Unless our country gets a reality check about who we elect to office and we educate ourselves on their positions, we women have no hope of deciding whether we want to start a family or not—or if we want to carry a rapist’s child. We stand no chance unless we fight for what we believe in. (Graphic by Kelly Lennon)
Unless our country gets a reality check about who we elect to office and we educate ourselves on their positions, we women have no hope of deciding whether we want to start a family or not—or if we want to carry a rapist’s child. We stand no chance unless we fight for what we believe in.
The following is Madysyn Anderson’s personal story, as told to Courier Dallas.
When I first saw the positive lines on the pregnancy test, my heart stopped. I couldn’t believe it. I was on birth control. I also felt sick about the idea of telling my parents that I had gotten pregnant at 21 and at the very start of my senior year at the University of Houston in Sept. 2021.
It was really difficult for me to think about breaking the news to my parents because they themselves had been teen parents. They had constantly drilled into me and my two siblings that we shouldn’t make the same mistakes that they did when they became such young parents. My mom was just 16 when she had my older brother and they got married within a year.
They told us instead to focus on ourselves and our careers and become established so that when we were ready for a family, it could be a joyous experience and not something stressful that could hold you back in life like it did for my mom. My mom didn’t graduate college until 2008 after she had divorced my dad. She was working a full-time job and raising three kids and doing night classes. She is now a lawyer and I’m very proud of her.
I was devastated that I had made the one mistake that they told me not to make and I was so afraid of disappointing them.
While I was on birth control at the time, it wasn’t unusual for me to miss a period for two months because I have endometriosis. Even though I had constantly been feeling nauseous for a couple of weeks, I had chalked it up to stress because I was helping my sorority run our annual recruitment effort.
I decided to take a precautionary pregnancy test because I had broken up with my boyfriend of two years in August and I wanted to start seeing other people again. When I did, and it came up positive, I couldn’t believe it. I ended up taking five drugstore tests including digital tests before I had to face the fact that I was definitely pregnant.
The timing couldn’t have been more of a gut punch. I was very aware of Texas’s new law which banned abortion from the time a fetus’ heartbeat is detected, which is usually around six weeks. It was the first law in the country to limit access to abortion at such an early stage in pregnancy even though Roe v. Wade was still officially law of the land.
SB 8 had become Texas law on Sept. 1, so I was finding out about my pregnancy just a couple of weeks later. I prayed that I was still within the legal time to get an abortion in the state.
I called the local Planned Parenthood immediately, but they didn’t have an appointment until about a week later. Because I was already over nine weeks pregnant, there was no way I would be able to get an abortion in Texas. That was a lot to handle and I just cried because I knew instantly that any chance I had to keep this private were gone. It was a very hard thing to come to terms with in minutes in a doctor’s office all by myself.
I knew at this point that I had to see my ex. I felt that he deserved to know, and even though the relationship had not been the greatest, I knew that he did care about me and fortunately he was kind and supported my decision to get an abortion. His mom, however, tried to talk me out of having it because it would have been her first grandchild.
I was sure, however, that if I continued with the pregnancy I would wind up back in a relationship with him, and I would have to lean on my parents a lot with child care if I wanted to continue school. I knew it would set my life back and that was a choice I didn’t want to make. I’d done everything I could to push through college. I was so close to finishing. I didn’t want an unwanted pregnancy to prevent me from completing the biggest achievement in my life thus far.
Next, I had to research where I could go to get an abortion. A lot of the states in the South had required waiting periods, so I would have to go to a clinic twice. I called all the way to Georgia, Las Vegas, and Salt Lake City, but the place that could take me soonest was in Jackson, Mississippi, which was a 7 or 8-hour drive. It was called the Jackson Women’s Health Organization, the very clinic that later was the subject of the Supreme Court ruling in the Dobbs decision that overturned Roe v. Wade in 2022.
I’m so glad that I didn’t take one of my now ex-friends’ advice and go to a pregnancy crisis center instead of Planned Parenthood. Other friends warned me that they are run by anti-abortion groups that try to convince you to keep your baby. I don’t think I could have handled someone calling me a terrible person at that point. I was sleep deprived and was sick all the time and couldn’t eat. I was barely holding onto the threads of my life. I also was trying to find out if Planned Parenthood could help me cover the cost of the abortion and travel with gas cards and food coupons.
The biggest problem was that none of my friends could go with me on that drive to Jackson. That’s when I finally broke down and decided to tell my dad. I didn’t know how he would react, but I knew in my heart that he would have my back and he did. He immediately agreed to drive me to Mississippi and got us a hotel there.
It was so hard to go into the clinic alone for my first required visit due to COVID, even though I was escorted by someone who worked there. Protestors screamed at me and it made me angry and frustrated. They’re screaming that you’re a horrible human being and you wouldn’t be here if your mother made the same choice. Plus, they could be yelling at someone who’s just there to pick up their birth control because Planned Parenthood offers a lot of different services. The protesters’ sense of entitlement to tell you what to do is jarring. I think they probably feel entitled to their own opinion, but I’m also entitled to my opinion.
