Termination of pregnancies - too willing to terminate, maybe there are other choices?

[Ilovepastafortea]

I have trouble with the issue of terminating pregnancies.

For context I had 5 miscarriages & 1 baby born 'sleeping' at 29 weeks.

Also 2 of my (3) husbands were adopted-well DH's mother was adopted in the 1920's. The point is if abortion was available in 1963 & 1926 neither of them would have existed. Their childless mothers wouldn't have had babies to love & care for.

If my first husband had been aborted my lovely son wouldn't exist. He killed himself at the age of 32 leaving me with a baby. But at least I had my baby which was part of him.

If my DH's mother had been aborted my 3 lovely step children & 7 gorgeous grandchildren wouldn't be here. Both of my step sons served in the Royal Navy - one in special forces & got his Green (Marine) beret. My Step daughter is a nurse & worked in A&E for many years, is now a Matron. She has saved many lives & made a difference to many other people's lives including taking unpaid leave to be there when her grandmother was dying.

But then I understand why some people do it.

I can particularly understand it if the woman has been abused or raped - who would want to bring their abuser's or rapist's child into the world. I get that.

I just wish that they would think about having their unwanted baby adopted so that someone who can't have a baby can love & care for it.

My heart goes out to those with an unwanted pregnancy & facing this.

I don't know what I'd do to be honest.

I have no doubt that most women terminate a pregnancy after much heart searching & grief. However, I also hear about women who are terminating their 3rd or more pregnancies & using it as a method of birth control.

So brings me around to AIBU to ask if people terminate a pregnancy number 3 or 4 are being unreasonable?

Or not.

Just canvassing opinions.

I meant if a woman has chosen to keep her baby there seem to be people who don’t respect and support her decision, and so push the abortion idea on to her.

I still don’t know if I’m reading you correctly 🤦🏼‍♀️. But by support I just meant supporting a woman’s choice to keep her baby whether you agree with it or not. For example there was a thread yesterday where the OP was leaning towards keeping her baby and people were calling her selfish and that abortion is best in her position.

@snughugs It is you who is objectifying women. You are saying that women are „expected” to have sex are „expected” to move in with men. Newsflash, vast majority of women have sex because they enjoy it and move in with men because they want to. We are independent people, not some objects who do what they are expected to.
Yes, decades ago most women were virgins before marriage because there was no contraception, but it was not a good thing. They had to commit to a man without knowing if they would be compatible, without even knowing they would enjoy sex with a man.
Yes, we need to have careers to be independent, but contraception vastly helped women to have careers. You cannot have a career if you have 8-9 children in quick succession and are always pregnant or have a newborn.

Contraception has not ended abuse but it is easier to escape abuse if you are not married and don’t have children.
Also, not that long ago maritial rape was not recognised as crime so many men got away with abuse.

My mother desperately tried to abort me. I wouldn't have known because I wouldn't have been born. I wouldn't have been born the 'been there, done that' kid that there was never enough time, love or care for. I am fervently pro-choice. Children should be born loved and wanted. It makes for a shit of a childhood if they aren't.

While there are wonderful adoptive families out there, and adoptees who have had good lives, the two I know best had less than ideal, in fact, pretty bloody abusive, childhoods. I made a promise to myself that the only babies I was going to bring into the world, would be the ones I rose and took responsibility for. So when I got pregnant when I wasn't ready or able, in any which way, for a child, it was a no-brainer for me.

I wouldn't get a cat I couldn't see how I was going to provide for it, and give it a good life, I sure as hell wouldn't do that to a kid.

I believe in a woman’s right to choose.

I had pre-natal testing for chromosomal abnormalities when I was pregnant because I did not want to care for a special needs child.

I have a child with severe autism and am in an abusive relationship. I still believe in a woman’s right to choose. Probably more so now.

Whilst you are entitled to your view, I think your post lacks empathy and any intelligent thought process.

I think the concept of carrying a pregnancy to term with the plan of having the baby adopted is something seen in films or that happens in countries such as America. In reality in the UK the system isn’t really set up for women choosing to give birth then just leave their babies. A baby also can’t be adopted under aged 6 weeks here so they would go to temporary foster care then the nature of the system means they are unlikely to have their adoption finalised before 18 months of age. This causes untold trauma.

