The Importance of Abortion Rights for a Trans Man

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nd I’d have a giant hole in my heart for the rest of my life. I don’t have that hole in my heart as a result of taking Plan B. That was a decision I feel good about making. I actually wouldn’t have even thought of it if I hadn’t just seen an episode of a TV show where the main character took it. It was as if the universe handed me a gift to have that pill available and to remind me about it just before I needed it.Of course, I don’t even know if I can get pregnant, because I was born intersex and I’m on T and nearly forty years old. Some intersex people can carry children but some can’t. Either way, I wanted to be on the safe side.<h2 id="da6f">The only other time in my life that I had a pregnancy scare was in 1991 when I was thirteen years old.</h2>I’d just gone to a cheap motel with a grown man who I met on a chat line. I was so messed up and confused back then. My puberty began when I was eight years old because of my intersex condition, so by the time I was thirteen I could pass for twenty-one and I sometimes lied about my age. I usually said I was sixteen though, and that was still technically too young for a lot of creeps who came onto me. I was in over my head and starting to have queer feelings which I was already drowning in drugs and alcohol already, even at that young age. Nobody understood me and I was alone in the world. I was naive and actually excited about the fact that I might be “preggo”. Now, I think anyone who says “preggo” probably isn’t ready for the reality of parenting. I certainly wasn’t. I barely survived my youth and early adulthood because I didn’t have the tools to even take care of myself, never mind a child. At that age, I was still very anti-choice myself. I was raised in a Catholic town where people believed abortion was murder.I barely survived my youth and early adulthood because I didn’t have the tools to eve

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n take care of myself, never mind a child.A year later, when I was in high school and trying to get sober in AA, I met a straight couple who gave me a ride to a meeting one night. They were extremely sketchy, racist, rude, fucked up people, to begin with. I could tell I didn’t like them from the second I met them, but they told me on the way to the AA meeting, which they were court-ordered to go to, that they had left their infant child at home alone because they didn’t care about it and didn’t bother to get a sitter. They said they tried to get an abortion but it was too hard to find anywhere local that they could afford, so the man beat up the woman and pushed her down the stairs to try to kill the baby. When that didn’t work and they were forced to deliver, they decided to just leave it alone and hope it died. They said they hated the baby and didn’t even want it.I felt sick to my stomach after talking to those people, but I immediately switched from being “pro-life” to pro-choice. I realized that baby would have been much better off if it was never born, and my perspective drastically shifted. I joined the Pro-Choice Committee at school and that was my first exposure to human rights activism, so it’s an issue that means a lot to me, especially now. What’s happening is scary!I thought, instead of trying to write a politically themed article full of facts and statistics and all that kind of shit I struggle with, I’d write this my own way and just talk about my personal experience. I realize there are things I may have left out of this important discussion, but I hope it opens people’s eyes to the fact that trans men and non-binary people are part of this fight too. Everyone should have the right to an abortion for any reason. It is selfish and cruel to force a child into a world where it is not wanted.Peace.</article></body>

Why I’m going out of my mind right now

Animal Art Therapy by Jymi Cliche (the author/artist)

Trigger Warning: Abortion, Sexual Trauma, Neglect, Abuse.

I just put up a meme on social media the other day. It was one of many abortion-related memes I’ve shared since hearing the recent news about overturning Roe v Wade. It said, “I love someone who’s had an abortion, and so do you.” I wondered if people might think I was saying that I had an abortion, and I haven’t, but I wasn’t worried about what people thought. What I meant to say with the meme, however, was that most people probably don’t realize so many people they know and love have had them. I’m very vocal about being pro-choice and don’t mind offending people about it. I don’t even mind if people think I’ve had an abortion, but I wanted to say something more than just sharing a meme.

“I love someone who’s had an abortion, and so do you.”

I did take Plan B once.

That will likely be taken away from us as well since they consider it a form of abortion. If that is abortion, then yes, I did that, and I didn’t feel the slightest bit of guilt about it. I was close to forty years old, living as a male for about fifteen years, taking testosterone and a big pile of pills for arthritis and mental health symptoms. I’m in poor physical shape and am agoraphobic. I’m on limited income due to my disability and the person I had sex with was not someone who I could raise a child in a healthy environment with. Even if I gave up the child for adoption, they’d have all kinds of severe problems due to what I would be passing onto them, and I’d have a giant hole in my heart for the rest of my life. I don’t have that hole in my heart as a result of taking Plan B. That was a decision I feel good about making. I actually wouldn’t have even thought of it if I hadn’t just seen an episode of a TV show where the main character took it. It was as if the universe handed me a gift to have that pill available and to remind me about it just before I needed it.

Of course, I don’t even know if I can get pregnant, because I was born intersex and I’m on T and nearly forty years old. Some intersex people can carry children but some can’t. Either way, I wanted to be on the safe side.

The only other time in my life that I had a pregnancy scare was in 1991 when I was thirteen years old.

I’d just gone to a cheap motel with a grown man who I met on a chat line. I was so messed up and confused back then. My puberty began when I was eight years old because of my intersex condition, so by the time I was thirteen I could pass for twenty-one and I sometimes lied about my age. I usually said I was sixteen though, and that was still technically too young for a lot of creeps who came onto me. I was in over my head and starting to have queer feelings which I was already drowning in drugs and alcohol already, even at that young age. Nobody understood me and I was alone in the world. I was naive and actually excited about the fact that I might be “preggo”. Now, I think anyone who says “preggo” probably isn’t ready for the reality of parenting. I certainly wasn’t. I barely survived my youth and early adulthood because I didn’t have the tools to even take care of myself, never mind a child. At that age, I was still very anti-choice myself. I was raised in a Catholic town where people believed abortion was murder.

I barely survived my youth and early adulthood because I didn’t have the tools to even take care of myself, never mind a child.

A year later, when I was in high school and trying to get sober in AA, I met a straight couple who gave me a ride to a meeting one night. They were extremely sketchy, racist, rude, fucked up people, to begin with. I could tell I didn’t like them from the second I met them, but they told me on the way to the AA meeting, which they were court-ordered to go to, that they had left their infant child at home alone because they didn’t care about it and didn’t bother to get a sitter. They said they tried to get an abortion but it was too hard to find anywhere local that they could afford, so the man beat up the woman and pushed her down the stairs to try to kill the baby. When that didn’t work and they were forced to deliver, they decided to just leave it alone and hope it died. They said they hated the baby and didn’t even want it.

I felt sick to my stomach after talking to those people, but I immediately switched from being “pro-life” to pro-choice. I realized that baby would have been much better off if it was never born, and my perspective drastically shifted. I joined the Pro-Choice Committee at school and that was my first exposure to human rights activism, so it’s an issue that means a lot to me, especially now. What’s happening is scary!

I thought, instead of trying to write a politically themed article full of facts and statistics and all that kind of shit I struggle with, I’d write this my own way and just talk about my personal experience. I realize there are things I may have left out of this important discussion, but I hope it opens people’s eyes to the fact that trans men and non-binary people are part of this fight too. Everyone should have the right to an abortion for any reason. It is selfish and cruel to force a child into a world where it is not wanted.

Peace.