At that first appointment one of the providers was legally required to tell me a bunch of scary things like the risks of getting breast cancer or becoming infertile because of an abortion. I knew that these things weren’t factually true, however.
Then I was given a time and date a week later to come back for the procedure. Even though the legal waiting period in Mississippi was just 24 hours, the clinic had such an influx of women coming for abortions from Texas that I needed to wait a week for the procedure.
On the drive home I finally decided to text my mom and tell her that I wanted to talk and she called back right away. She was a little hurt that I was so scared to talk with her. She thought she had built a better relationship with me and that I would know I could go to her. I confessed to her that I was so worried that I was a disappointment to her. Thankfully, she reassured me that I wasn’t and that she vowed she would do whatever it took to get me whatever I needed.
True to her word, she booked flights for us to fly to Jackson the next week for the abortion. Then she drove me from the airport to the clinic and waited in a coffee shop for me.
It was actually kind of comforting to talk with the other girls in the waiting room who were there for the same procedure. We talked about who was nauseous and how far along we were, just kind of finding commonalities.
After I walked out of the clinic and I was finally able to see my mom, I broke down. It just sucked having to do it alone because of COVID and my mom was so apologetic that she had to leave me. But, that was the first night that I was able to actually sleep and the first time I didn’t feel nauseous after 13 weeks and 4 days.
I feel very lucky that my parents ended up being understanding and I felt tremendous relief that it was finally over. I’d never had to fight so hard for something I wanted and was best for me. I could finally move on with my life. There was nothing else that could hold me back.
I have friends who don’t agree with the choice that I made, but they understand that it was my body, my choice. This does not have to be a make-or-break for friendship as long as you are respectful. You don’t have to agree with my choice, but you don’t get to make me feel bad for making it.
I was shattered, however, when I heard that Roe v. Wade had been overturned by the Supreme Court. It was right around my 22nd birthday, so it was the worst birthday present I could get. I was bawling my eyes out in my room. The worst thing I thought about was the little girls who are going to have to grow up not knowing about bodily autonomy and having that safeguard. The little girls that would have to go through hell again after they were raped or taken advantage of in any way.
I decided that I wanted to share and talk about my experience with abortion and be an educational resource. Abortion is so stigmatized and no one was speaking out about it and I’m tired of that. I wanted to be a resource for other women.
I found that I had a passion for advocacy.
I was very excited when I learned through a contact at Planned Parenthood that I was selected to appear before a Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions (HELP ) Committee hearing called “The Assault on Women’s Freedoms: How Abortion Bans Have Created a Health Care Nightmare Across America.”
Madysyn Anderson appearing before a Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions (HELP) Committee hearing. (Senate HELP Committee)
The hearing was chaired by Senator Patty Murray to focus on the harm that Republican abortion bans or restrictions in 22 states have created since the Supreme Court’s Dobbs v. Jackson decision, which ended the federal guarantee of abortion rights.
My dad came with me and sat in the committee room. Beforehand he helped me prep for possible tricky questions. He had been a rock star wanting to promote my advocacy. I did not expect that this whole abortion experience would be something that I would share so closely with him.
Essentially, I told my story to the senators there and I pleaded with them not to continue with these (anti-abortion policies). Republican Senator Bill Cassidy led the Republican contingent and he had a cartoon drawing of a fetus’ gestational ages in the womb next to him.
Of course, Texas’ two senators, Ted Cruz and John Cornyn, were not there, but a few other Republican senators, including Lisa Murkowski, Markwayne Mullin, and Ted Budd, attended. It felt amazing to have these people in power essentially required to hear me talk about the experience I had. Republicans have caused this outcome. It was a heartbreaking outcome in terms of what I had to go through but also a heartbreaking outcome (for them) since their laws and tactics haven’t worked: people are still having abortions.
It was empowering also because there was a packed gallery and I knew there were people who were impacted by my story. Numerous people came up to me afterwards, including senators, to thank me for sharing my story.
Senator Patty Murray and Bernie Sanders were incredibly kind and wonderful.
Now, I’m hoping that Texas will turn blue in November, though that’s a shooting-for-the-stars kind of hope. The majority of women that I meet and talk to agree that women should have a choice over their bodies. Plus, I’m seeing more men be upset because they realize that this will affect their nieces or cousins or sisters or their significant others in the future.
Unless our country gets a reality check about who we elect to office and we educate ourselves on their positions, we women have no hope of deciding whether we want to start a family or not—or if we want to carry a rapist’s child. We stand no chance unless we fight for what we believe in.
I’m doing what I can to show the real effects of these laws and encouraging people to vote. I’ll go out and vote and I’m ready to fight.
