Abortion places women’s mental health at risk, a top expert says.
Although many women believe that abortion is safer than childbirth, the trauma among women who undergo an abortion appears to be a sleeping giant that won’t go away, according to a researcher who testified before a state senate committee.
Moodiness, sudden and uncontrollable crying episodes, and low self-esteem are some of the woes suffered by women who have had abortions, as reported in testimony before the Wisconsin State Senate last year over a bill that would ensure that abortion remain legal in Wisconsin if Roe v. Wade were overturned. Roe v. Wade is the 1973 U.S. Supreme Court decision legalizing abortion.
In the weeks leading up to the bill’s failure in March 2008, the Senate heard from various opponents of S.B. 398. None perhaps was more compelling than that of a practicing psychotherapist with over 30 years of specialization in the treatment of trauma and grief associated with induced abortion.
“Now with over three decades of legal abortion,” said Vincent M. Rue, co-director of the Institute for Pregnancy Loss in Jacksonville, FL, “the scientific evidence is increasingly clear that abortion places women’s mental health at risk, even for those who have never had mental health problems previously.”
Rue cited several studies, one of which was a large study of women in California, in which women who had abortions made 63% more claims of psychiatric problems within 90 days after pregnancy resolution than women who delivered their babies.
Planned Parenthood, on the other hand, calls post-abortion syndrome a “false idea.” The debate about the syndrome also entered national politics during last year’s presidential election.
Attention to Post Abortion Syndrome Diverted
Post-partum blues are well known, but when it comes to mental health after an abortion, much of the national attention has centered on a woman’s “right to choose” rather than the emotional after-effects that many women experience.
Women in Berwyn, Cicero, N. Riverside and other western Chicago suburbs should learn about the possible emotional consequences of abortion by calling WomanCare Services at 708-795-6000, or go to http://www.womancare.org.
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