply a stupid slut.

And why no anger against the men involved? Once again, the misogynist heart is beating strong. It is always the woman's fault and shame when it comes to pregnancy, even though it very obviously takes two to tango.

If you don't like discussing abortion, why do you continue to engage on a thread which is so obviously about abortion? I simply don't understand that. Your remedy is to engage in another thread, not wring your hands in horror at this one.

I agree, men are just as to blame, op hasn't given details of the man/men involved so people probably over looked this. I think op's friend needs some kind of support in place to establish what's going on here, and hope that if she is going for a 4th termination doctors will pick up on this and offer it to her.

I would hope that some kind of counselling/help is offered to women who have multiple abortions because I completely agree, something is not going well for them. But given some of the really nasty attitudes on this thread, I wonder.

The abortion topic always creates heated responses because it's something people tend to feel strongly about. I certainly haven't assumed this woman is a slut, I think it's fairly obvious she needs help. If op doesn't feel able or willing to give that to her on this occasion that is fair enough.

I agree it creates heated responses and I think it a shame that these reponses crystalise quite quickly around moral judgment. Maybe I am oversensitive, but the general reponse to this woman seems to me to be one of condemnation.

Getting angry with someone for wasting NHS money could quite easily apply to someone who obese, but I bet large sums of money that being fat wouldn't attract the same kind of moral judgment

The woman described in the OP sounds unhappy and confused, in need, perhaps, of counselling. She is perhaps 'attention-seeking' - a term I use as a statement of fact rather than a judgement. What she has done is not wise, not 'good' in a number of senses (and I am 100% pro-choice but would find it very difficult indeed personally to undergo a termination myself), but it doesn't seem to me to be a reason for the ending of a friendship, in the properly understood sense of the term 'friendship'. Anger and disgust are the easy response.

I imagine women who have perhaps had an abortion and found it very traumatic would find it difficult to understand someone who they think has entered into abortion lightly and not cared. I'm sure I read 1 in 3 women have abortions and that won't account for those who've considered it etc so it's something most women have some sort of experience of and that will obviously influence their reaction to this thread.

I must say my eyes have been opened by this thread and my stance changed from outright anger to a far more balanced view. My initial reaction was more extreme because of my own experience, going to an abortion clinic and being so hysterical that the nurse didn't know whether I should have been 'allowed' to have an abortion, I had panic attacks for the first time in my life and desperately wished i could go ahead with it but couldn't if that makes sense. Luckily for me, my situation turned out well and I don't regret my choice. But coming from that angle it was hard to empathise with this woman.

However after reading some posts I really believe she has deeper issues that need to be tackled as opposed to criticising her, for her own safety (safe sex).

Always asking - I am really pleased you feel this thread has given you something of value. The biggest tragedy in this debate is the almost immediate polarisation, so no one ever hears what the other side is saying.

It is always good to check my own response as well, just because I can honestly say I suffered no consequences from my abortions (and have my own well loved daughter now) doesn't mean that others don't feel very strongly.

I just don't think any woman could be so utterly careless of her own health and safety without there being something pretty dark going on for her.

I tend to find pro-life propaganda information to be very like some animal rights groups...deliberately designed to upset and not necessarily inform. I stumbled across a pro-life site once full of horrifying fake images and virtually no factual information,just Bible quotes.

I guess they feel so strongly they are 'right' that any means justify their ends. I just don't understand why their energies go there, rather than being activists for children actually in the world.

I do wonder whether the root of it is simple misogyny and a wish to keep women under control. My perception is that most pro lifers are men, or at least in the US.

When a painful act is repeated then it may be she is attempting to come to terms with a decision that she was not happy with. Repeating the action until she is feels different about it.
Yes she sounds as if she needs councelling but it is unwise to try to counsell family or friends unless you want to eventually loose them.
A good friend would just try to be there and listen -even when you have to keep your opinions to yourself

spero the most vocal and passionate pro-life types like to call pro-choice types pro-abortion because "that's what it is really"

It's for that reason I generally refer to them as pro-gestation because they sure as hell don't care about anyone once they're living and breathing independently from the mother.

It's all shock tactics... When I was trying to figure out what to do (regarding my pregnancy) I found it very hard to get factual information without stumbling across pro-life sites, I was googling "7 week foetus" for instance and images would pop up of aborted ones when I wanted to find ones in the womb. It was during this time I saw the silent scream video, found by accident, which ultimately convinced me not to have an abortion (I was 18, not thinking about the bias of the video or the age of it) and only watched it again today, all of this seems obvious now (not that I regret not having abortion).

More information should be available to women if they desire it, perhaps given by gps, to avoid looking online and finding a load of pro-life stuff. I ended up paying for a private scan because the pre-abortion sonographer wouldn't let me see the screen despite me telling her I wanted to make a decision based on all information available to me, they had an attitude of 'don't think about it just do it'. I can appreciate some women may not want to find these things out but some do and they should have that opportunity.

Ooo thats good, I am going to use pro gestation from now on. That is much more accurate.

Just read a horrible article about a woman in Italy in a coma being kept alive because she is pregnant - she was called the human wheelbarrow for some reason? Her only worth as a vessel for her unborn child - no mention of who was going to care for that child once born.

She sounds like a selfish self centered cow! YANBU.

It's not dearth of information that's the problem. It's our weird fucked up attitudes to sex and procreation - look at the fuss some parents make whenever sex education in schools is raised. Why is our teenage pregnancy rate the highest in Europe (or certainly one of the highest, suddenly not so confident in that claim).

I shall teach my daughter that sex is not shameful but can be lovely with the right partner. But she had better respect herself enough not to have sex with anyone to try to make them like her and if she is inviting a penis into her vagina it will only be when the owner of that penis respects her enough to discuss contraception with her. And if she gets pregnant, I will support her in whatever choice she makes.

spero that is hideous. Fine if it what she would have wanted but to refer to her like that . Presumably once the baby is developed enough to be delivered they will do so and then turn off her life support machine.

Well time for bed. Goodnight all, especially NK493etc, you do sound sweet.

It was in that link from hopkinette I think, so may be quite an old story - but sadly we have many closer in time and closer to home, most particularly in Ireland...