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In February 2017, I was lucky enough to see the play | 0:00:02 | 0:00:06 | |
I Told My Mum I Was Going On An RE Trip, in Manchester, | 0:00:06 | 0:00:10 | |
when Contact and Liverpool-based 20 Stories High developed this | 0:00:10 | 0:00:14 | |
piece of theatre about abortion. | 0:00:14 | 0:00:16 | |
It's a verbatim piece made from hundreds of hours of interviews, | 0:00:16 | 0:00:20 | |
with young women in Britain and in Northern Ireland. | 0:00:20 | 0:00:23 | |
And you'll see that the four young actors have earpieces | 0:00:23 | 0:00:26 | |
and are actually listening to the original recordings | 0:00:26 | 0:00:29 | |
as they perform. | 0:00:29 | 0:00:31 | |
The subject is challenging and some viewers might find it upsetting. | 0:00:31 | 0:00:36 | |
But on the 50th anniversary of the legalisation of abortion in Britain, | 0:00:36 | 0:00:40 | |
writer Julia Samuels explores the ways in which society deals with | 0:00:40 | 0:00:45 | |
the subject, how it impacts on women today and, importantly, | 0:00:45 | 0:00:49 | |
asks the question - what would happen if we started to talk | 0:00:49 | 0:00:53 | |
openly about it? | 0:00:53 | 0:00:54 | |
This programme contains some strong language and scenes which some viewers may find upsetting. | 0:00:54 | 0:01:02 | |
Three, two, one, play. | 0:01:20 | 0:01:23 | |
-RECORDING PLAYS THROUGH EARPHONES: -My name's Paige... | 0:01:23 | 0:01:26 | |
My name's Paige. I've had three pregnancies, two with terminations, | 0:01:26 | 0:01:29 | |
and one, I had a child. | 0:01:29 | 0:01:32 | |
My first pregnancy, when I was 17, which I terminated. | 0:01:32 | 0:01:36 | |
My second, I was 20, gave birth at 21. | 0:01:36 | 0:01:40 | |
And then my third, I was still 21, six months after having | 0:01:40 | 0:01:44 | |
my daughter, Paitlyn. | 0:01:44 | 0:01:45 | |
I'm Leah, 22. I have four kids. | 0:01:48 | 0:01:52 | |
I had my first child at 16, | 0:01:52 | 0:01:55 | |
and I had the abortion at about 17. | 0:01:55 | 0:02:01 | |
Em... | 0:02:01 | 0:02:02 | |
I'm going to talk a wee bit about it. | 0:02:02 | 0:02:05 | |
I'm Tanaya and I'm 24 years old, | 0:02:06 | 0:02:09 | |
and when I was 16, I had an abortion. | 0:02:09 | 0:02:12 | |
My impregnator was a 21-year-old drug dealer, | 0:02:12 | 0:02:16 | |
and so it was just not ever going to be the right thing for me to do. | 0:02:16 | 0:02:21 | |
One, two, one, two. | 0:02:22 | 0:02:23 | |
This is Cousin on the mic. | 0:02:27 | 0:02:28 | |
From Manchester to Liverpool to Belfast... | 0:02:30 | 0:02:35 | |
to Harare, Zimbabwe. | 0:02:35 | 0:02:37 | |
My story goes undocumented, unrecorded. | 0:02:40 | 0:02:44 | |
But I have a story to tell. | 0:02:46 | 0:02:48 | |
So check it. | 0:02:51 | 0:02:52 | |
Like, any girl over here, | 0:02:58 | 0:02:59 | |
we would be really uneducated about it, really. | 0:02:59 | 0:03:02 | |
There's nothing over here for them, other than Google. | 0:03:02 | 0:03:05 | |
Of course, we typed it into Google, all the horrific stories come up | 0:03:05 | 0:03:09 | |
and the pictures come up. | 0:03:09 | 0:03:11 | |
-Did you learn anything in school? -Never did anything about it | 0:03:17 | 0:03:20 | |
in science, never did anything about it in, you know, social health... | 0:03:20 | 0:03:23 | |
-Yeah. -..or anything like that. | 0:03:23 | 0:03:25 | |
