It's been a long time since I've blogged! I guess I got out of the habit of writing something every week and perhaps had exhausted my range of topics. The topic I am going to discuss today is going to be controversial, but I think it bears some thought, especially as to how it relates to adoption. I hate politics, although I'm glued to the national conventions as if they were train wrecks...oh, they are! Are we better off than we were four years ago? I haven't met anyone who thinks so. How has the past four years affected adoption? President Obama is pro-abortion. The number of abortions is way up. That is one part of the equation. Then there is the economy. Women who previously would have tried to parent and then eventually decided on adoption as a better option are figuring out very early in the pregnancy that they won't be able to parent due to financial constraints. It's so early that they can justify making a decision for abortion and they are, thus, aborting (in record numbers). Fewer babies, lower birth rate, higher abortions...well that all equates to less babies for adoption.
I know there are many women who don't want their abortion "rights" taken away. Mitt Romney is pro-life and so is Paul Ryan. That doesn't mean they will even be able to change the law, as congress has a say. Just because they get elected doesn't mean that abortions will cease to exist in this country. I'm not sure that will ever happen. But it would be nice to limit them and it would be beneficial to women to understand better what is happening when a baby is aborted. Planned Parenthood would call it "products of conception" or "pregnancy tissue". They don't call it "pregnancy tissue" when it pops out screaming and wiggling. "Products of conception" ARE babies.
I am not condemning women who choose abortion. I think only God can do that. However, I praise women who have the courage to deliver a baby that wasn't planned and place it in the arms of another woman who may have fertility issues. That is a gift few people can give -- the gift of life. I think that's a much more healthy (physically, emotionally, and medically) way to handle an unplanned pregnancy. Just because a baby is a surprise doesn't mean the child isn't a blessing. Please consider all this when you vote in this November's Presidential election. There are hundreds of thousands of souls counting on you.
Showing posts with label election. Show all posts
Showing posts with label election. Show all posts
Wednesday, September 5, 2012
Monday, November 3, 2008
Adoptions and Elections - VOTE!
Not only is November National Adoption Month, but it's also the month we elect our next president. No matter who you are voting for, make it a point to go out to the polls if you haven't already mailed in your ballot. We can't complain about our policy makers if we don't vote. For those of us involved in adoption -- either through family ties or emotional ties -- this is a critical vote. There is one pro-"choice" candidate and one pro-life candidate. I've talked about abortion in this blog before and you can go to the archives to see what I have to say about it, but suffice to say that life should come before "choice". I haven't met anyone who would choose to be aborted. I haven't met anyone who was happy about their "choice" to abort. On the contrary, I have spoken with many women who are forever traumatized by their decision. It's one of those decisions you can never take back. Anyone who has had children can look at one of them and understand the ramifications -- it could have been that one. Today's world is different than the world our parents or grandparents grew up in. It's acceptable to be single and pregnant. There is no shame in carrying a child to term, so there is no reason to kill a child to rectify an error in judgment. The child didn't make the error and had no choice at all. So, when you go to the polls tomorrow, think long and hard about how many lives you can save by simply casting your ballot. I don't think it matters whether you are republican or democrat, man or woman, Catholic or Protestant. You can change the world one life at a time. WWJD?
Saturday, October 11, 2008
Election 2008 and the ever-present abortion debate
This November, there is more at stake than who should be our next President. In several states, there are life or death measures on the ballot. California voters will have a chance to make a difference with Proposition 4, which seeks to require notification of parents or guardians when unemancipated minors seek an abortion. My 14 year old son can't take an aspirin at school without parental permission. His girlfriend, however, can have a surgical procedure which includes anesthesia and significant blood loss. I can imagine a teenager going to get an abortion and not revealing (or not knowing) important past medical history, which could prove not only dangerous, but fatal. Presumably her parents would be notified if that happened. It seems ludicrous to me that I have control over whether my child can go to a movie or school dance, but I have no control over whether an abortion is performed on her. This measure is meant to protect young people and reduce the rate of abortion. I realize that most young people fear telling their parents about the fact that they have been sexually active. Some opponents of this initiative and others like it argue that these children are at risk from abusive parents if they tell them. My argument to that is to get them out of that abusive home. Let them tell a school counselor, teacher, trusted friend, or clergy person who could intervene and make sure that they are not at risk. We were all teenagers once and we likely all feared how parents would react if confronted with that very issue. The reality is that even though there would likely be some repercussions, most parents would get over the initial anger and support their children. Proposition 4 provides for judicial override of the notification requirement "based on clear and convincing evidence of the minor's maturity or best interests". Parents can also sign a Department of Health Services form authorizing an abortion without prior parental notice. No notice is required if a physician concludes that the abortion is necessary to save the minor's life. That would account for considerably less than 1% of the abortions requested by teens.
A few statistics to think about...
