In an essay for The Federalist, Melissa Brooks shared the life-saving effect that pro-life laws had on her life and the life of her son following the Supreme Court decision of Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization, which overturned Roe v. Wade on June 24, 2022. Brooks says she was pressured by her baby’s father to abort their child — but after several delays and a visit to a pregnancy center where she heard her baby’s heartbeat, she walked out of an abortion facility at 14 weeks pregnant and never looked back.
Coercion and delays
Brooks wrote that she was living in Kentucky following the Dobbs decision and knew that the state only allowed abortion when the life of the mother was at risk (though induced abortion — intentionally killing a preborn child — is not medically necessary). Then, in April of 2023, less than a year after Roe fell, Brooks learned she was pregnant by her ex-boyfriend, whom she had only dated for a couple of months.
“After learning I was pregnant, I reached back out to him, and we were both filled with shock and fear,” she wrote. “I already had an 18-year-old son, and the man I was seeing had two children from a previous relationship, and of course, [the ex-boyfriend and I] were no longer together.”
She noted, “Without hesitation, he said I should have an abortion.”
Brooks said she considered herself ‘pro-choice’ and had seen friends undergo multiple abortions. The idea of abortion didn’t bother her, but suddenly she was the one who would be undergoing the abortion and it would be her child being aborted. Her feelings began to change. Despite this, she agreed to undergo an abortion, but would have to travel out of state to do it.
“The mere thought of it made me sick, and I could never schedule the appointments myself,” she wrote at the Federalist. Ultimately, an abortion appointment was made at a facility in Carbondale, Illinois, which was a four-hour drive away.
But various events continued to delay the abortion.
Brooks wrote, “Due to family issues, I had to reschedule my first appointment. Because of various complications and unforeseen bumps, I would soon have to cancel my next two appointments as well. I had great fear and doubt about undergoing the procedure, but I was pressured to continue because I was being told that all the things I wanted for my relationship with my child’s father would come true if I had an abortion.” She added, “I was told we could finally be together, and we could be happy. But he told me we ‘wouldn’t be able to love one another while also loving a child.’ While I had agreed to the abortion, each cancellation came as a silent relief to me.”
Coerced abortion is unfortunately common, with studies showing that 64% of post-abortive women say they felt pressured to abort by their partner, their parents, their financial situation, or the false idea that mothers can’t pursue higher education or succeed in their chosen career.
In the meantime, Brooks had secretly visited a pregnancy resource center, where she heard her baby’s heartbeat and learned she was having a boy. When she finally made it to her scheduled abortion, she was 14 weeks pregnant and was told she would need to take an abortion drug and then have “a procedure to have my son removed from me.” This may have been a D&E dismemberment abortion, which is the most common abortion procedure carried out in the second trimester.
“Thanks to my state’s pro-life protection…”
“In that moment, all my worries and apprehensions came to a head. There was no way I was going to put myself through that. There was no way I could put my innocent baby through that,” she wrote.
She left the abortion facility with her son still safe in her womb and headed to her OB/GYN’s office where she heard her son’s heartbeat again and promised to take care of him.
As her prenatal appointments continued, she learned that her son had a small hole in his heart that would require surgery, as well as an omphalocele, which is a condition in which the organs form outside of the body.
“Despite this, I was never pressured by my doctors to abort him,” she wrote. “They assured me that while there would be difficulties, they would do their best to treat my son.”
She welcomed her son, Oryan, in November of 2023. Today, he has endured some medical procedures, but she writes that he “is full of great purpose and worth, and his sweet face lights up my days.”
She added, “He enriches the lives around him, and we are all better off because of his presence.”
Brooks knows that pro-life laws save lives because Kentucky’s laws aimed at protecting preborn children from abortion are to thank for Oryan’s life today.
While abortion advocates claim that pro-life laws do not prevent abortions, an analysis published by the University of Houston found that there were 16,147 more births in Texas in 2022 (the year Roe fell) than there were the previous year. The same report also found that while the overall U.S. fertility rate (defined as births per 1,000 women aged 15-44) fell, Texas’ fertility rate “rose in 2022 for the first time since 2014, by 2.0% over 2021[.]”
In addition, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) said that only three states – North Dakota, Nebraska, and South Dakota – can boast 2022 fertility rates higher than that of Texas, which has one of the most pro-life laws in the nation. The fertility rate in Kentucky also rose from 2020 to 2022. In Kentucky just this month, a judge ruled to dismiss a lawsuit against the state’s pro-life law, keeping protections for preborn children in place so babies like Oryan can live.
“I can say for a fact that if an abortion facility were in my own backyard, I would have succumbed to the pressure to end the life of my child,” she wrote. “However, I’m proud to say, that is not our story. Thanks to my state’s pro-life protection, my baby boy is alive today, and his life has already made the world a much better place.”
