Tuesday, May 13, 2008
They come from faraway towns where second-term abortions are impossible to find. Catherine Megill and the Haven Coalition are there to help them.
Jun 8, 2004 | Nicole (not her real name) spent a night on our sofa bed in February. Neither my husband nor I had met Nicole, and she'd never been to New York. On the subway over the Manhattan Bridge, I pointed out the touristy seaport, the commuter ferries, the missing-tooth space where the twin towers had been. Problem was, we seemed to be on the filthiest train in the city -- straight off the set of "The Warriors" -- with windows so grimy we could hardly see outside. I told her the trip back in the next morning would be better.
She was tall and thin; not bony, but smooth, like dark clay someone had gently stretched up from the ground. When she told me she used to run track, I wasn't surprised. She was 19 or 20, a college student from Pennsylvania who'd just scored a full scholarship to an even better school than the one she was attending. Her giant smile was the opposite of her teeny, faint voice, which sounded like a radio station not quite tuned in. She was craving peanut butter and jelly -- Skippy and grape -- on that soft white potato bread. She insisted on making it herself. As we chatted at my table, I watched her eat one, two, three sandwiches, then reach for the knife again. This kid really puts it away, I thought, impressed. And then I remembered: Right. She's pregnant.
I brought Nicole a heating pad and some Advil and we watched "American Idol," finding common ground: Fantasia = good; Matt Rogers = heinous. "I just can't be pregnant now," she said at one point in her hazy voice, staring ahead. And later: "I just want to be home." She called her mom and was ready for bed before 10. First thing in the morning, my husband took her to the clinic; early that afternoon, we heard, Nicole's boyfriend picked her up and took her home. The view from the bridge, my husband said, had been bright and clear.
Nicole was the first person we hosted as members of a New York-based organization called the Haven Coalition, founded in 2001 by abortion rights advocate Catherine Megill. Haven is a group of about 50 New York City households that offer free overnight housing to women coming from surrounding states -- some as far as Maine -- for second-trimester abortions, which are rarely available closer to home. (Second-trimester procedures take two days because the cervix is dilated overnight, using sterile sticks of seaweed called laminaria.)
Why do they come to New York? While Roe vs. Wade is the law of the land, making abortion broadly legal, actual access to it is often blocked by thickets of state laws and persistent stigmas. According to Haven, legal and logistical restrictions on abortion -- parental consent requirements, lack of Medicaid funding, and the like -- push many women past the date at which services are available in their area, and therefore into New York. Here, abortions are available up to 24 weeks of pregnancy -- longer than in most nearby states, even in the liberal Northeast -- and are significantly more accessible, both legally and financially. Even as "Save Roe!" alarms ring louder, Megill's and Haven's efforts -- and the need for them -- are a reminder that for women with limited resources, "choice" is a mere concept; their rights may already hinge not on the courts, but on sandwiches, bus tickets and the futons of strangers. Women seeking later-term abortions "have been trained to feel shame and guilt, but when you hear their stories you could never feel that you could judge this decision," says Megill. "Well, I guess you could, but that means you're not listening."
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