* The consequences of Roe v. Wade -- 48, 589,993 abortions. Of course, in the time it has taken you to read this blog article, the number has increased and continues to do so.
* Nearly half of all pregnancies among American women are unintended. 4 in 10 of those unplanned pregnancies are terminated by abortion.
* In the U.S. 22% of all pregnancies end in abortion.
* In 2005, the most recent year that statistics are readily available, 1.21 million abortions were performed in the U.S.
* At current rates, one-third of all American women will have had an abortion by the age of 45.
* The risk of death associated with abortion increases with the length of time the pregnancy has progressed. At under eight weeks, there is one death for every million abortions. There is one death per 29,000 procedures when the pregnancy is 16-20 weeks. At 21 or more weeks, there is one death per 11,000.
* Teens are more likely than older women to delay having an abortion until after 15 weeks of pregnancy, when the medical risks are significantly higher.
Some would argue that without legal abortion, more women would die due to seeking illegal abortions. The fact is that before the first legalized abortions, the death rate from back alley abortions had already dropped quite significantly. The reason? The availability of antibiotics to combat infection. Once Penicillin was readily available, the death rate when down. the U.S. Bureau of Vital Statistics reports that in 1972, the year BEFORE Roe v. Wade, there were only 39 women who died from illegal abortions. By comparison, there were 54 deaths from legal abortions when Roe v. Wade passed. In 1975, 87% of obstetricians and gynecologists in the U.S. had to hospitalize at least one patient due to complications of legal abortions.
The following are possible complications of abortion:
* Genital tract infection is a common occurrence (according to a report by Johns-Hopkins University in the American Journal of OB/GYN vol 128, no. 5, 1977)
* infection, hemorrhage, or uterine perforation, which can all result in death.
* pelvic abscess due to perforation of the uterus and sometimes the bowel, which can also result in death.
* infection of the uterus or fallopian tubes can do permanent damage. With infection, a fallopian tube can be sealed shut, causing future reproduction difficulties.
* uncontrolled bleeding, sometimes requiring blood transfusions and sometimes resulting in death. Approximately 16,000 women annually are transfused due to post-abortion complications. Viral hepatitis is transmitted in up to 10% of those cases. Ultimately, 32 deaths result annually from hepatitis transmitted during or after abortions. AIDS can also be transmitted, although screening for AIDS is much more thorough than previously.
* blood clots. While blood clots can also be the cause of death of mothers who deliver babies normally, they can also cause death in otherwise healthy women who have abortions.
* amniotic fluid embolism has "emerged as an important cause of death from legally induced abortion. Treatment is ineffective." (American Journal of OB/GYN, vol 41, 1981)
* disseminated intravascular coagulation. This is a sudden drop in blood clotting ability which can cause extensive internal bleeding and death. This can result from hyper-tonic saline abortions. (JAMA, vol 225., No.1, July 1973). In recent years, this has been used less commonly.
The statistics regarding deaths due to abortion are hazy because some deaths do not occur until weeks or months later and are the result of complications of the procedure. These cases are not always reported as being due to abortion. For example, if a perforated uterus leads to a pelvic abscess and sepsis (or blood poisoning), which leads to death, the official cause listed may list pelvic abscess and septicemia, rather than abortion. Death due to an ectopic pregnancy years later caused by scarring of the fallopian tubes would not be reported as a death due to abortion, even though the cause of the closed fallopian tubes was the abortion.
Depression and guilt following abortion has lead to suicide. While the actual cause was the abortion, the cause of death listed is suicide. It's impossible to calculate the actual death rates caused by abortion because of the length of time it takes for some of these deaths to occur. Because the death rate is under-reported, the statistics are actually much lower than the reality.
Women will die from pregnancy and abortion. For those who die from abortion, the numbers have drastically reduced in the years since antibiotics became more available. Now, the only difference is that more mothers are dying from legal, rather than illegal, abortions.
We'll talk about the motivation of the abortion mills in a future blog, but for now my message is simply this -- Our daughters are precious and the lives they could potentially carry are equally precious. I saw a bumper sticker once that said "Abortion: One dead, one wounded". It stuck with me because it's so true. I once did some lay counseling for an organization which provided a safe haven for women who experienced unplanned pregnancy. I recall one woman telling me, "After all these years I can't forgive myself for killing my first child". After having three children, she realized that the baby she aborted was, in fact, the same as any one of them. It is no longer taboo to be pregnant out of wedlock. It is no longer shameful to give birth if you are not married. In fact 45% of all babies born last year in the U.S. were born to single mothers. There is no longer any reason to hide in shame simply because of a pregnancy. There are better alternatives than the ones being presented to our children. I, for one, would feel that MY rights were violated if someone performed surgery on one of my children without me knowing about it. Consider these things when you go to the polls in November and vote to respect life.
A few statistics to think about...
