By Maya Dusenbery • @mayadusenbery • 11 years ago

Thank an abortion provider

Tell an abortion provider thank you.

Image via Advocates for Youth.

Yesterday was the National Day of Appreciation for Abortion Providers. In a reasonable world, being an abortion provider would not require any particular courage. But we live in a country that has seen 218 bombings and arsons, 656 bomb threats, and 191 incidents of assault and battery at abortion clinics in the last 35 years. So, as one of the one in three American women who will have an abortion, thank you to all the doctors who endure harassment to do this stigmatized and too-often thankless job.

Access to safe, legal abortion is dependent on there continuing to be doctors who will provide this care. As Dr. Susan Robinson, one of four late-term abortion providers profiled in the new documentary After Tiller that premiered at Sundance this weekend, said, “Kindness, courtesy, justice, love and respect are the hallmarks of a good doctor-patient relationship. People tell me every single day, ‘Dr. Robinson, you’ve given me my life back.’ For these women it is life or death.”

Show your appreciation here.

St. Paul, MN

Maya Dusenbery is executive director in charge of editorial at Feministing. She is the author of the forthcoming book Doing Harm: The Truth About How Bad Medicine and Lazy Science Leave Women Dismissed, Misdiagnosed, and Sick (HarperOne, March 2018). She has been a fellow at Mother Jones magazine and a columnist at Pacific Standard magazine. Her work has appeared in publications like Cosmopolitan.com, TheAtlantic.com, Bitch Magazine, as well as the anthology The Feminist Utopia Project. Before become a full-time journalist, she worked at the National Institute for Reproductive Health. A Minnesota native, she received her B.A. from Carleton College in 2008. After living in Brooklyn, Oakland, and Atlanta, she is currently based in the Twin Cities.

Maya Dusenbery is an executive director of Feministing and author of the forthcoming book Doing Harm on sexism in medicine.

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