It wasn't a very openly talked about thing, unless it was sort of | 0:03:25 | 0:03:30 | |
in the nervous kind of joking sense. | 0:03:30 | 0:03:32 | |
I know, like, a lot of young males | 0:03:32 | 0:03:34 | |
like to joke about a lot of things, especially when it's a serious topic | 0:03:34 | 0:03:37 | |
like this. So the only thing I'd ever really learned about it | 0:03:37 | 0:03:41 | |
from friends was, like, jokes about like promiscuous girls | 0:03:41 | 0:03:45 | |
getting abortions and whatnot, which is obviously false, | 0:03:45 | 0:03:48 | |
but I think that's about it from like... | 0:03:48 | 0:03:50 | |
-From friends? -Yeah. Mad friends. | 0:03:50 | 0:03:52 | |
I had a pregnancy scare. I wasn't pregnant, but I was talking | 0:03:54 | 0:03:57 | |
to my sister and I was going, "Oh, my God, I'm pregnant. | 0:03:57 | 0:04:00 | |
"I'm going to have to get an abortion, I'm going to have | 0:04:00 | 0:04:02 | |
"to get an abortion." And I was going, "Is it like how they say | 0:04:02 | 0:04:05 | |
"in like Dirty Dancing?" I was just absolutely convinced | 0:04:05 | 0:04:09 | |
that I was going to end up like Penny, just like on the bed | 0:04:09 | 0:04:13 | |
with Patrick Swayze next to me, going, "What are you doing?!" | 0:04:13 | 0:04:16 | |
It's a bit weird. | 0:04:18 | 0:04:19 | |
-I think if I had Patrick Swayze next to me... -Yeah. | 0:04:19 | 0:04:21 | |
-..I would have gone through the process. -Yeah, me too! | 0:04:21 | 0:04:24 | |
I went to a Catholic school, and in RE, I was shown | 0:04:28 | 0:04:31 | |
an abortion video. Not only did it have what looked like | 0:04:31 | 0:04:36 | |
a full-term baby shown on the screen, but it had, like, | 0:04:36 | 0:04:40 | |
horror music with a piano. | 0:04:40 | 0:04:41 | |
Like the Psycho music. | 0:04:41 | 0:04:43 | |
-You know like? -Yeah. Psycho music. | 0:04:43 | 0:04:45 | |
Proper "eee, eee, eee, eee, eee!" | 0:04:45 | 0:04:47 | |
THEY GIGGLE | 0:04:47 | 0:04:49 | |
When I found out I was pregnant the first time, | 0:05:22 | 0:05:24 | |
I decided literally from the get-go. | 0:05:24 | 0:05:28 | |
I explored the idea of keeping it, must have been for about | 0:05:28 | 0:05:31 | |
ten, 15 minutes, and then I was just like, "No, it's not the right | 0:05:31 | 0:05:34 | |
"thing to do." And cos my mum, the type of mum my mum is, | 0:05:34 | 0:05:38 | |
she's like, "This is what you're supposed to do," as in you | 0:05:38 | 0:05:41 | |
find somebody you love, then you buy a house, then you make babies, | 0:05:41 | 0:05:44 | |
do you know what I mean? | 0:05:44 | 0:05:46 | |
So, like, for me, I was just like, this is everything against | 0:05:46 | 0:05:49 | |
what my mum wants. I've got nowhere to live, | 0:05:49 | 0:05:51 | |
I'm still in school, like. | 0:05:51 | 0:05:53 | |
He's not even my boyfriend. She just wouldn't have had it. | 0:05:53 | 0:05:56 | |
Well, I thought not anyway. | 0:05:56 | 0:05:58 | |
I was on another planet at that age. | 0:06:00 | 0:06:03 | |
I didn't get on with my family at all and I was finding myself | 0:06:03 | 0:06:08 | |
in this sort of spiral of like doing really bad things, rebelling. | 0:06:08 | 0:06:11 | |
I did think about keeping the baby, on some occasions, | 0:06:13 | 0:06:17 | |
but the sort of sense of, "Oh, my God, like, what would happen?" | 0:06:17 | 0:06:24 | |
was just so overbearing, like. | 0:06:24 | 0:06:27 | |
I thought that my mum would kill me. | 0:06:27 | 0:06:29 | |
