Wishing, and Waiting, and Hoping, and Praying

Many years ago I was talking to a male friend, and he described one of our mutual female acquaintances as "boy crazy." It irked me at the time, but I let it pass because it wasn't really the time/place to get into a feminist rant (though, with age, I've come to realize that almost any time and place can accommodate the occasional feminist rant). "Boy crazy" is a way to dismiss women for not showing the appropriate level of interest in romantic relationships. Women can also, of course, be described as "frigid" and "too picky" - it's a really fine line to walk between seeming available and being too available - how does one even navigate this? 

As a perennially single Mormon woman, I probably spend too much time wondering about the "appropriate" level of time/thought/energy to my single status - have I given up? Am I obsessing if I spend a few hours swiping through dating apps? No matter what my answer is, it always seems to be the wrong one - I appear to be trying too hard or not hard enough.

Another experience from a few years ago: I was having dinner with family. The restaurant seated us at an eight person table - two seats for my parents; two seats for one of my brothers and his wife; two seats for my other brother and his then fiancé (now wife), and one seat for me - of course, this only added up to seven, so there was an empty seat next to me. I started to think: is that seat going to be empty forever? Given my current age and the life expectancy of Americans, I probably have another few decades of life on this earth ahead of me, at least. Part of me spiraled a little bit inside during that dinner: am I forever going to be the single one at this table (and all the other tables)? It feels like staring down decades of loneliness as I look to the future.

Logically, I know I am worthy of love - every human being is. But I can't help but feel like I am missing some essential characteristic that makes me attractive to members of the opposite sex. I don't mean to say that I am the sexiest or best person on the planet, in fact I am far from either. Just, sometimes it hurts to feel like there is no one in my life who chose me - a person who thinks I'm great not because I'm a good friend or because they are obligated to love me because of family connections, but someone who sees a potential future with me. I've never had a serious romantic relationship, and it feels like it must be my fault (and I'm sure, in many ways, it is).

Of course, part of what makes this hard is that I feel churlish complaining about it. I don't want my married friends/family to feel guilty or bad about being married - I'm happy for them! Likewise, in the grand scheme of life options on this planet, I have by far one of the easiest lives - I have food, shelter, transportation, health, loving family members who care about me, enough money to support myself, etc. It seems silly to complain and moan about my "single blessedness" when other people are struggling with far greater challenges.

Not to mention, "a woman needs a man like a fish needs a bicycle" - I know that my self worth is not tied to being found desirable by men. I know this, and yet, still I yearn: I yearn to have a boyfriend/husband to share my life with and lie down with at the end of a long day. I want this so badly it hurts sometimes. And I don't know where to put that pain - it would be a lot easier if I truly didn't care. And sometimes that is what I want - to just be numb to this desire - to have it be taken away would be so much easier than caring. 

I think about a line from the musical Wicked a lot. Idina Menzel's character, Elphaba, is lusting after Fiero, a character who is dating her best friend. She sings a song "I'm Not That Girl" recognizing that she's not the pretty/popular girl who gets the guy. One line cuts me deep each time I hear it: "Don't wish/too hard/wishing only wounds the heart." To me, it speaks of the pain of wishing, with no actual hope of success. I wish I didn't identify with that sentiment. In the meantime, I'll just be over here, trying not to wish (which yes, I know makes me the continued queen-of-non-emotionally-healthy-responses to difficult topics).

Anyway today this was on my mind - usually I'm pretty successful in pushing it out of my mind and not thinking about it. I don't want it to consume my life, but some days I give in to a pity party and feel sorry for myself. If you've made it this far, thanks for reading.

Title of this post is taken from the great Dusty Springfield song.

The (GOP-Court-Majority-Sized) Elephant in the Room

Unless you've been living under a rock the past few days, you probably heard that a leaked Supreme Court decision shows a majority on the Court are supporting an overturn of the precedential case Roe v. Wade, which provided a constitutional right to abortion in certain cases. While most observers expected this conservative majority to chip away at abortion rights, the main shocking thing seems to be that Roe is being completely thrown away (and under reasoning I find very suspect, but that's probably a separate post). 

