There Are No Stigma-Free Abortions, Even in 'Progressive' Countries

This article originally appeared on VICE Netherlands.

Getting pregnant was the last of a long list of life-changing events I hadn’t seen coming. My roommate, however, had. I’d been tired for weeks, the only food I craved was mango – which I inevitably threw up after eating – and I felt ambivalent about absolutely everything. “I think you should probably take a test,” she said.

I live in the Netherlands, one of the countries with some of the most progressive abortion laws in the world. Abortions are available on request up to 21 weeks from the day of conception and up to 24 weeks in cases where the mother’s health is at risk. According to the 2021 European Abortion Policies Atlas, this legislation is among the most permissive in the EU where most countries (13 out of 27 members, including Denmark, Finland, Greece, Italy and Ireland) limit abortions to 12 weeks from the day of your last menstruation. That basically means you only have two months to find out you’re pregnant and make a decision after you miss your first period.

Another seven countries, including Austria, Germany, France, Belgium and Spain, allow abortions up to between 12 and 18 weeks, while in Poland and Malta abortions are pretty much illegal. Just outside of EU boundaries, only Sweden, the UK and Iceland have comparatively permissive abortion laws, allowing the procedure up to 24 weeks. 

The Netherlands loses a few points in the Atlas ranking because you have to wait for a mandatory five-day reflection period before you can access abortion care. Eight other member states, including Italy, Germany, Belgium and Spain, also have mandatory waiting periods. But at least abortions are completely covered by the Dutch healthcare system, something that is true for only 15 out of the 27 EU countries. 

In 2019, around 32,200 abortions were performed in the Netherlands, corresponding to about ninne out of 1,000 people aged 15 to 44. That’s well below the international average of 39 per 1,000, which is likely to be an underestimate given how underreported abortions are, especially in places where they’re illegal.

I find this fact fascinating because anti-abortion advocates often say that making abortion care easily accessible will result in more people terminating their pregnancy. That’s not corroborated by the facts: Abortion rates have fallen and plateaued in the Netherlands since the 90s. A country’s abortion rate is strongly linked to women’s socioeconomic status and sex education. As stated in a 2020 UN report about abortion laws, “restricting legal access to abortion does not decrease the need for abortion, but it is likely to increase the number of women seeking illegal and unsafe abortions.”

Another country place once thought to have progressive abortion legislation was the US, at least before Roe v. Wade was overturned. Although this is currently being challenged in the courts, states like Texas have banned abortions beyond six weeks of pregnancy. Remember: If you’re six weeks along, your periods might have only dried up for about two weeks – something that can happen if you’re stressed or hormonally imbalanced. I was six weeks pregnant when I found out. If I lived in Texas, I could have been forced to have the baby. 

I think about that all the time. People are most likely to get an abortion between the ages of 18 and 29. At 25, I was a textbook case. But even though I had the law and the healthcare system behind me, this decision wasn’t easy to make.

Quite the opposite. I’ve always been clearly pro-choice. But when I got pregnant, I didn’t know which decision was right for me. I had always wanted to be a mother, but only at a time when my life was stable. And even though my circumstances were incompatible with having a kid, I was still riddled with doubt. 

Before going through with this, I wanted to talk things through with someone, but I couldn’t think of anyone who had gone through the same experience, even though the people around me are quite open-minded. According to a 2020 study conducted by the consulting firm Ipsos and the NGO Humanistisch Verbond, 69 percent of people in the Netherlands have hardly ever spoken about abortion with anyone in their lives. Interestingly, 85 percent of respondents also said discussions on the topic should be more open. 

Three days after I found out I was pregnant, the Netherlands entered an “intelligent lockdown”, introducing a series of restrictive measures to contain the pandemic. Nobody knew much about COVID-19 at that point, and I was told that if I felt even the slightest bit under the weather, I wouldn’t be allowed to go to the abortion clinic or even see my GP. Despite the country’s state of emergency, my doctor couldn’t mail me the abortion pill either. I had to quarantine for two weeks in my tiny room and hope I wouldn’t develop or display any COVID-19 symptoms, otherwise my abortion would have been further delayed. 

With each passing day, the decision became more difficult. I yearned for a hug, but was too afraid to touch my roommates. Getting too close to people meant I risked jeopardizing my appointment. I was consumed by fears I’d have to move back with my parents and raise a child. I kept struggling with feelings of guilt and shame, but couldn’t open up about them to friends, because I felt I couldn’t just drop the news on them over the phone.

Eventually, I managed to get my pregnancy terminated and started putting the pieces of my life back together. But I still craved a frank conversation to try to make sense of what I’d just been through. So I decided to meet with Eva de Goeij, 30, the founder of the Abortion Buddies programme, which matches people seeking an abortion with volunteers who accompany them to the clinic and protect them from anti-abortion activists.

“I had thought my decision through and kept a brave face while I was at the clinic, but I also felt so ashamed. I cried so much during that time,” de Goeij told me over coffee. I, too, felt like I had to project I was brave and resilient. When I woke up after the procedure, still a little bit high, I assured the doctors I could easily walk to my own bed. Recovery takes a few hours, but I asked to go home after 15 minutes to work on my thesis.

Once I stepped outside, I decided to walk all the way to my place because I didn’t want to burden anybody. All I wanted was not to make a big deal out of this. And yet, my body was telling me I wasn’t as strong as I wanted to be. In the weeks leading up to the appointment, I felt constantly tired and overcome by emotion.

“Interviews we’ve done for our research show that the pregnancy was super fuzzy for many people,” de Goeij said, “as if their heads were submerged in fog.”

Feeling insecure, blaming yourself for everything and panicking for no reason – I chalked it all up to my own shortcomings. But in fact, the hormones in my blood and the constant state of stress had a huge impact on that, too. I struggled for a while, even after the procedure. If I had known you can experience depression after an abortion or miscarriage, I would have been able to understand my own feelings a lot better.

Another thing de Goeij and I had in common was how our perception of our own bodies shifted. Suddenly, I found my body to be absolutely beautiful, despite carrying a bunch of extra weight. My breasts were fuller and I was charmed by the little bump of my belly. “I can relate to that,” de Goeji said. “It was a confusing feeling, I was both ashamed and proud. I felt super feminine and thought, ‘Look at me, this is what I’m capable of’.”

In my case, the signs of the pregnancy are still visible on my body. In the beginning, I found it difficult to look in the mirror, because I’d be confronted with the fact that I was no longer carrying a baby, nor had I birthed one. Now I can say that I have never been so confident in my body. When I look at it, I think of all the amazing things it can do.

As de Goeij said, borrowing from Dutch philosopher Trudy Dehue, our discussion about abortions have become so warped because they all centre the foetus as a separate entity, not as part of a pregnant person. I think making this decision is so stigmatised in the Netherlands and in other Western countries because Christian conservatism is embedded in our laws, in the fabric of our society and our debates. Although countries like the Netherlands and the UK have progressive laws, abortion is still regulated under the criminal code.

To this day, we simply don’t hear enough stories about unwanted pregnancies. For me, talking about my abortion was incredibly helpful, although no one should feel pressured to do so. We’ll only start tearing the stigma down if more people put their different experiences and perspectives out there to show how they’re all valid and able to coexist. It could also open the door to more comprehensive and empathetic care before and after the procedure. That’s why, despite my shame, I decided to tell my story. Because I know how important it is to realise you’re not alone.