Posted by My OB said WHAT?!?.
Jul
16
Posted by My OB said WHAT?!?.
“Oh, You Had An Abortion Then?”
Nurse: “Have you any children?”
Mother: “One pregnancy, no living children.”
Nurse: “Oh, you had an abortion then?”
There are 41 comments to this post.
Gemma had this to say,
Jul 16, 2010 @ 5:08 am (Quote)
My first ever post here, but this really made me yell!! My sister gave birth to a sleeping baby at 25 weeks gestation when she was 18. In her next pregnancy the nurse assumed that my niece had been an abortion!! It sickens me that people can be so rude!
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beccaisadoula had this to say,
Jul 16, 2010 @ 5:52 am (Quote)
Because there are obviously only 2 options: a child you want lives or a child you don’t want you abort. Sheesh
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Sheva had this to say,
Jul 16, 2010 @ 5:55 am (Quote)
So mean, and thoughtless.
Yes, everybody has an oops moment like this at one time or another. But some jobs require more vigilance, and thoughtfulness, and medical care is one if them. I you can’t do it, get out.
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Knitted in the Womb Reply:
July 20th, 2010 at 8:21 am (Quote)
Yeah…especially since this scenario is QUITE common–a hospital that does more than 3 births per day would encounter this on an almost daily basis.
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let’s see…
Miscarriage
stillbirth
fetal anomaly resulting in birth shortly after death
SIDS
accident at a very young age
nope…abortion doesn’t even make my top 5 reasons to have a pregnancy and no living children…
How assumptive of her. Rude I say, RUDE.
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One other option: birth mother who lovingly gave her child for adoption at birth. (I don’t want to debate others feelings of my decision, please. It is/was the right decision for me at the time.) I have to explain this one everytime when asked at all appointments, “How many live births?”
One c-section with adoption, one miscarriage, one HBAC, one HBAC coming up.
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Kat Reply:
July 16th, 2010 at 7:51 am (Quote)
I certainly wouldn’t want to debate your decision either.
I would want to say thank you for giving such a tremendous gift to a family. Being a birth mother who makes a courageous adoption plan for her child is an amazing thing. I know many families who were blessed by adoption, and birth mothers made that possible.
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Aunt4God Reply:
July 16th, 2010 at 7:56 am (Quote)
As an adopted child, I want to commend you for doing what you thought was best for you and your child at that time. It is a hard decision to make.
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Luann Reply:
July 16th, 2010 at 8:13 am (Quote)
ditto. adopted child here. nothing but gratitude.
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Cmat Reply:
July 16th, 2010 at 8:59 am (Quote)
Ditto here too. I am also adopted. Your decision took love, courage and generosity.
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Elizabeth H Reply:
January 24th, 2011 at 5:20 pm (Quote)
I know this is random, being so long after the original post…
Anyway, I’m also an adopted child, nothing but gratitude for all birth mothers here. I was recently reunited with my birth mother after 22 years, and learned all of the details around my adoption.
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Alyson Miers had this to say,
Jul 16, 2010 @ 7:26 am (Quote)
Why don’t we try this again:
Nurse: “Have you any children?”
Mother: “One pregnancy, no living children.”
Nurse: “Can you tell me how the pregnancy ended?”
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cheeks023 Reply:
July 16th, 2010 at 8:11 am (Quote)
now honestly; how hard was that?
Tact is not really a quality in short supply in this world, why is it missing so badly from the medical community? I’ve been taught about tact since I was a little girl, and in turn this is a lesson I teach my 4 children…
It is NOT what you say, it is HOW you say it.
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You know what happens when you ASSume? Yes, nurse, you just made an ass out of yourself. If that was me she said that too, I probably would’ve slapped her. (okay okay, maybe not, but I would’ve given her an earful)
As someone who has had 2 miscarriages and a stillbirth, this really boils my blood.
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Even from the point of view of a mother who has not experienced loss.. this is just disgusting. Like Alyson said- “Can you tell me how the pregnancy ended?” Its not even really necessary to show compassion (though it would be nice) just TACT.
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This was mine.
What made it worse was that I had found out about my miscarriage on the same day I found out I had precancerous cells on my cervix, this dialogue happened two weeks after at a scheduled colposcopy. So the loss was very fresh and raw in my mind.