If you are uncomfortable or against aborting your own pregnancies for any reason, that is for you to work out, but you have no business imposing your own thaughs onto other women’s choices. Abortion is healthcare. What difference does it make to you if another woman uses abortion as a form of contraception?

babies born to mothers who didn’t want them, suffer in one way or another, and the trauma of abandonment or abuse is a heavy burden to bear. A termination, whilst sad, stops that. The fetus is not self aware, so does not have a concept of the possibility of its future existence. So it cannot experience regret. No child should be born to a mother who doesn’t want it. It’s cruel to both mother and child.

It’s not a baby.

If you don’t want an abortion then don’t have one but it isn’t up to you to decide for anyone else.

Perhaps, if abortion is criminalised and women are forced to give birth to children they don't want/can't support, the children should be given to the fathers to raise. I bet abortion would be legalised tout de suite.

I hear what you’re saying but there’s now more women dying from abuse, more neglected children in the care system now than before. I’m not against contraception or abortion it’s how society we put young girls on the pill, pressure perfectly capable women into abortion and have women having three four abortions in a row and call it progress for women. Sex is meant to be enjoyable but we need to move away from the pressure women feel to have casual sex. I had this pressure from age 13 and really wish I had lived in a different time. I grew up with Madonna acting like a slapper and if you didn’t like it you were a prude. I was on the pill at 14 this stunted my growth, they’ve stopped the combination pill to teenagers for this reason. All my friends had abortions and all suffered as a result, they’ll justify it but in every case their lives would have been better going ahead with the pregnancy in my opinion. This is a societal issue, of course pregnancy is hard but trivialising abortion like I saw that Lily Allen doing this week I felt was gross, she totally irresponsible anyway gives up her dog for chewing her passport, for example. What’s wrong with teaching people to not have sport sex and be responsible for your actions and not just think of yourself?

I have no idea what "sport sex" is, @snughugs , but the solution to all the supposed problems that you cite is not to ban or limit the availability of safe, clean abortion.

None of your business.

What’s wrong with teaching people to not have sport sex

What is sport sex?

From what you say, I am much the same age as you. I was not on the pill at 14. None of my friends got pregnant and had abortions. Most of us waited until we had met someone we were committed to - even if it was not marriage - before we had sex - I was 19 and it was a serious relationship. Your experience is anecdote, nothing more.

And the reason there are more children in the care system is very unlikely to be solely due to women's freedom to enjoy sex. It's likely that increases in economic inequality and social inequality are the main contributing factors.

Agreed and I think it will come, (eventually) younger people are now having more conservative views and some are going back to church. Most of my son’s friends attend church on Sundays (even on lads holidays abroad, although he did attend a Catholic School). I think liberals went too far pushing casual sex and trans ideology onto kids that it’s something of a rebellion now. I welcome it. I’d rather my son went to church than wanted a say in what women did with their bodies after using them for sex, like the boy next door that’s got his long term girlfriend pregnant, his Mother is very angry with the girl and thinks men should have a say in weather the pregnancy continues. We need responsible men and women with a moral compass otherwise society suffers. Yes individual cases of requiring abortion are sad but we need to change our attitude to sex and not just look upon life of the unborn as a disposable outcome of sex, We know not every abortion isn’t due to disability or rape this is used as a method of contraception now. It’s not the individual cases that bother me it’s the outcome for society, the same goes for euthanasia you can bet people will be putting pressure on their relatives and using the same excuses for not having their babies to encouraging their parents to end it, it’s sounds dreadful but this is the position we are now in with abortion. It hasn’t stopped neglected or abused kids or done anything positive for society.

Ash yes, so kids from vulnerable backgrounds are fair game? I was put on the pill to regulate my period. Yes I had friends that got pregnant. It’s sounds like you were a bit more sheltered than myself and I’m pleased you experienced that but that isn’t how society is otherwise we wouldn’t have loads of women requiring abortions would we?

@snughugs I am not going to comment on church attendance. That's a very individual choice. I do not like the judgement on girls and women. Their body, their choice. The so called "moral compass" can be off kilter, in my experience.

Not all women who have abortions are young girls having casual sex. Some are older, some are married etc.

