An Open Letter To My Fellow Pro-Lifers On The Eve of the Anniversary of Roe Vs. Wade

I started this blog in part to be a witness to the fact that it is possible to be diagnosed and treated for cancer during pregnancy and have a successful outcome for both mother and child.  I am pro life, and any information that I believe would save a woman and child from abortion I view as vitally important and I feel a moral obligation to share it wherever and whenever I can.

BUT

Please, fellow pro lifers, do not use my story as a stick to beat people with in an argument.  Do not use my story as a rhetorical device to win a round of anecdotal gotcha.  Fellow pro lifers, tomorrow when you feel especially inspired to speak out in defense of life I'd like to suggest one thing:

 

Tomorrow is an emotional day.  It is hard not to feel compelled to shout from the rooftops the injustice that has been done and continues to be done in this country everyday, but I'm going to ask as a woman who has faced a crisis pregnancy that when you want to post something on facebook or jump in a combox tomorrow, stop.  Just stop, take a breath, and pray on it.  If you are not a believer meditate on it.  Think about what a woman who is considering abortion must be facing and say to yourself: There but for the grace of God, go I.  Then stop, take a breath, and pray, and meditate on it and say to yourself again: There but for the grace of God, go I. There are many times that I am sure I have the most brilliant point to add to a conversation that will enlighten all who hear it and if I pause to pray about it first that Holy Spirit puts a muzzle on me.  We always like to think when we're spouting off that it's Him at work, but when was the last time you asked Him before you spoke to see if you should speak at all?  It's not likely that you will have anything new to add to the discussion tomorrow.  I'd like to submit that what you say could possibly even do more harm than good.

I found out I was pregnant and soon to be diagnosed with cancer right before the anniversary of Roe vs Wade last year.  I went through the events of my diagnosis during 40 days for life.  One day during this time a facebook friend posted something about "If you are facing a crisis pregnancy have courage!".  In that moment my blood boiled.  Courage!  How dare she!  She has NO IDEA about courage! I just sat there and fumed and then I remembered...she does have an idea about courage, because she had her oldest child when she was just 17 years old and raised him as a single mother for years before she met her husband.  She is kind, compassionate, and walks the walk when it comes to providing true support for women facing crisis pregnancies.  I agreed with what she was saying, but I couldn't stand to hear it.  I am pro life, but suddenly many messages that used to sound totally compassionate and reasonable to me, messages I have spoken and typed myself with nothing but love in my heart, sounded insensitive and sometimes hurtful.

I received many kind, loving emails offering prayers to St. Gianna Molla on my behalf and encouraging me to do the same...but all I could think was...you guys...she's...DEAD.  It felt a bit like people were romanticizing what was for me REALITY.  These are dear, compassionate people, they were not romanticizing my situation, but I was truly having to contemplate and research and rehearse telling my 5 small children that their mother was dying, because at that time I didn't know, and that's not something you want to screw up.

If you are a mother, I want you to close your eyes right now and imagine gathering your children around you and telling them that you are going to die.  That you are going to leave them.  I want you to see their faces and the disbelief and fear and anguish that washes over them BECAUSE OF YOU.  Then I want you to imagine how it would sound to you to have someone who did not have to contemplate that possibility in a very real way telling you to have courage.  How would you receive that message?  Would it sound compassionate to you?  Imagine now that you aren't pro life.  Now how does that sound?  Fellow pro lifers, the people you are trying to reach are suffering through fear and anguish I pray you never face.  Your editorializing will not change their minds.  Your mercy might.  Please, remember, There but for the grace of God go I.  If you want to say something, stop, pray, There but for the grace of God, go I. 

In the minute or so after my second pregnancy test came up positive I considered having an abortion.  In that moment I considered having an abortion because the idea of telling my husband that I was pregnant when he was already reeling from the news that I likely had cancer was absolutely more than I could bear.  I considered having an abortion because I had 5 small children at home and I didn't know what my pregnancy would mean for my treatment and I didn't want to face the possibility of leaving them.  I considered having an abortion because there are people in our lives that I knew would take the news that I had cancer better than the news that I was pregnant again, even if it had been without the cancer.  I knew in that moment that only I knew truth of my situation and that if I wanted to keep it that way I could.  I could have easily made it just go away.  What I experienced that night, sitting in the stall of a grocery store bathroom, was anguish to an extreme that I believe I now understand viscerally what our Lord experienced in the Garden at Gethsemane when "He was in such agony and he prayed so fervently that His sweat became like drops of blood on the ground." (Luke 22:44)

I am a white, privileged woman living in the United States of America in the 21st century with a husband who is a good provider and who is deeply compassionate and committed to our family.  I have family and friends that I knew would support me every step of the way without fail.  If I was so scared facing my crisis pregnancy that I considered an abortion despite at lifetime of being fervently pro life, please reflect on the terror of a woman who is a member of any number of minorities, who is poor, who does not have anyone to support her materially or emotionally.