I remember I was at my boyfriend's house and I was smoking | 0:06:29 | 0:06:34 | |
some weed, and I'd fallen asleep. | 0:06:34 | 0:06:36 | |
And she was ringing me, and it was two o'clock in the morning, | 0:06:36 | 0:06:39 | |
and eventually I called her back and she was like, | 0:06:39 | 0:06:42 | |
"Where are you?" She was going to kill me, etc, etc. | 0:06:42 | 0:06:45 | |
She came to pick me up and then my sister | 0:06:45 | 0:06:48 | |
was driving, and my mum took her shoe off and she was hitting me | 0:06:48 | 0:06:51 | |
with it. My sister was like, "Don't do it now, do it when | 0:06:51 | 0:06:54 | |
"we get home." | 0:06:54 | 0:06:56 | |
We got home and my mum got a knife from the kitchen cupboard, | 0:06:56 | 0:07:00 | |
and she was just like... | 0:07:00 | 0:07:01 | |
The things that she was saying were about, like, you... | 0:07:02 | 0:07:06 | |
What... SHE SIGHS | 0:07:06 | 0:07:08 | |
It's hard to translate this directly into English, but it was | 0:07:08 | 0:07:11 | |
sort of like, "What you're doing to my, like, respect, | 0:07:11 | 0:07:17 | |
"like what you're doing to my standard in the community, | 0:07:17 | 0:07:19 | |
"I won't have it, I won't have it." | 0:07:19 | 0:07:21 | |
That was just me staying out somewhere till | 0:07:21 | 0:07:23 | |
two o'clock in the morning. | 0:07:23 | 0:07:25 | |
Imagine what it would have been like | 0:07:25 | 0:07:28 | |
if I'd have come home and said I was pregnant? | 0:07:28 | 0:07:30 | |
The second time I got pregnant, so Paul, my partner, was in the house | 0:07:31 | 0:07:34 | |
with his two kids. So I just walked straight past him, | 0:07:34 | 0:07:37 | |
went in the bathroom, shut the door and done the test, | 0:07:37 | 0:07:40 | |
and I was like this, sat waiting. | 0:07:40 | 0:07:43 | |
And then when it said positive, I was just sobbing on the toilet. | 0:07:43 | 0:07:47 | |
So, by this point, he was like, "What's going on? Let me in | 0:07:47 | 0:07:50 | |
"the bathroom." So he ended up picking the lock with a knife | 0:07:50 | 0:07:52 | |
and come in. And I was just sobbing and he was just like... | 0:07:52 | 0:07:56 | |
He thought I'd lost a job or something, | 0:07:56 | 0:07:58 | |
so I picked the pregnancy test up | 0:07:58 | 0:07:59 | |
and threw it at him and went, "I'm pregnant." | 0:07:59 | 0:08:01 | |
So then he was like, "Why are you crying? That's good news." | 0:08:01 | 0:08:04 | |
But I didn't think it was at the time. | 0:08:04 | 0:08:06 | |
I was like, "How on Earth is that good news? I'm going to lose uni, | 0:08:06 | 0:08:09 | |
"I'm going to lose my job, blah, blah, blah." | 0:08:09 | 0:08:11 | |
It's just not the right time. | 0:08:11 | 0:08:12 | |
And he was sobbing, saying, "Oh, please, please, please. | 0:08:12 | 0:08:15 | |
"I want to you to keep it," and all that. | 0:08:15 | 0:08:17 | |
And in my head, from that point, I was like, | 0:08:17 | 0:08:20 | |
"I'm not having this baby, one bit." | 0:08:20 | 0:08:23 | |
I'll be honest, I'm not very responsible. | 0:08:27 | 0:08:29 | |
So I was sort of like taking the pill one day, | 0:08:29 | 0:08:32 | |
then not taking it the other. | 0:08:32 | 0:08:34 | |
I just assumed that however much I was taking, that would be enough | 0:08:34 | 0:08:38 | |
to, like, you know, stop a baby from occurring. | 0:08:38 | 0:08:42 | |
So then, right, I decided, OK, I'm going to go to the Brook. | 0:08:42 | 0:08:46 | |