She didn’t even have the decency to apologise for her rash assumption after I set her straight.
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Jane Reply:
July 16th, 2010 at 1:13 pm (Quote)
I’m sorry Claire. You shouldn’t have had to deal with that. 
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Sarah Dorrance-Minch Reply:
July 16th, 2010 at 1:15 pm (Quote)
What an awful nurse. Shame on her. You have my sympathies, btw.
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Issa Reply:
July 20th, 2010 at 6:24 pm (Quote)
It is an awful thing to lose a child, at any age, and I am so sorry for you. I have had nurses say a few off beat things and after I correct them or tell them I’m not comfortable with their comments, I make sure to tell the doctor. Hearing it from me is one thing, hearing it from people they work with is something else.
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Sarah Dorrance-Minch had this to say,
Jul 16, 2010 @ 12:57 pm (Quote)
The nerve!
For medical reasons, the care provider needs to know the circumstances of the previous pregnancy loss – miscarriage? stillbirth? pregnancy terminated by docotr and if so, at what age of gestation and by what method and was it elective or done for reasons of medical emergency?
That does not mean the care provider or any assistants to said care provider get to fill in the blanks and make assumptions while filling out the form. It means whoever is doing the interview needs to ask in a tactful way, “We need to know a little more about this, can you please elaborate? I know it’s personal, and I apologize, but we have medical reasons for asking.”
Oh, and for the record, even if the mother says, “Yes, I had an abortion,” that does not excuse the rudeness. Or any further rudeness. Sixteen years ago I had an abortion in early pregnancy, primarily for medical reasons, at least in the eyes of the doctor who advised me to get one (I was severely malnourished, and my pregnancy was putting stress on my heart and causing what were apparently some scary irregularities – think how Karen Carpenter died. I’m not much of a gambler, and having an extremely high risk pregnancy when I wasn’t even happy about being pregnant or willing to raise the child myself scared the snot out of me).
I still cry myself to sleep sometimes.
The local free midwifery clinic for pregnant women, which I availed myself of long enough to get an ultrasound (really, I’d gone in to ask about dental care, and children’s Medicaid, but they only saw my fundus) asked me about my gynecologic history as part of routine screening, and when we got to the part about why I said I’d been pregnant four times before but only had three children, and the medical assistant asked for more information, I told her the circumstances, and she got snippy and icy with me and pretty much ceased to see me as a human being or at least as a good mother, at least, going by her rudeness.
I suppose I could have told her the entire story of how a condom broke, I had no idea what the “morning after” pill even was or I would have got it out of paranoia even though I hadn’t had a period in more than a year due to being about forty pounds underweight at the time, I went to my college health centre for what I thought was a really bad flu and found out I was pregnant and the doctor didn’t think it would be wise of me to continue the pregnancy based on my symptoms and what he heard with the stethoscope, and how I had only just got myself back into college after several years of living hand to mouth and couldn’t even afford food and could barely afford rent, and it nearly crippled me to come up with the fee for the clinic and I went without any anaesthesia because that would have been ANOTHER month’s rent, and how I played Brahms’ “German Requiem” over and over that night with tears rolling down my face and still sometimes dream about the baby I didn’t have. I’m going to stop here because my pregnancy hormones are making me cry (I’m usually not much of a crier) and crying gives me migraines, and I don’t want to deal with a migraine. Bottom line: like many women, I had some pretty sad circumstances that I dealt with in the only way I knew how at the time, and whether there was another way or not, there’s no way to go back and change things, and my personal life was none of the medical assistant’s G-ddamned business and it was not her place to cast judgment on me. And the same goes for any other medical professional doing an intake history on any other pregnant mother.
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Sarah Dorrance-Minch Reply:
July 16th, 2010 at 1:04 pm (Quote)
PS. I am aware that ordinarily one does not go into a midwifery clinic for a dental appointment. I should probably clarify things. We have a couple of health networks for indigent and moderate-income people in the city I live in, one of which (the one I chose) has midwifery services and a branch that is closer to where we live than the other network, which seems to mostly cater to the northern and eastern parts of the city.
To talk to the financial screener and get into the system, one must meet with the screener in person, presenting certain documents. The screener is in the obstetric/midwifery office.
Sorry if I hadn’t made that clear. I was guilty of typing while addled.