There, but for the grace of God, go I. 

Tomorrow, if you absolutely must do something, send money to Feminists for Life , or Abby Johnson's organization And Then There Were None, or to your local Pregnancy Center.

Tomorrow, if you are a believer, pray.  If you think that's not enough then that is absolutely where you should start.  What do you think your hastily chosen words can accomplish that God cannot?

Tomorrow, if you must say something, PLEASE REMEMBER, there but for the grace of God, go I.  Choose your words with the utmost of care and imagine what you would need most desperately if you were facing a crisis pregnancy.

Illness and Shame And Dropping the C-Bomb

First, if you're here from Mary's or Jaimie's, thank you and welcome!  Second, if you're here from Facebook, well, you're probably like "What the heck?!?!?".  I know, this whole pregnant with lymphoma situation is all kinds of weird.  All. kinds. of. WEIRD.  Sorry I dropped the C-bomb on you.

That's what it's like to tell people you have cancer.  It's like dropping a bomb on them in slow motion face to face (or keyboard to keyboard-- 'cause those is just the times we livin' in).  As the person with the cancer, by the time you're ready to tell someone, you've had some time to let things marinate.  Even if it's just been a short time, you're ahead of the poor sucker you're about to blind side.  To say that it is a painful, uncomfortable, and awkward news item to share is a huge understatement.  That's what makes avoiding the sharing so enticing.  It's not fun to tell someone bad news.

The problem with not telling people you have cancer and are going through chemo while you are pregnant is that you run the risk of bumping into some unsuspecting person you haven't seen in like 5 years and there you are--9 months pregnant with a bald head--talk about blindsiding!  My hair didn't fall out yet (YAY!), but I'm a ticking hair ball.  I'll have a wig, but I'm pretty lazy and I could see myself at some point deciding a scarf is just going to have to do, and even if I do wear my wig, what if I'm terrible at drawing my eyebrows back on?  What if I'm doomed to spend my treatment having to choose between having no eyebrows or looking like Uncle Leo?  Anyhoo, point is, sometime soon, my treatment will force the issue of telling people, because my bald head and/or lack of eyebrows will do the talking.  Plus, really, what is the big deal with telling people?  There's no shame in being sick.  Except that there is.

I remember as a little girl hearing Bible stories featuring people who were sick.  The priest explained during the homily that back in Biblical times people were ashamed of family members who fell ill.  It was considered an indication of some sin or curse on the part of the sick person or their family.  In cultures around the world, across time, we have been ashamed of illness.  I remember thinking: "Thank goodness we've come so far and that now we have science to tell us that illness is caused by germs, undernourishment, chemical imbalances, etc.".  Now that I'm faced with an illness, I realize we haven't really come that far at all.  Now that I'm sick and I have to tell people, I realize that even though we know it's not a curse or a moral sin that caused our illness, we still recoil from admitting it.  We are ashamed of admitting we are guilty of some of the greatest sins of modern times: weakness and imperfection.  Well, here I am.  I am weak.  I am imperfect.  We all are.

We humans, we like to think we are so smart that we can control our way to perfection.  That we can choose a diet and an exercise plan and a career and a family size and balance for our bank account that will trump our inherent weakness and imperfection.  That if we just make all the right choices we will never suffer.  The problem with this idea is that there will always be some "more perfect" choice for us to chase.  Something we try to tell ourselves will protect us from our humanity:  "You eat white bread?  You should really eat whole grain.  You eat store bought whole grain?  You should really eat homemade whole grain.  You eat homemade whole grain?  It should really be soaked. You eat soaked whole grain?  It should really be sprouted.  You eat sprouted whole grain?  Grain can kill you, have fun suffering through your short pitiful life.".  We can continue that for every choice that presents itself throughout our lives, and when we or a family member end up sick, we can beat ourselves up that we didn't make a perfect choice, or we can admit that we are weak and imperfect.  We all have to strive to make the best choices we can to be good stewards of what we've been given, but we must also face that we are and will always be inherently weak and imperfect.

You know who else is weak?  My daughter.  The one who is growing inside me right now, oblivious to the toxic onslaught she endures every 2 weeks.  The one who continues to thrive despite it.  The one who many believe is not possible, but who is so very possible.  She is more than possible.  She is.  In the end, I cannot hide the fact that I have cancer because I'm ashamed to admit that I am weak and imperfect.  I have a responsibility to my human family to say I am weak and imperfect and so are you and that's ok.  I have a responsibility to other Mothers and other babies to let them know that you can have cancer and be pregnant and be ok.  You can both survive and thrive.  It's important to me that people understand this.  So I will expose my weakness, my imperfection, the consequences of my mistakes.  I will tell you I have cancer.  I have cancer and I am pregnant and we will both be just fine.  We will be weak and imperfect and just fine.

“My grace is sufficient for you, for power is made perfect in weakness.” 2 Corinthians 12:9