And I went with my boyfriend and when she said, | 0:08:46 | 0:08:48 | |
"I'd like to inform you that you are pregnant," that moment, I just | 0:08:48 | 0:08:53 | |
felt sick straightaway. | 0:08:53 | 0:08:54 | |
I mean, all the questions of, like, | 0:08:54 | 0:08:57 | |
my college, everything, my ambitions, my boyfriend. | 0:08:57 | 0:09:01 | |
I also remember me being really dramatic, like, | 0:09:01 | 0:09:03 | |
"My family is Muslim!" Like, "I'm having an abortion." | 0:09:03 | 0:09:07 | |
I was just really angry, like, "Of course I can't keep it!" | 0:09:07 | 0:09:11 | |
-Abortion's still illegal in Ireland. -Is it? | 0:09:11 | 0:09:14 | |
-Now? -They have pure protests and pure, like, Irish people | 0:09:15 | 0:09:18 | |
-and all that. -So you can't... | 0:09:18 | 0:09:19 | |
There's nowhere to get an abortion in Ireland? | 0:09:19 | 0:09:21 | |
-Or Northern Ireland. -Or Northern Ireland? | 0:09:21 | 0:09:23 | |
No, but they have, like, people online over there who sell tablets | 0:09:23 | 0:09:25 | |
what can trigger abortions and stuff like that. But these are the extents | 0:09:25 | 0:09:28 | |
-what the girls over there have to go through. -Oh, my God. | 0:09:28 | 0:09:31 | |
I was pregnant when I was 16, with Ashley, | 0:09:31 | 0:09:35 | |
and I kind of knew it was my decision to have her. | 0:09:35 | 0:09:38 | |
And then March 2012, I got pregnant again and I decided that it | 0:09:38 | 0:09:45 | |
was the wrong time and that's when I thought, like, I had to have | 0:09:45 | 0:09:51 | |
the abortion. I just thought about Ashley, her dad wasn't about, | 0:09:51 | 0:09:56 | |
so I thought I had to give her my 110% attention. | 0:09:56 | 0:10:00 | |
So, she kind of made the decision a bit easier as well. | 0:10:00 | 0:10:03 | |
And I couldn't... Like, mentally, I had depression and stuff. | 0:10:03 | 0:10:07 | |
I just thought having this baby's not for me, not at this time. | 0:10:07 | 0:10:11 | |
And then I told my mum straightaway because I knew I needed | 0:10:11 | 0:10:14 | |
help to have the abortion. | 0:10:14 | 0:10:16 | |
So, she was just kind of like, | 0:10:16 | 0:10:19 | |
"It's your decision. It's your choice. | 0:10:19 | 0:10:21 | |
"I'll support you either way." | 0:10:21 | 0:10:24 | |
And... | 0:10:24 | 0:10:26 | |
Well, for like us, we have to... | 0:10:26 | 0:10:27 | |
I had to go to my doctor and I told him | 0:10:27 | 0:10:30 | |
I wanted to have an abortion. | 0:10:30 | 0:10:32 | |
And he was very much against it and said that he wouldn't advise me | 0:10:32 | 0:10:35 | |
to do it and wouldn't put me in contact with anybody to do it, so... | 0:10:35 | 0:10:38 | |
It didn't matter what anybody thought they knew. | 0:10:47 | 0:10:51 | |
It didn't matter, cos we snuck around and hid the truth. | 0:10:52 | 0:10:55 | |
It didn't matter, cos his heart was mine, and mine his, entwined. | 0:10:57 | 0:11:02 | |
But after seeing two pink lines, I knew there were two hearts | 0:11:05 | 0:11:08 | |
beating inside of me. | 0:11:08 | 0:11:11 | |
Couldn't believe, cried so hard I couldn't breathe. | 0:11:11 | 0:11:13 | |
This would be the end of my life, if they knew I had a baby. | 0:11:17 | 0:11:20 | |
