Eva

As a certified rape crisis counselor who volunteers to provide medical and legal advocacy to survivors of sexual assault seeking ER services, I believe that protecting women’s health is not only incredibly important – it is an absolute necessity in the work against the patronizing, demeaning, and dangerous laws that prevent women from seeking health services and having control over their bodies.

“Protecting women’s health is not only incredibly important - it is an absolute necessity in the work against the patronizing, demeaning, and dangerous laws.”

All women, despite how they came to carry a pregnancy, have the right to safe, timely, and humane medical procedures. It is not just the rape survivors I work with who should be able to make choices about their bodies without fear of shame, losing a job to take time off of work or going into debt to make the payment.

I want to be able to tell the brave survivors I work with, who have all agency and choice taken away from them, that they have options about what they do next. As it stands, I have to warn them about the dark realities of what it often takes to terminate a pregnancy, meaning that the survivor is not able to make choice free of outside influence from the government.

No one should have to weigh the emotional, monetary and financial risks of terminating a pregnancy against what they truly want for themselves and their futures.