So one night a couple months ago a friend asked me this question: “You have have been pregnant and had kids. At what point during your pregnancies were the children you carried your children? I mean, when did you consider them life? (not trying to start an argument, just trying to understand is all)”

She asked me in a chat window and made reference to something I posted on FaceBook concerning the beginning of life.  I am ashamed to say that I did not answer her right away and I went off-line.  It was not the kind of question I felt I could answer in a chat window.  I wanted to take my time working through a lot of angry thoughts I was having about the state of affairs in our country concerning women, pregnancy and the beginning of life right now.  I did not want to dump those on to my friend.  I needed to let the question percolate and I wanted to write about my thoughts more fully here.

My friend is correct, as all of you know, I have two children (the LightChildren).  But I’ve had four pregnancies.  Two pregnancies ended as live births and two ended as abortions.  One abortion was caused by medical professionals, one was caused by nature’s capriciousness.  Both of those pregnancies ended at about the same point – between 9 and 10 weeks.  You see, a miscarriage is medically classified as an “abortion.”  I didn’t know that until I read my chart in the emergency room.  I grieved after both pregnancies ended.  I was sad.  I was much sadder after the second (a planned pregnancy) than after the first (unplanned).  After the second I also felt a crushing sense of guilt because the thought occurred to me that the justice of a God who required an eye for an eye might have taken the second pregnancy in payment for the first.  I now recognize that this is not true.

So I began to think (after my friend posed her question) what was it that I was grieving?  Why was I sad at the end of those pregnancies?  When did I feel that my children’s lives began?

My best answer to that is … I don’t know when I actually considered my children to be alive and embodied with who they are (their soul, for lack of a better term).  It might have been when I first felt them move.  I know that when those two pregnancies ended I was not grieving actual people.  I was grieving dreams, potentials, wishes and hopes.  Far more were shattered when the second one ended capriciously than when the first ended as a planned event.  But even though I and LightHusband knew that first pregnancy had to end (for reasons far too complex to write about here), it was not something we did lightly or without sober thought.  Given the circumstances surrounding that pregnancy and the context we were in, I believe I would do it again.  My sense of loss and failure were the tightly woven warp amongst the weft of self-preservation, ability, and meeting expectations.

I know that for every reason given by every mother who makes that Hobbesian choice, there is a person out there who can counter with a Tebow like story of transcendent victory over obstacles with God’s grace or the assistance of some other natural intervention.  Yet there are an equal number of stories of children born into oblivion.  Mothers who have multiple children in their teens, but only one (if any) is given up for adoption.  The cycle of poverty, ignorance and misery is visited upon another generation.  For them the American dream is a nightmare of squalor, dependence, and terrible options.

We sit at a crossroads in our country right now.  No one is comfortable here and a lot of vitriol is being thrown around in attempts to regain comfort levels and upper hands.  People who support the right of a woman to be in control of her body and pregnancies are called by various factions, “Pro-choice” and “Pro-abortion.”  People who support the right of the fetus to exist to the limits of it’s potential are called variously, “Pro-life” and “Pro-fetus” or “Anti-Choice”.  The problem is that none of those labels are adequate.  People who support the right of a woman to be in control of her body are not running around promoting abortion (despite what anyone says).  I have yet to meet a single person who thinks it’s even a mediocre idea; it’s not a choice that anyone wants.  Believe me.  So saying that one is in favor of a choice you never want to make is like saying you love blood ice cream.  Gross.  What women are really saying is that they want freedom (and I’m going to get back to that in a minute).  On the flip side of the coin, those who support the existence of the fetus are not truly pro-life.  There are a few in that set of people who take on what might be called a consistent ethic of life positions (that is, they also reject war, death penalty, etc.) and thus are truly PRO-life.  However, most of the speaking on behalf of the fetus/baby has been just that … simply get the child born.  Once born (since the pro-life movement is primarily conservative) there is not very much support for it’s life after that should s/he be born into an impoverished family.

Boiled down, we have an impasse between mother and fetus.  What a terrible crossroads to be at … pitting mother against pre-child?  One set of people proposes that the mother’s rights are paramount.  The other side proposes that the fetuses rights are paramount.  Yet both sets of rights must inhabit the same body.  Both sets of rights (if we are going to grant rights to a fetus, and I am not certain that we should) may not be compatible with one another.

How have we gotten to this impasse?  Well, it’s been a twisty, windy road.  But I’ve lived through some of it.  So I’ll describe some of the view from my perspective.  Just as we’ve reached an impasse between mother and pre-child, we are also coming to an impasse between reason/science and faith.

Reason and science teach us many things about the pre-child.  But they cannot teach us when a child is given its soul; that breath of being that brings a sparkle to each of our eyes.  We know that a fetal monitor can find a heart beat at 8 weeks.  That at 12 weeks s/he is growing fingernails.  At 24 weeks a pre-child is considered “viable.”  Viable means that doctors and medical personnel can keep it alive outside the womb with costly medical equipment.  Whether or not the child will suffer permanent loss of different abilities (both physical and mental) as a result of these heroics seems to be capricious.  And when I looked up fetal development here is what I found for 25 weeks –

• At 25 weeks pregnant, the structures of the spine begin to form — joints, ligaments and rings. These will protect the all important spinal cord which serves as the information transmitter for your child’s body.
• Blood vessels of the lungs develop.
• Your baby’s nostrils begin to open. There is a study out of Belfast that suggests babies at this stage have the capability of scent preferences!
• The nerves around the mouth and lip area are showing more sensitivity now. When baby is rooting for food later on, these will be valuable!
• His swallowing reflexes are developing at week 25 of your pregnancy.

Based on this, a baby born at 24 weeks would not have a spinal structure, nor blood vessels in the lungs and no swallowing reflexes!!  Getting a baby to survive under those circumstances is a miracle!  Some of them thrive.  But does a tiny baby born at 24 weeks have a soul?  Or is it a fetus outside the womb?  How would we know?

I have seen in the papers (read that on-line media) that politicians in various places want to introduce legislation that prohibit abortion … even in the case of incest and rape and even when the abortion is necessary to preserve the life of the mother.   I read those articles with a sense of awe and bewilderment.  Awe that someone could be so wed to their principle that they don’t see the human face on it.  Bewildered at the lack of understanding and the lack of nuance.  Somehow it doesn’t make sense to sacrifice the mother for the baby.  No, what doesn’t make sense is that the sacrifice would be codified into law.  There are some families who might choose that sacrifice, but it should never be forced on anyone.  Nor should the bearing of a child as the result of a rape or (worse) incest be forced on a woman or young girl.  Should she decide to make that sacrifice, wonderful!  Let’s embrace that and applaud it.  But don’t make it a law, molesting women a second time.

We, as a culture, are in a place where science has outstripped our ability to make decisions.  50 years ago, women very often didn’t know they were pregnant until enough time had passed that abortion was not even an option.  Now we have the ability to know within hours of conception.  The language we use surrounding pregnancy has become dystopian in many ways.  I believe this is an attempt to relieve some of the pressure that has built up around pregnancies and our choices concerning them.  What are the ethics of competing rights inhabiting one body?  How do we choose which rights are paramount?  Some would say faith points the way, others say science.  I think that both carry inherent flaws and strengths that need to be explored.  But that is for another post.  Hopefully later this week.