# I never knew I could feel this way | 0:11:22 | 0:11:27 | |
# About someone, it's kind of crazy | 0:11:27 | 0:11:33 | |
# But there's something about you | 0:11:33 | 0:11:38 | |
# That's got me breaking the rules | 0:11:38 | 0:11:43 | |
# Ooh | 0:11:44 | 0:11:47 | |
# Breaking the rules | 0:11:50 | 0:11:53 | |
# Aah | 0:11:55 | 0:11:59 | |
# Aah, aah | 0:12:01 | 0:12:06 | |
# Ooh, ooh. # | 0:12:06 | 0:12:09 | |
So, they sent me off to have the scan and they put that stuff | 0:12:18 | 0:12:23 | |
on your belly that feels like hand sanitizer, really cold! | 0:12:23 | 0:12:27 | |
And then, at that point, the screen was facing me | 0:12:27 | 0:12:31 | |
and I just remember feeling like, this is such a grown-up thing, | 0:12:31 | 0:12:36 | |
I can't believe, like, I'm here doing such a grown-up thing. | 0:12:36 | 0:12:40 | |
And the scan lady said, "Oh, are you keeping this baby?" | 0:12:40 | 0:12:43 | |
And I said, "No." So she just turned the screen round. | 0:12:43 | 0:12:46 | |
I then had to go to Manchester Pregnancy Advisory Service. | 0:12:46 | 0:12:50 | |
No-one could accompany me to that, so I went on my own, | 0:12:50 | 0:12:54 | |
and then I... | 0:12:54 | 0:12:56 | |
I went into the room and it was my family GP. | 0:12:57 | 0:13:01 | |
And I was just like, "I can't believe, like, my family GP | 0:13:01 | 0:13:05 | |
"who's been my family GP since I was, like, a baby, | 0:13:05 | 0:13:08 | |
"moonlights as an abortion doctor!" | 0:13:08 | 0:13:12 | |
And he's also Bengali. | 0:13:12 | 0:13:14 | |
And so then, it was just... | 0:13:14 | 0:13:18 | |
Well, you know, of course he can't say anything, but as soon as | 0:13:18 | 0:13:20 | |
they came out of the room, when it was done, I changed doctors | 0:13:20 | 0:13:23 | |
really quickly! | 0:13:23 | 0:13:24 | |
If people have got goals in life - | 0:13:27 | 0:13:30 | |
so they're 16 years old, they're planning on doing A-levels, | 0:13:30 | 0:13:33 | |
then uni - they, more often than not, choose termination. | 0:13:33 | 0:13:39 | |
If they're 16 years old and they say, "Ah, he's very nice | 0:13:39 | 0:13:43 | |
"and I might as well just have the baby. He's already got two | 0:13:43 | 0:13:46 | |
"to somebody else, but..." | 0:13:46 | 0:13:48 | |
If they haven't got any other life goal, then having a baby | 0:13:48 | 0:13:52 | |
seems to be their goal, which is OK. | 0:13:52 | 0:13:56 | |
What we've got to be is completely non-judgmental. | 0:13:57 | 0:14:00 | |
So you might think, "Oh, God, here you are again. | 0:14:00 | 0:14:04 | |
"Now, you're 19, you've had three terminations in the past," | 0:14:04 | 0:14:07 | |
it might be quite irritating to us. | 0:14:07 | 0:14:09 | |
But we don't let that show. | 0:14:09 | 0:14:12 | |
Cos the one thing that I always say to them is, | 0:14:12 | 0:14:15 | |
"The decision you make today is right for you today. | 0:14:15 | 0:14:19 | |
"It's nobody else's business. | 0:14:19 | 0:14:21 | |
"So it might be different next year, it might be different | 0:14:21 | 0:14:25 | |
"in five years' time, but today you're making the right decision." | 0:14:25 | 0:14:30 | |
Our Paige said to me, "I'm going to go to the doctors and talk about | 0:14:30 | 0:14:33 | |
"my options," is what she said to me. | 0:14:33 | 0:14:35 | |
And I just said to her, "Paige, you've got no options | 0:14:35 | 0:14:37 | |
"at the end of the day, because if you get rid of this baby, | 0:14:37 | 0:14:40 | |
"then I just don't know if I could have ever spoke to her again," | 0:14:40 | 0:14:43 | |
because I just thought... | 0:14:43 | 0:14:44 | |
