Flowers and Cards Are Nice. I’d Rather Have Bodily Autonomy

This Sunday will be the first Mother’s Day since the Supreme Court decided Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization and struck down the constitutional right to abortion. According to the Guttmacher Institute, more than half of women of reproductive age now live in states that are hostile to abortion rights. This is having serious effects on the lives of people who can become pregnant. Research by the Society for Family Planning shows a sharp drop in the number of abortions in the six months after Roe v. Wade was overturned, suggesting that many people who might have otherwise terminated a pregnancy could not legally do so.

Most people who seek abortions are already mothers. They are intimately familiar with the joys we celebrate and sacrifices we honor on Mother’s Day. One of the main reasons I treasure my own experience of motherhood so dearly is because I chose it for myself. But now this country will force pregnancy and birth on many people who do not want that experience, as well as many who do but face dangerous or unviable pregnancies they should have the option to terminate. This Mother’s Day, I’ll be thinking not only about myself, but about them as well.