* The consequences of Roe v. Wade -- 48, 589,993 abortions. Of course, in the time it has taken you to read this blog article, the number has increased and continues to do so.
* Nearly half of all pregnancies among American women are unintended. 4 in 10 of those unplanned pregnancies are terminated by abortion.
* In the U.S. 22% of all pregnancies end in abortion.
* In 2005, the most recent year that statistics are readily available, 1.21 million abortions were performed in the U.S.
* At current rates, one-third of all American women will have had an abortion by the age of 45.
* The risk of death associated with abortion increases with the length of time the pregnancy has progressed. At under eight weeks, there is one death for every million abortions. There is one death per 29,000 procedures when the pregnancy is 16-20 weeks. At 21 or more weeks, there is one death per 11,000.
* Teens are more likely than older women to delay having an abortion until after 15 weeks of pregnancy, when the medical risks are significantly higher.
Some would argue that without legal abortion, more women would die due to seeking illegal abortions. The fact is that before the first legalized abortions, the death rate from back alley abortions had already dropped quite significantly. The reason? The availability of antibiotics to combat infection. Once Penicillin was readily available, the death rate when down. the U.S. Bureau of Vital Statistics reports that in 1972, the year BEFORE Roe v. Wade, there were only 39 women who died from illegal abortions. By comparison, there were 54 deaths from legal abortions when Roe v. Wade passed. In 1975, 87% of obstetricians and gynecologists in the U.S. had to hospitalize at least one patient due to complications of legal abortions.
The following are possible complications of abortion:
* Genital tract infection is a common occurrence (according to a report by Johns-Hopkins University in the American Journal of OB/GYN vol 128, no. 5, 1977)
* infection, hemorrhage, or uterine perforation, which can all result in death.
* pelvic abscess due to perforation of the uterus and sometimes the bowel, which can also result in death.
* infection of the uterus or fallopian tubes can do permanent damage. With infection, a fallopian tube can be sealed shut, causing future reproduction difficulties.
* uncontrolled bleeding, sometimes requiring blood transfusions and sometimes resulting in death. Approximately 16,000 women annually are transfused due to post-abortion complications. Viral hepatitis is transmitted in up to 10% of those cases. Ultimately, 32 deaths result annually from hepatitis transmitted during or after abortions. AIDS can also be transmitted, although screening for AIDS is much more thorough than previously.
* blood clots. While blood clots can also be the cause of death of mothers who deliver babies normally, they can also cause death in otherwise healthy women who have abortions.
* amniotic fluid embolism has "emerged as an important cause of death from legally induced abortion. Treatment is ineffective." (American Journal of OB/GYN, vol 41, 1981)
* disseminated intravascular coagulation. This is a sudden drop in blood clotting ability which can cause extensive internal bleeding and death. This can result from hyper-tonic saline abortions. (JAMA, vol 225., No.1, July 1973). In recent years, this has been used less commonly.
The statistics regarding deaths due to abortion are hazy because some deaths do not occur until weeks or months later and are the result of complications of the procedure. These cases are not always reported as being due to abortion. For example, if a perforated uterus leads to a pelvic abscess and sepsis (or blood poisoning), which leads to death, the official cause listed may list pelvic abscess and septicemia, rather than abortion. Death due to an ectopic pregnancy years later caused by scarring of the fallopian tubes would not be reported as a death due to abortion, even though the cause of the closed fallopian tubes was the abortion.
Depression and guilt following abortion has lead to suicide. While the actual cause was the abortion, the cause of death listed is suicide. It's impossible to calculate the actual death rates caused by abortion because of the length of time it takes for some of these deaths to occur. Because the death rate is under-reported, the statistics are actually much lower than the reality.
Women will die from pregnancy and abortion. For those who die from abortion, the numbers have drastically reduced in the years since antibiotics became more available. Now, the only difference is that more mothers are dying from legal, rather than illegal, abortions.
We'll talk about the motivation of the abortion mills in a future blog, but for now my message is simply this -- Our daughters are precious and the lives they could potentially carry are equally precious. I saw a bumper sticker once that said "Abortion: One dead, one wounded". It stuck with me because it's so true. I once did some lay counseling for an organization which provided a safe haven for women who experienced unplanned pregnancy. I recall one woman telling me, "After all these years I can't forgive myself for killing my first child". After having three children, she realized that the baby she aborted was, in fact, the same as any one of them. It is no longer taboo to be pregnant out of wedlock. It is no longer shameful to give birth if you are not married. In fact 45% of all babies born last year in the U.S. were born to single mothers. There is no longer any reason to hide in shame simply because of a pregnancy. There are better alternatives than the ones being presented to our children. I, for one, would feel that MY rights were violated if someone performed surgery on one of my children without me knowing about it. Consider these things when you go to the polls in November and vote to respect life.
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