I don't know, I just think it's selfish, to be honest. | 0:14:45 | 0:14:48 | |
I just think it's really selfish. | 0:14:48 | 0:14:50 | |
I think if you're going to get pregnant, | 0:14:50 | 0:14:52 | |
you need to take on the responsibility. | 0:14:52 | 0:14:54 | |
Why should we decide whether somebody lives or dies? | 0:14:54 | 0:14:59 | |
Do you know what I mean? | 0:14:59 | 0:15:00 | |
No, not "somebody", Sherry Ann. | 0:15:00 | 0:15:02 | |
If it was somebody who'd already been born, we don't get to make | 0:15:02 | 0:15:05 | |
the choice whether somebody lives or dies | 0:15:05 | 0:15:07 | |
once they're already here. So what makes it any different | 0:15:07 | 0:15:10 | |
when they're inside your stomach? Do you know what I mean? | 0:15:10 | 0:15:12 | |
You was here telling me not to get rid of it, our Zoe was in here | 0:15:12 | 0:15:15 | |
telling me not to get rid of it. | 0:15:15 | 0:15:16 | |
My mum was saying, "I'm not saying nothin'." | 0:15:16 | 0:15:19 | |
But, basically, subliminally telling me not to get rid of it, | 0:15:19 | 0:15:23 | |
and I thought, "No, I need to just remove myself from what | 0:15:23 | 0:15:28 | |
"all them people are saying," and this needs to be my decision. | 0:15:28 | 0:15:31 | |
Your decision. | 0:15:31 | 0:15:33 | |
So, if it turns out that I do want to get rid of this baby | 0:15:33 | 0:15:37 | |
-and Sherry Ann hates me, I'm sure she'll come round in the end. -Yeah. | 0:15:37 | 0:15:41 | |
Cos what will I do if I have this baby and I cannot take care of her? | 0:15:41 | 0:15:45 | |
That's when they told me that you could have the tablet. | 0:15:46 | 0:15:51 | |
You have a tablet and then you miscarry. | 0:15:51 | 0:15:55 | |
Or you could have the... I think it was called something like... | 0:15:55 | 0:15:59 | |
Something like evacuation or something, | 0:15:59 | 0:16:01 | |
I can't remember what it was called, but they suck it out. | 0:16:01 | 0:16:04 | |
Vacuum something. | 0:16:04 | 0:16:06 | |
Vacuumasperosis! | 0:16:06 | 0:16:08 | |
I can't remember what it was called! | 0:16:08 | 0:16:10 | |
It's just all words. When you're 16 years old, they don't mean anything. | 0:16:11 | 0:16:15 | |
But I decided that I'd prefer to have that one and, unfortunately, | 0:16:15 | 0:16:20 | |
I wasn't far enough along, it has to be after six weeks. | 0:16:20 | 0:16:24 | |
And I just remember, like, it was really hard. | 0:16:24 | 0:16:27 | |
I booked a doctor's appointment. | 0:16:30 | 0:16:32 | |
So she done this thing and she was like, | 0:16:32 | 0:16:34 | |
"Oh, my God, you're five months pregnant." | 0:16:34 | 0:16:36 | |
So I was like, "Oh, my God, no!" | 0:16:36 | 0:16:38 | |
So she was like, "Why are you crying?" | 0:16:38 | 0:16:40 | |
And I was like, "Cos that means it's too late to get an abortion." | 0:16:40 | 0:16:44 | |
So she was like, "We're going to have to send you for a scan | 0:16:44 | 0:16:46 | |
"to see how exactly how far you're on." | 0:16:46 | 0:16:48 | |
Cos you could get an abortion up to 18 to 20 weeks, | 0:16:48 | 0:16:52 | |
but not in Liverpool, nowhere in Liverpool does it. | 0:16:52 | 0:16:55 | |
So she was like, "Just before that point, you will still be able | 0:16:55 | 0:16:58 | |
"to get it." But in my head, I was thinking, "I can't cos it's | 0:16:58 | 0:17:01 | |
"a full blown baby then." | 0:17:01 | 0:17:03 | |