I believe that one of the reasons many Mormons are so Republican/conservative is that there is a strong anti-abortion sentiment among most members. In case you haven't already guessed this from the title of my blog, I'm pro-choice (and I did another blog post on this topic back in 2013). That doesn't mean I necessarily think abortion is great. If I found myself with an unwanted or unplanned pregnancy, I know I would really struggle with what to do - but I think it should be my choice, not the government's. It seems like the height of government overreach to say that government should control the private medical decisions about what happens inside a woman's body. So, I thought I would lay out the "moral" and "practical" reasons I feel that abortion should still be legal here in America.

The Moral Argument for Legal Abortion

If someone needs a kidney transplant, I cannot be forced to give him/her my kidney - even if I *can* do so without causing my own death, the law of the land respects my bodily autonomy enough to say that I cannot be forced to save another's life. Is this a morally complicated issue? Absolutely! But I have control over how my body is used - that is the essence of personal liberty. The same argument applies to abortion. Not even a mother can be forced to save the life of her child by giving up a kidney - similarly, I don't believe a woman should be forced to carry a baby to term.

There are many circumstances where a woman may consider an abortion - when her own life is at stake, when the baby's life is at stake, when the pregnancy is the result of rape/incest, or many other situations too numerous to mention. My point here is that the woman is an adult, capable of making mature ethical and medical decisions. You may not agree with those decisions (just like you might not agree with me eating junk food) but you don't get to make those decisions on behalf of another person. 

Of course, pro-life individuals will argue that it is the woman who is making a decision on behalf of another person by "murdering" a fetus. To me, the question of when life begins is a complicated one - is a fertilized egg sitting in a petri dish, waiting to be implanted in a woman, a life? I don't think so, and most people would agree that it's not. On the other hand, I don't believe that abortion should be allowed "up to conception" - at some point, that fetus becomes a baby, and I'm not sure when that is, to be honest. BUT, I know that I am much more comfortable with women making a decision on abortion, than with a court mandating that women be forced to give birth.

Practical Arguments for Legal Abortion 

Setting aside the moral arguments for and against legal abortion, let's look at the practical arguments.

Research shows that rates of abortion are similar across the world in countries where abortion is legal and where it is illegal. Outlawing abortion doesn't decrease the number of abortions, it decreases the number of safe abortions. One of the consequences of overturning Roe will be women seeking unsafe abortions, and likely dying as a result. How can you claim to be pro-life if the policy you are pursuing results in more death?

The majority of Americans think that abortion should be legal in some or all circumstances. The most recent poll I could find showed that 32% of Americans think abortion should be legal in all circumstances while 48% said it should be legal in some circumstances - only 19% of Americans think it should be illegal in all circumstances (poll info along with lots of other polls available here). How are we going to craft laws that allow abortion in the cases where most people believe it should be legal (i.e. mother's health at stake, or as the result of rape) while disallowing it in cases we think it shouldn't be legal? It's really hard to draft a law considering all situations, and it's also going to be really hard to enforce that law. Are we willing to lock up women seeking abortions? Send doctors and medical professionals to jail? Do we think that these actions are the right answer here? 

Final Thoughts

Look, you may agree with none of what I said (in which case, kudos for reading this far). That is okay - there are lots of different views on abortion, and it's a complicated moral issue, so there should be lots of different views. But, I would ask you to step into the shoes of women contemplating abortion - think about the 11-year old victim of rape, the mother of 3 who finds out her baby has a non-survivable medical condition, the woman finding out that a longed-for pregnancy is dangerous to her health, the abuse victim who can't bear to raise a baby with her abuser. There are a lot of these stories out there. You may not think that these situations represent the majority of those seeking abortions, but there are a non-zero number of stories like this. Please have compassion on the women in any situation where they are contemplating abortion, and consider them as people, as human beings with thoughts and emotions and their own unique circumstances. I think they are able to make this difficult decision best for themselves, rather than having it made for them by the government.

There is lots more I can say on this topic - all the ways we can reduce "demand" for abortions without outlawing "supply," etc. But for now, I'll leave you with this clip from the movie "After Tiller" about late term abortions - this clip is about a fetus developing without part of its brain, and the difficult decision facing the doctor and parents at a late stage of pregnancy. I think about this clip a lot when abortion is discussed. I hope that no one has to go through this agonizing decision, but the only thing that could make it worse is if the government intervened and made the decision for you.

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