dar a luz (give light)...

Paz.
Out of ALL the things I had been brainstorming about, abortion was not even a thought in my heart nor in my mind when trying to come up with new blog entries for this new year we were blessed with. but the billboard that was plastered up on soho and all the chatter and back and forth that came along with it led me to write about such a sensitive subject (one that i seldom opinionate on,for many reasons...until now).

my gods, guides and angels have protected me thus far and i haven't had to even consider the thought of an abortion, thank you most high. i don't know if it was the boring a#% sex-ed course i took in the 11th grade, the fact that i kept my virginity until a relatively later age than most sistahs around my way or the sheer fear that dominga torres and fransico rodriguez would strike in my heart every time they would attempt to have 'the' talk with gris and i. (btw: that talk consisted of my mom or my dad reminding us that if we decided to open our legs to any little boy that we would have to come home and pack our ish and move in with him because they weren't about to be raising no 'women' in their house. This was only about having sex, they didn't even tell us what they'd do to us if we came out pregnant while living at home) no talk about condoms, birth control pills just abstinence (old school dominican campo abstinence). but whatever it was, it 'worked'.
or maybe i was just 'lucky' - and given the stats I'm feeling that way right about now:

41% of New York babies are aborted, with the percentage even higher in the Bronx and among African-Americans.
When you break this down by race for 2010:
Blacks have a 59.8% abortion rate.

Hispanics have a 41.3% abortion rate.

Asians have a 22.7% abortion rate.

And non-Hispanic Whites have a 20.4% abortion rate.

These numbers are alarming, my womb hurts just from reading them.

But...although these numbers are disturbing, they still do not lead me to caste any judgment of my sistahs who are opting to have an abortion. the situation is complicated and multifaceted, simply saying you are PRO CHOICE or PRO LIFE is not that easy and judging sistahs will not make these numbers disappear, it won't even make them decrease.

I am not saying I am PRO CHOICE. At the end of the day you are killing a being, period. I will not try to sugar coat it, nor will I try to minimize the fetus to a sheer 'thing' when I know it has a soul and had a whole other life (or lives) prior to this one that is about to be taken away.

But...I am not PRO LIFE. I am not about to be up in no one's face telling them they are 'wrong' for aborting their fetus, or that they shouldn't. Personally, some PRO LIFEers have a lot of nerve ESPECIALLY when most of these folk do not have wombs and will never carry a child: MEN!!


There is one thing to try to educate our folk or to try to get to the bottom of those numbers listed above (something NO ONE is doing at this point). But when you are pointing fingers, even if done so subtly, or plastering an offensive, insensitive, racist, sexist and CRUEL billboard in white-ass SOHO, than I just have to start 'caring' enough to speak up on abortion.

As I reiterated on my FB post: I know there is trouble in our communities, these numbers do NOT lie. I am a social science researcher and I understand that numbers speak volumes. We are in trouble and we need to get ourselves out of this situation, not point fingers and worry about who is doing what with their placenta: that is step B, we aren't even focusing on step A.

Now some of us sistahs need to sit back and reflect on some of the decisions we make in our lives. Some are using abortions as a contraceptive, like "Oops, I effed up, gotta 'take care' of this" and that is not the way it should be used. I know that a few of us (I was going to say MOST but I'm trying to be sensitive and P.C. here) know sistahs who have had multiple abortions (and multiple don't have to mean 5, TWO is multiple, TWO too many-and if you are younger than 21, that TWO feels like 22). Some of ya wanted the child but the daddy refused to take care of it, so you 'took care of it' and made a decision with your mind not your heart. Some are in a place in their lives where an extra mouth to feed would be detrimental not only to you and the rest of your family, but to that child that will suffer in your hands. Some just simply are not 'ready' for a child in their lives. and i KNOW they should've thought about that before making the decision to have sex(IF it was consented sex, that's a whole different entry), we need to worry about the cause and not place 100% of our attention on the effect.


In my personal experience with Dominga and her version of the 'birds and the bees' I can see how I could have been led by fear to abort my child. Fear that I would be adorned with the burning "A" on my chest forever. Fear that I would be disowned by my loved ones. My mother is using a sex education framework that is not only outdated but it's out of context. Not only is my mother from a different generation but she is from a different country, lifestyle, set of values, etc. Here she is with the 'simple' campo mentality in a world that promotes sex, where some children are taught about their bodies at a young age, something my mom thought was absurd and would only lead to sex.
Let me give you a prime example of how 'deep' this issue runs:
In the 6th grade the girls in our grade were taken down to the auditorium and shown a quick video on menstruating. They showed us how our reproductive organs and the menstrual cycle worked, at approximately what age we should expect it and how to care for yourself when you do get your 'friend'. I was blushing and a bit embarrassed because my family never really spoke to me about my 'friend'. I don't know how I knew about it, but I knew what menstruating was, what I did know was that I hadn't learned it from my family and that you don't speak about it in public. But there were my ovaries and fallopian tubes plastered on a huge screen at P.S. 81.
As if I wasn't red enough, the lady pulls out a shiny blue box and delicately places it in my hands: tampons! I wanted to die. I don't know exactly why the embarrassment but I do know why the fear in my racing heart. I knew that if I got home with these Dominga would kick my ass. I remember hiding them for months and fearing that I would come home from school one day and find Dominga with the blue box in one hand and the plastic Dominican chancleta in the other, ready to whoop my behind. At that age, I want my daughters to feel like they can speak to me about what they just heard (not 'learned' because I would have hopefully spoken to them by that age) and that we can sit and have a conversation (not a lecture) about menstruating, and tampons vs. kotex. But I didn't feel like I had any rapport with my mom in terms of ANY 'sex' education, not even menstruating.
That lil story goes to show how deeply rooted this lack of sex education is. My family felt it was 'taboo' to discuss menstruating to their 11 year old daughters who would inevitably begin their cycle, let alone discuss condoms or birth control.

I say all this not to caste any responsibility away from anyone, nor to minimize the fact that abortions suck. But to hopefully get you all to think about ALL the parties involved in this situation, not just the fetus.

Those of us who have never had to go through an abortion cannot even fathom how hard it must be for that mother to go through with this process. The physical, psychological and emotional scars must run deep. What about the father's who do care enough to stick around? Those who suffer the emotional and psychological effects along with the mother?

Family, I honestly do not know where I'm going with this entry, I am truly writing from my heart. Very little editing, just typing. Again, I am not one to opinionate much about this topic but today my guides led me to sit and share my story, a story (hopefully a 'neutral' one) with you all who care to read it.
Or maybe it was because at the age of 40 an illegal immigrant in this country with very little family here never fathomed that she could get pregnant at the age of 40, but she did. this was in the 80s and to be pregnant at 40 was almost unheard of. She was lost confused and the only way she thought she could get out of that situation was by aborting her fetuSES...thank god the babies father and the sistah's heavenly father were there to help her remember that she was strong enough to go through with this and trust me, Gris and I are happy that my mom did.

I completely understand why my mom was thinking about it, I really do... but I'm glad she decided to dar a luz (give light) to this dark world...

The world isn't so 'black and white' nor 'Pro THIS and Pro THAT'...member that.

LUZ!