So I was like, "Oh, God. I went to the appointment and our Shana | 0:17:03 | 0:17:06 | |
came with me. | 0:17:06 | 0:17:08 | |
And then they done the scan, but they don't let you see it | 0:17:08 | 0:17:10 | |
when you're supposed to be at an abortion. | 0:17:10 | 0:17:12 | |
They say, "We're not going to show you it, it's just to see how | 0:17:12 | 0:17:15 | |
"far you are." So then the woman done it and our Shana was looking | 0:17:15 | 0:17:18 | |
at the screen and as soon as she seen it, she was like, | 0:17:18 | 0:17:21 | |
"Oh, my God!" So then I was like to the woman, "I want to see it," | 0:17:21 | 0:17:24 | |
and she was like, "I really don't think that's a good..." | 0:17:24 | 0:17:27 | |
And I was like, "No, I want to see it." | 0:17:27 | 0:17:29 | |
And then as soon as I seen it, I was just like, | 0:17:29 | 0:17:32 | |
"Oh, my God, having an abortion, I can't." | 0:17:32 | 0:17:36 | |
Well, we went home and discussed everything with my mum | 0:17:39 | 0:17:42 | |
and she done all the googling, all the research, and spoke it over | 0:17:42 | 0:17:46 | |
with me. It was hard, it was difficult. | 0:17:46 | 0:17:49 | |
We told so many lies to get the money. | 0:17:49 | 0:17:52 | |
It was unbelievable. | 0:17:52 | 0:17:54 | |
And I had to get, like, a fast-track passport the day before | 0:17:55 | 0:17:58 | |
and that was like £110 on top of 80 something for the flights | 0:17:58 | 0:18:02 | |
and then £800 for the abortion. | 0:18:02 | 0:18:04 | |
I definitely think there should be more fight | 0:18:05 | 0:18:08 | |
for it to be legal over here. | 0:18:08 | 0:18:10 | |
I just think that if it becomes legalised here, | 0:18:13 | 0:18:16 | |
then I think more and more people will become more careless | 0:18:16 | 0:18:19 | |
and then more and more people have abortions. | 0:18:19 | 0:18:21 | |
I just feel like it's murdering someone. | 0:18:21 | 0:18:23 | |
Like, I just don't understand how you could just kill something | 0:18:23 | 0:18:26 | |
so precious that's living inside of you. | 0:18:26 | 0:18:28 | |
And it's technically your fault, unless it was due to something | 0:18:28 | 0:18:32 | |
with like, like rape or something like that. | 0:18:32 | 0:18:34 | |
And if people don't have to live with consequences, | 0:18:34 | 0:18:37 | |
then they're not going to change their actions. | 0:18:37 | 0:18:40 | |
I'd just like to... | 0:18:40 | 0:18:42 | |
I'll say that, everyone is entitled to their own opinion | 0:18:42 | 0:18:47 | |
and everyone should have a choice, which is hence the pro-choice. | 0:18:47 | 0:18:51 | |
I feel like if you're on the pro-choice end, you're saying yes | 0:18:51 | 0:18:55 | |
to both. You are entitled to have a child if you want | 0:18:55 | 0:18:58 | |
and you're entitled to abort the child if you want. | 0:18:58 | 0:19:01 | |
If you're on the pro-life end, you're just taking that choice away, | 0:19:01 | 0:19:04 | |
and I feel like a choice is a human right. | 0:19:04 | 0:19:07 | |
I also had to schedule it around my exams, because my college | 0:19:10 | 0:19:15 | |
is a Catholic college. So I could get away with saying that I had | 0:19:15 | 0:19:18 | |
an RE trip. So I told my mum I was going on an RE trip | 0:19:18 | 0:19:23 | |
and I needed to be at Piccadilly Bus Station for seven o'clock | 0:19:23 | 0:19:27 | |
in the morning in order to get to the clinic by half past eight, | 0:19:27 | 0:19:30 | |
