We Can do Better for Women and Children

It feels impossible these days to discuss hard things. We’ve become so comfortable aligning ourselves with the same point of view that we’re sometimes hostile to listening to others. It reminds me of the seemingly innocuous playground game Red Rover I played as a child.  One team calls out a player from the other team, and that player tries to run through the other team’s arms to break the chain.

Firm and rigid, no one wants to bend.  Other points of view get plowed over or knocked down. It’s dirty and messy. People get hurt. Saddest of all, it makes us forget a fundamental truth about our humanity – that we belong to each other. In a primal sense, there is no other side.

Nowhere does division seem more obvious than the contentious issue of abortion rights.

This November, Floridians will vote on Amendment 4 which the ballot summary states “no law shall prohibit, penalize, delay, or restrict abortion before viability or when necessary to protect the patient’s health, as determined by the patient’s healthcare provider. This amendment does not change the Legislature’s constitutional authority to require notification to a parent or guardian before a minor has an abortion.”

The language of this amendment might appear to put limitations on abortion as it states that a “health care provider” is required to determine if an abortion is necessary to protect the mother’s “health.” However, a healthcare provider is not synonymous with a licensed medical doctor, and the broad term “health” also includes, as determined by the courts, the mental health of the mother.

While the seriousness of mental health issues should never be downplayed, this amendment makes no mention of how significant these “health” issues must be. Presumably, any mother seeking an abortion has some level of anxiety as to her condition. As it’s written, it is hard to imagine any instance in which an abortion wouldn’t be allowed under Amendment 4. It essentially allows abortions on babies who could survive outside of the womb for health concerns that may be treatable and temporary.

Currently, Florida law requires parental consent for minors to have an abortion. Receiving “notification” significantly dilutes the existing requirement of parental consent, making abortion the only medical decision for which parents have no say. Considering the epidemic mental health crisis of our youth, Amendment 4 puts minors in the precarious position of making a pivotal life decision without a loved one to help navigate how their decision may affect their emotional well-being. This is a dangerous precedent and an infringement on the rights of parents that is not in the best interest of our children.

Most women take the decision to have an abortion seriously. Even when we see things differently, we still share the commonalities of creating and carrying life; of making difficult decisions unique to individual circumstances; and living with the consequences of those decisions. Pregnancy, whether it ends in a live birth, miscarriage, or an abortion leaves an indelible mark. Maybe it’s part of natural law that supersedes legal amendments but being pregnant is something a woman never forgets.

These are not small things we can dismiss about one another or simple issues to legislate. Amendment 4 offers an overcorrection to current restrictions that will cause more harm to the women it’s meant to protect, our young people, and the voiceless in the womb who are the most vulnerable to our vote.

I once spoke to a young woman who was refused an abortion because her child was developed enough to live outside the womb. Eventually, I accompanied her to an adoption agency where she carefully picked a home for her son from countless couples who were desperate to welcome a child into their family. We had lunch a few months after his birth and she beamed as she told me about her son’s new family, her love for him, and the trip she was making out of state to visit him.

It was a remarkable reminder of how love finds a way when we open our arms to the possibilities that come from prioritizing the welfare of others and remembering our fundamental purpose is to love and care for one another. Hand in hand, it’s time to look for alternatives to Amendment 4 that collectively lift us all.

Hi all~ I know this is a legitimately sensitive topic but this is something we need to get right. I don’t think most people understand the far-reaching implications of this amendment. This goes further than the debate about when life begins or bodily autonomy. This amendment essentially opens the door for abortions in the third trimester for medical conditions that may be temporary or treatable. We can do better than that for ourselves and the unborn.  ~ Love, Lara