Editor’s note: Glamour is committed to supporting and advancing reproductive rights worldwide. A key component of our coverage is de-stigmatizing abortions and providing accurate and current information. These are our bodies and our choices and these stories deserve to be told.
Abortion is often spoken of as a terrible physical hardship, but I have a slightly different perspective. In my early twenties I had a medication abortion. A few years later I got terrible food poisoning. Both may have involved stomach pain and vomiting, but the latter was much more painful and extreme. I returned to having sex shortly after my abortion, but I haven’t been able to look at chicken curry salad since.
In the late aughts I was casually dating a man I met at work. I wasn’t using hormonal birth control because I suffered from aura migraines and my ob-gyn discouraged it due to a slightly increased stroke risk when the two are combined. I generally used condoms, but as I started to see this guy more, we occasionally cut corners. We spent a fun New Year’s Eve together, and three weeks later, I missed my period.
Having a child at the time seemed laughable. I was one year out of college, working a media job with pathetic pay, planning for graduate school, and living with roommates—and the guy and I hadn’t even defined our relationship.
I have been prochoice for as long as I’ve known what abortion was. My mom is a strong second-wave feminist, and I was raised to believe in reproductive justice. I was confronted with some antichoice views at my Midwestern college, but I held deeply to the belief that if you don’t believe in abortion, you don’t have to have one. So when I found myself staring at a positive pregnancy test, I did not feel like I was facing a moral dilemma.
The next day I called my ob-gyn’s office, and the receptionist gave me the number for a clinic that was close to my apartment. I made an appointment for the following Saturday.
The clinic (which wasn’t Planned Parenthood but has a similar mission) was in a nondescript area near a prominent New York City bridge. There was a woman near the clinic’s entrance who half-heartedly handed me some antichoice propaganda, but I waved her away. I was given a urine test and a sonogram, and then informed that I could opt for a medication abortion.
Medication abortion is an option in a woman’s first trimester of pregnancy, which is when 92 percent of abortions in America take place. It consists of two pills, mifepristone and misoprostol, which are taken 24 to 48 hours apart. Medication abortion is 98 percent effective when taken in the first eight weeks of pregnancy, and 93 percent effective when taken in the ninth and tenth weeks. Many women choose this because it is simpler than a surgical procedure, and in terms of side effects, it’s safer than getting your tonsils out.
I had no idea if my health insurance covered abortion and was afraid to call and ask, so I paid in cash. It cost $600, which was about half my savings.
I took the first pill at the clinic and went home. The next evening I treated myself to a Baskin Robbins mint chocolate chip ice cream, and took the second pill. It wasn’t the best night of my life. I experienced heavy cramps, and I threw up the ice cream. But eventually I took a painkiller that I had received at the clinic and fell asleep. The next day I went to work. I bled for a few days, but it wasn’t very different from a regular period. And life went on.
Abortion-rights advocates often use extremes to make their case. They talk about the need for legal abortion to help rape and incest victims or to prevent children from being born with illnesses that would lead to early, painful deaths. And abortion absolutely needs to be accessible for each one of the women who confront these situations, at all stages of pregnancy.
But the truth about most women who seek abortion doesn’t fit well on a poster. Many are like me: They just don’t want to have a baby at the time.
Reproductive rights remain under assault in America. President Trump recently signed an executive order eliminating federal funding for international organizations that include abortion counseling among their services. There is also legislation to make the Hyde Amendment permanent, banning Medicaid from paying for abortion. Not only is this a tool of the patriarchy; it isn’t economically sound for anyone. My medication abortion cost $600. It costs between $29,000 and $50,000 for Medicaid to pay for a pregnant woman’s health care, and that doesn’t include the child’s care.
Right now it isn’t legal to receive a medication abortion prescription without seeing a doctor, and many Republican state legislatures want to outlaw the option entirely in their states. But reproductive justice activists are creative, and advocacy groups are researching ways to make procuring the pills easier for women.
I know I was lucky. I was educated enough to notice when I missed my period. I had the resources to find a clinic. I was able to take time to go to my appointments without worrying about work or child care. I had $600 to pay for the procedure. I lived in a liberal city where a clinic was close by and reproductive health care was supported.
I’m 30 now and still child-free, with complicated feelings about whether motherhood will ever be right for me. Yet my feelings on abortion remain uncomplicated: Every woman should have the same choice as me.