A Woman's Choice -- by Anne Shier

(Inspired by an episode from the hit TV series: Private Practice)

The surgeon looked down, thoughtfully, into the deep sink in front of her as she scrubbed in.  She contemplated the operation she was about to perform:  an abortion.  Not that abortions were anything new to her, however.  She’d done them hundreds of times before.  This one was somehow different.

Her patient was a mature, single woman who claimed that she had no money saved up; she spent at least 10 hours per night on her feet as a bartender; and, a baby was the last thing she needed or wanted in her life.

The surgeon, an OB/GYN, who was most famous for her life-saving operations on pregnant women and their unborn babies, did not judge Patti for the choice she was making.  She knew that Patti’s choice to have an abortion in her 19^th week of pregnancy was not an easy one.  She also knew that Patti had had an unsuccessful abortion attempt done earlier in her pregnancy.  The quack that screwed that procedure up by not performing it was one of the reasons that Patti was here today.

The surgeon, Dr. Susan Schultz, did not judge any woman who made an informed choice about terminating her pregnancy.  From about the 21^st week to about the 27^th week of pregnancy, it was still a very gray area of knowledge for doctors.  Some OB/GYNs thought that a fetus was not viable before week 24, which meant that it could not survive outside the mother’s womb.  Others felt that the fetus was viable by about the 21^st week onward.  Either way, viability was a medical judgment call that no one had a definitive answer to.

Still, Susan respected this most difficult choice that a pregnant woman would ever have to make – whether to terminate her pregnancy, or have her baby and then give it up for adoption, or have her baby and keep it.  No choice was an easy one for the pregnant woman.  She, alone, without regard for anyone else’s opinion, would have to make a choice that she would have to live with for the rest of her life.

If the woman chose to terminate her pregnancy, Susan did not try to talk her out of it.  She did not feel it was her place to do that.  She did, however, have to inform her patient about the details of the procedure she would be performing.  A D&E (Dilation and Evacuation) or a D&C (Dilation and Curettage) would always be required for any late-term pregnancy like Patti’s.  A Vacuum Aspiration procedure, on the other hand, could have been performed any time up to the 11^th or 12^th week of pregnancy.  This stage was considered early pregnancy.  The Vacuum Aspiration procedure was relatively uncomplicated.  It could be done under local anesthetic on an outpatient basis.  Thus, it could be performed in a clinical setting.

The D&E procedure, however, had to be performed in a hospital setting under general anesthesia by a licensed surgeon familiar with such techniques.  If it was not performed properly, infection could result due to incomplete removal of the contents of the woman’s uterus.  Everything there had to be removed:  the uterine lining, the amniotic sac, and, of course, the fetus.

There were always ongoing debates as to whether the fetus in a late-term pregnancy felt pain and suffered during an abortion.  This was the primary reason that anti-abortionists traditionally demonstrated in front of abortion clinics.  They sometimes resorted to violence to shut these clinics down:  ironic considering that violence against the unborn was what these anti-abortionists were protesting.  They conveniently seemed to abandon their consciences when it came to harming the women who had decided to end their pregnancies.

It didn’t matter that it was a legal procedure, not murder, as some continued to proclaim.  The courts routinely upheld a woman’s legal right and decision to obtain an abortion up to the point of viability.  It was that very gray area that sometimes caused problems for these women.

This time, Patti got the necessary D&E procedure done properly.  Susan was a very professional OB/GYN and surgeon.  Although Susan had her own private feelings about such procedures, Patti was sure of her own choice and Susan respected that choice.  She would always respect that most difficult choice.

copyright 2016 - Anne Shier - to be published in book format in the future (hard cover, soft cover, e-book / audio book)