No, I was not sheltered. I grew up in the Netherlands, where there is a far more sensible attitude towards sex and sexuality. You're looking at life through a verty 1950s puritan lens - your constant references to churchgoing as a solution to anything tell me as much. I had a very liberal upbringing. My parents made it plain that if I was planning to have sex, I could come to them and they would support me in getting contraception. I had outstanding sex education in school, which is pretty much the norm over there. I knew exactly what was what.

I am nothing like you. Nothing. At. All. I am not a puritan who wears rose tinted nostalgia coloured spectacles. I support a woman's freedom to enjoy sex if she wants to. One of my children is trans, the other two are gay.

And I am 100% pro choice. If you want to lower abortion levels, there is a simple solution: look at those countries in the world which have the lowest rate of abortion (and exclude those where rates look artificially low because abortion isn't legal). You will find that those countries have less economic inequality and poverty, excellent sex education started young, outstanding support networks in terms of healthcare and lastly, affordable and accessible childcare. That is how you do it, not by restricting abortion.

I oppose everything you believe.

@pointythings - excellent points, and I wholeheartedly agree with everything you say 👌

I've had two abortions. Both of which were when I was married. Feel no guilt, no shame, no trauma. Just relief that I wasn't pregnant anymore.

I have had plenty of 'sports sex' (by which i assume you mean casual sex). No pressure to want it or enjoy it, I wanted it.

I was never put on the pill as a teenager or made to feel a prude because I didn't sleep with anyone until I was 18 (who later became my husband).

Most of the people who I know who have had abortions are married or in long term relationships, already have children and are in settled careers.

You may just be "canvassing opinions", but the only opinion that matters is that of the pregnant woman. It's her body and her choice.

i think a lot of women my age (50) had Mothers who were still virgins on their wedding day

Mine wasn't. She had a baby out of wedlock in the early 1960s. But it was very tough for her

And if Hitler had been aborted, maybe WW2 wouldn't have happened, and if Einstein had been aborted, we wouldn't have the theory of relativity, and if the apple had hit Newton on the head from a bit higher up the tree we wouldn't have the theory of gravity.

Sorry you've had so many losses in your life, but no-one is obliged to carry a pregnancy to term because maybe one day their child might make someone else happy or because a childless couple would like their baby.

There really isn't a shortage of unwanted children, but people want pristine new babies, not traumatised, damaged kids who desperately need homes. So who is the most selfish, parents who have babies they can't take care of and end up having them taken by the state, people who want to adopt but won't consider older kids needing families, or people terminating their pregnancies rather than bring another unwanted child into the world?

I know I wouldn't give up 9 months of my life and go through an extremely difficult and potentially fatal event just so a childless couple can have a baby, and one day someone might marry that baby. Who may then end up dying by suicide very young, quite possibly linked to the trauma that comes with adoption.

Being adopted isn't the same as being brought up by your biological parents, it leaves scars. In an ideal world, people wouldn't have babies they should never have had, and there'd be no adoptions. Even though that would be sad for parents suffering with infertility.

In my eyes you are either pro choice or not. You are not .

@snughugs I am sorry that it happened to you. It was child sexual abuse. What happened to you friends was child sexual abuse as they were under the age of consent. However, this was not caused by contraception, it was caused by abusive adults. This kind of abuse existed before contraception, when girls like your friends were shipped away to give birth in secret.
I must be similar age to you, because I was a teenager when Madonna’s antics skandalised many people. I didn’t much like her music then, but I do not agree with calling anybody a „slapper”. It is a disguisting mysoginistic term.
Even though I grew up in a communist country where unrestricted abortion was free for all, I never felt pressured to act in sexualised way.

I don’t agree that there is more abuse now than in the past. The laws are stricter so more abuse is reported. In the past men were free to rape their wives to their heart content. If women reported physcial abuse, they were not treated seriously. There are more children in care now , because we have safeguarding laws and children are removed from abusive parents. In the past, those children stayed in their homes and were abused or killed. As a person who works in education, I believe that the threshold is still too high.

If you look at the lack of rights for women in the countries where pre marital sex is still illegal and women are expected to be virgins till marriage, you will see that we are very lucky to have moved away from that.
With regards to Lilly Allen, it’s her body, her choice.