‘Sick and Twisted’: Women Describe Losing Pregnancies, Nearly Dying Because of Texas Laws

Amanda Zurawski withstood 18 months of “grueling” fertility treatment prior to she and her other half had the ability to develop their child, Willow. She remained in the middle of her 2nd trimester, putting the ending up discuss the visitor list for her child shower, when she began experiencing what she believed of at the time as “curious” signs. Her cervix had actually dilated too soon, and not long after, her water broke. Without amniotic fluid to safeguard her, Zurawski and her other half were notified Willow would not endure.

“I asked what can be done to guarantee the considerate death of our child, and what might safeguard me from a lethal infection, now that my body was vulnerable and susceptible,” Zurawski remembered on Tuesday, speaking with press reporters at an interview outside the Texas State Capitol Building. “They described there was absolutely nothing they might do.”

Because Willow’s heart was still beating, the Zurawskis were informed they needed to wait till she might get treatment. Three days later on, she was checked out an extensive care system with sepsis — an infection that nearly eliminated her.

Zurawski is the lead complainant in a lawsuit submitted Monday by 5 Texas women who might not acquire abortions regardless of dangerous medical issues. Her co-plaintiffs — whom Zurawski called “uncontrolled members of the most dreadful club in the world” — congregated Tuesday to share their experiences and get in touch with members of Texas’ legislature to include medical exceptions to the state’s several, overlapping abortion bans. 

The case marks the very first time that pregnant women themselves have actually challenged the state’s 3 abortion prohibits: a criminal restriction that pre-dates Roe v. Wade, a trigger restriction passed in anticipation of Roe being reversed, and Senate Bill 8, an efficient restriction on abortion after about 6 weeks of pregnancy. All 3 restrictions have exceptions for medical “emergency situations,” however supporters state they are uncertain and have actually led to “prevalent confusion” over who and what certifies.

What occurred to each of them seems like, as Zurawski put it, the “ill and twisted plot to a dystopian unique — however it’s not.”

Lauren Hall was 18 weeks pregnant with a child she prepared to call Amelia when she discovered the child had anencephaly, a deadly condition that indicated she had actually established no skull and extremely little brain matter. After notifying her of the medical diagnosis (their child would not endure), Hall kept in mind how the medical professional “silently and thoroughly described to us that if we selected to end, we would need to leave” Texas. Because of the state’s laws, the medical professional would not make a recommendation, and even send her medical records to her abortion company. 

“We were entirely on our own,” Hall remembered. Before she left, Hall stated the medical professional alerted her and her other half “to just inform individuals who were definitely essential and requiring to understand; she advised us to state absolutely nothing to good friends or colleagues; say nothing at the airport and nothing until the procedure was completed.”

The doctor’s fears was well-founded: In addition to facing steep penalties — up to 99 years in prison, $100,000 in fines — for providing abortion care, health care providers (or anyone for that matter: good friends, family members, uber drivers, TSA agents) can open themselves up to lawsuits if they help a Texan obtain an abortion. 

Another plaintiff, Lauren Miller, was 12 weeks along when she learned one of the two twins she was carrying had compounding complications: Trisomy-18, a condition that limited his growth, and two “large fluid masses” where his brain should have been. Multiple doctors confirmed that not only would the baby not survive, continuing to carry him would pose a health risk to herself and the other twin. 

Miller traveled to Colorado for a selective abortion; she is due to give birth to the surviving twin this month. “I was lucky,” she said. “I had connections without out-of-state doctors. I had family to watch my son. We had the time and the money to make the journey. But layers of privilege should never determine which Texans couldn’t get access to the health care they need.”

Anna Zargarian, another plaintiff, was 19 weeks pregnant when her water broke prematurely. “My heart broke into a million pieces. I didn’t even know a pain like that could exist,” she said. While she should have been grieving, Zargarian was left scrambling to find an out-of-state clinic that could accommodate her. Like Miller, she sought care in Colorado. Getting on the flight, she says “was one of the most terrifying experiences of my life. It was like Russian roulette, knowing I was at risk of infection.”

“Politicians in Texas are prohibiting health care that they don’t understand,” Miller said on Tuesday. “It shouldn’t be controversial for an individual to make health care decisions for themselves, in consultation with their medical professional.”

The lawsuit the women have filed has a very modest goal: all they want is for the state of Texas to clarify, using medical terminology, what constitutes an “emergency” under the law. Or, as Molly Duane, senior staff attorney at the Center for Reproductive Rights, put it on Tuesday, “We want the state of Texas to acknowledge that the women standing behind me should have received timely abortion care, and that women and pregnant people throughout Texas who face similar situations — similar pregnancy issues in the future — must be allowed to receive abortion care in their home communities.”

Despite their harrowing personal experiences, the plaintiffs are hopeful that the state’s lawmakers will choose to act before they are compelled by a judge. 

Hall is now pregnant again — a boy this time — and she says she lives in constant fear. “I was calm during my previous pregnancy; now I compulsively look up every ache and pain, terrified that I will discover myself in this unbearable situation once again.” 

“I like Texas,” she informed press reporters outside the Capitol Building. “And it eliminates me that my own state does not appear to care if I live or pass away.”