• last month
"When Roe fell, everything changed."

At 18 weeks, she found out her baby had a fatal heart condition. For the next seven weeks, she carried an unviable pregnancy ...
Transcript
00:00I walked this earth 49 days knowing that she was not going to survive.
00:14They say that they care about life, but they don't care about the life of the woman carrying the child.
00:21This is not a political issue. This is a humanity issue.
00:26We were expecting our first child and we were over the moon, excited.
00:31Eight-week scan, great. Twelve-week scan, great.
00:35Genetic testing came back completely normal.
00:37Found out we were having a girl.
00:39We were so excited.
00:41I've never seen a man so excited to find out he was having a daughter.
00:52Met with a high-risk OBGYN.
00:55The first words out of her mouth when she came into our room after we had another anatomy scan,
01:01she said she definitely has hypoplastic left heart syndrome.
01:07And there are things that I'm going to be able to discuss with you today
01:10that I may not be able to discuss with you in two weeks
01:13because of how ever-changing and how rapidly the laws are changing in South Carolina.
01:26When Roe fell, everything changed.
01:29In the back of our minds, knowing that we're not going to have an option in South Carolina,
01:35which was also very scary, very scary and devastating,
01:39because then I'm like, OK, well, where do I go?
01:43And how do I trust that it's a good place to go to? And what does this all mean?
01:49You already get the devastating news that she's not going to survive.
01:53And then you find out that you can't even be at home with your family.
01:59You have to call and figure out the best place to go to.
02:14The only reason why I was 25 weeks is because of the backlog and having to travel
02:22because there's so many red states that are not helping us.
02:27Texas, Louisiana, now Georgia again, like all of these different states.
02:32So we're all having to travel and we want to go to healthy, amazing places
02:38to get the compassionate care that we deserve.
02:41But then the wait times are long.
02:44I don't understand why these legislators don't care about that aspect.
02:51And I also don't understand why abortion is a political issue.
03:00I never have. And I never will.
03:02They think women between 20 and 26 weeks are just randomly walking into
03:10an abortion clinic and just flippantly deciding,
03:13oh, I don't want my child anymore when that is very much not the case.
03:18The only reason why they're happening at these weeks are because of fetal anomalies.
03:23And we don't see the fetal anomalies until the 18, 19, 20 week scans.
03:28They can't see it before then.
03:30So why are we not allowed to make educated judgments if we have the technology
03:36to see that there is something truly wrong and they cannot survive outside of us?
03:42And if a woman decides to carry full term, I think that's beautiful.
03:48If she can do it, if that's what's best for her and her family.
03:52But the whole point is choice.

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