mjm;
I'll respond, but I do so expecting the respect that I've shown to others at this forum. Like McGrath said, no bottles.

While in school, I worked for quite a few years in a women's clinic that offered abortion services. My personal beliefs really didn't enter much into it. I consider myself pro-life, and couldn't imagine a situation where I would allow conception to happen unplanned or unwanted, but it happens. My main objectives were that
a) this is legal
b) there were so many instances we dealt with exeptional circumstances (a 9 year old girl was raped by her uncle, a 60 year old woman who thought she was in menopause..etc)
c) I knew with my skills and heart that these women would be given the best possible care, and options to prevent this happening to them again.

So, I can speak from first-hand that the partial birth abortion is one of the vilest things on this planet. Physically, a woman KNOWS well before this stage that she is pregnant. Most of the procedures our clinic did were 6-8 week fetuses that were balls of cells roughly the size of a pencil eraser. During pathology to determine if the entire fetus was removed, there were no fingers, toes, etc. Just a small amniotic sack.

Our procedure was for one staff member to accompany the woman throughout the entire procedure. From filling out the paperwork, to conducting the ultrasound and Rh bloodwork, to assisting during the procedure itself. It made the woman more comfortable, and saved having to repeat details. It also allowed for the clinician to advise the woman about birth control, health services, and counseling.

Our sister clinic in Seattle did abortions up to 28 weeks. I was horrified and refused to work relief shifts in that clinic. Children are born at that gestation every day and survive. This, to me, was not the correction of a mistake or sticky situation, this was killing your child.

Personally, I cannot see how you can have a life inside you for months, talking to it and feeling it move, and then destroying it. Legally, I'm fighting it tooth and nail. I am a staunch defender of women's rights to their own bodies, but this situation has me against the ropes. My only hopes lie in education, and serious psychological help for the women that go through this. No one has taken the time to study the long term effects of this on the psyches of the women that have these procedures, and building those kinds of walls inside your head and your heart can do no good.

My heart goes out to the women that feel this is their only option.

~Elle