Women Recall Their 'Barbaric' Illegal Abortions Before Roe v. Wade : 'We Cannot Go Back'
As the Supreme Court appears poised to reverse Roe v. Wade and the right to abortion this month, 10 women ages 25 to 82 are sharing their personal abortion experiences.
"We are your grandmothers, your mothers, your daughters. And we cannot go back," the group said in unison.
In a new video shared by Runaway Train Productions, a number of women recounted the "barbaric" conditions in which they had illegal abortions prior to the procedure becoming a constitutional right, detailing the unsafe conditions they had to rely on.
"The doctor found a motel, snuck me in the back and performed the abortion on the dining room table. Afterward, he drove me back to the hotel and dropped me on the sidewalk like a bag of dirty laundry," one woman recalled. "I felt so humiliated and disregarded as a human being. However, I was a lucky one. I was not killed and I still had my fertility."
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Runaway Train Productions/YouTube
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Another woman shared, "I had an abortion because I was raped. The doctor performed the abortion without anesthesia and yelled, 'This no hurt. This no hurt.' The abortion was almost worse than the rape."
According to the Guttmacher Institute, nearly 1 in 4 women in America will have an abortion by age 45. The criminalization of the procedure forced women into unsafe conditions that led to anguish, injury, infertility, and even death.
Additionally, the emotional clip includes the stories of women who received their abortions after the landmark Roe v. Wade decision, expressing the "empowerment" they felt to have access to sterile doctor's offices, nurses, anesthesia and compassionate care.
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"I heard stories in my family about back-alley abortions where women were left to die on the table. So when I think about that, I am so grateful I was able to get a safe, legal abortion," one woman expressed.
Others added, "It's my right because it's my body. It's our right because it's our bodies. It's an issue of moral responsibility. It's an issue of freedom. It's an issue of equality. It's an issue of humanity."