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Kit Reply:
July 16th, 2010 at 2:29 pm (Quote)
I’m so sorry. I’ve alwasy admired your posts, and hope I can be more like you once I get this growing up thing figured out. i’m sorry you were treated badly by that woman, and I hope God will take the hatefullness out of her heart. But most of all, I hope you can get some peace, and I wish you and your kiddos the very best.
Sorry, but your story made me a bit weepay, and something told me to post. I’ll shut up now.
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I have been pregnant 4 times and only have 3 living children.
I am a surrogate. I do not count the surrogate child as one of my own- she is made from her mothers egg and her fathers sperm and does not belong to me in any way.
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Sarah Dorrance-Minch Reply:
July 17th, 2010 at 10:58 am (Quote)
Oh, cool. 
I donated my eggs once, back in 1997 – that was before I knew what Asperger’s even was, because I doubt the people who usually go egg shopping would consider me to have designer genes now. But back then, hey. I was in my late twenties, of proven if unfortunate fertility, had graduated cum laude from my undergraduate institution and was going to Oxford for my master’s, had published poetry (albeit without getting paid), and the profile and body shots the fertility clinic took of me made me look like a “ten.”
I hate to sound so cynical, because I truly think egg donation and surrogacy both can be the ultimate gifts of love, but really, I was marketed like a brood mare. I’m pretty sure I wasn’t chosen at random.
Surrogacy is a very generous act. Kudos to you.
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The more I think about this one the more it angers me.
Why does abortion automatically equate to some stupid kid who gets herself in trouble and terminates the pregnancy on the sly so nobody knows. And if she did, does that automatically make her a bad person? Why the judgments?
There are many, MANY reasons that might require an abortion…each one as difficult a decision as the next, it should in no way be treated callously.
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Sarah Dorrance-Minch Reply:
July 17th, 2010 at 11:01 am (Quote)
FWIW, when I was in the abortion clinic I saw quite a few wedding rings in the waiting room, and they weren’t on the hands of mothers/chaperones of teenagers.
And there were quite a lot of women trying to hide tears or avoid crying in the recovery area.
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cheeks023 Reply:
July 17th, 2010 at 4:12 pm (Quote)
And that is just it. My husband and I had to have an abortion 5 months after we got married. The baby had Turner Syndrome and we were told with the way her heart was forming she wouldn’t live longer then 15 weeks in utero…causing issues with a later miscarriage.
We had to make the gut wrenching decision to terminate the pregnancy early while it was still beneficial to my health, or let the pregnancy terminate later, causing me potential problems. At 22 years old…that was an almost impossible choice and heading down to the clinic was probably the most horrible thing I have ever done in my life.
It turned out to “just” be a D& C because the baby’s heart stopped sometime that week.
I think if a nurse had said that to me during my next pregnancy I would have broken down into unstoppable sobs.
OP, I’m so sorry the nurse was so, SO callous towards you. {{HUGS}}
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Lindsey Carr-Ruck had this to say,
Jul 18, 2010 @ 5:25 pm (Quote)
BAD!!! Bad, nurse!!! (Insert image of a nurse being popped on the nose with the newspaper).
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And this is why, when I’m asked how many pregnancies I’ve had, I ALWAYS respond with “this is my second, my son was stillborn in February.”
As soon as people hear that horrible “S” word, they either clam up or tell me how sorry they are.
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“Actually, she was sixteen and I strangled her in your waiting room about five minutes ago. Please don’t make those kinds of assumptions!”
(Yes, we all know a miscarriage is a “spontaneous abortion” but there are so so so so so so many ways that women lose children, it’s beyond ridiculous to assume the woman miscarried or induced an abortion.)
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Aron Reply:
July 16th, 2010 at 5:32 am Aron(Quote)
Jane, will you come live in my head so that I will always have the perfect come-back to anyone’s arse-holery? Pretty please? I’ll bake you shortbread!
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Luann Reply:
July 16th, 2010 at 8:14 am Luann(Quote)
LOL thank you Aron. you made me smile this morning
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Jane Reply:
July 16th, 2010 at 10:59 am Jane(Quote)
The inside of my head is a small and nasty place. :-b But I’d take the shortbread.
It’s just such a ridiculous response when what should be called for is compassion. Even if this conversation was taking place inside an abortion clinic prior to a scheduled induced abortion, the nurse should not have made that assumption.
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