so you could have that day without being kept overnight. | 0:19:30 | 0:19:34 | |
Because I'm not allowed to... Well, at that age, | 0:19:34 | 0:19:36 | |
I wasn't allowed to stay out overnight. | 0:19:36 | 0:19:38 | |
Hiding in the shadows. | 0:19:46 | 0:19:48 | |
You ask a friend. | 0:19:50 | 0:19:51 | |
She knows a friend who knows a friend of a friend. | 0:19:54 | 0:19:57 | |
And then late one night, it comes back to you. | 0:20:02 | 0:20:06 | |
An address. | 0:20:09 | 0:20:10 | |
Number 23 Rukuhia Street, Epworth. | 0:20:12 | 0:20:17 | |
And the price... | 0:20:20 | 0:20:21 | |
..100. | 0:20:25 | 0:20:28 | |
My partner, he was still kind of like a wee teenage boy. | 0:20:38 | 0:20:41 | |
He wasn't really supportive, he didn't really care. | 0:20:41 | 0:20:45 | |
He didn't worry about how I got there or where I was getting | 0:20:45 | 0:20:48 | |
the money to get it done. | 0:20:48 | 0:20:50 | |
When I was pregnant the first time, and obviously the lad I was seeing, | 0:20:54 | 0:20:58 | |
I'd been seeing him for years, but he was a bellend, you know | 0:20:58 | 0:21:01 | |
what I mean? | 0:21:01 | 0:21:02 | |
So I said straightaway, "Well, I'm getting an abortion anyway." | 0:21:02 | 0:21:05 | |
And he was like, "It's not just your baby, it's not just your choice | 0:21:05 | 0:21:07 | |
"to make." And I was like, "No, mate, but it's my body | 0:21:07 | 0:21:10 | |
"and you're not even committing to me now, so why am I going | 0:21:10 | 0:21:13 | |
"to have a baby for you to leave the both of us?" | 0:21:13 | 0:21:15 | |
My boyfriend was really supportive, actually. | 0:21:17 | 0:21:21 | |
I remember he said that if I wanted to keep the baby that he would | 0:21:21 | 0:21:24 | |
tell his mum and we would be able to sort it out, | 0:21:24 | 0:21:28 | |
but I just kind of saw that as an annoyance, really. | 0:21:28 | 0:21:31 | |
Just thinking, "Don't make me feel any emotion | 0:21:31 | 0:21:34 | |
"towards this thing." | 0:21:34 | 0:21:36 | |
But then, on reflection, obviously, that was a really kind thing | 0:21:38 | 0:21:41 | |
that he'd offered to do. | 0:21:41 | 0:21:43 | |
The night before, he was like out drinking or something. | 0:21:43 | 0:21:46 | |
And I sent him a message, like, "Are you being fucking serious, like? | 0:21:46 | 0:21:49 | |
"I'm going for an abortion in the morning, it's two o'clock | 0:21:49 | 0:21:52 | |
"and you're absolutely out getting drunk and doing whatever." | 0:21:52 | 0:21:55 | |
But say you're not you... | 0:21:57 | 0:22:00 | |
OK, I'm not me. | 0:22:00 | 0:22:02 | |
-Shut up. And a girl gets pregnant. -Yes. | 0:22:02 | 0:22:06 | |
-And you... -Wait, am I me or...? | 0:22:06 | 0:22:09 | |
-What? -Am I not me? -No, no, this other person. -Yeah. | 0:22:09 | 0:22:13 | |
And you get this girl pregnant and she... | 0:22:13 | 0:22:17 | |
-You don't want her to get rid of the baby. -Yes. | 0:22:19 | 0:22:21 | |
-And she wants to get rid of it. -Yeah. | 0:22:21 | 0:22:23 | |
-Do you think that's fine? -That's her choice. | 0:22:23 | 0:22:26 | |
-And do you think that's right? -Well, yeah, because it's up to her, | 0:22:26 | 0:22:30 | |
she's going through it, do you know what I mean? | 0:22:30 | 0:22:32 | |
And if she really wants the abortion, I'd say, | 0:22:32 | 0:22:34 | |
"Listen, you know, my point of view, there's nothing more I can do." | 0:22:34 | 0:22:37 | |
Yeah, but it... | 0:22:37 | 0:22:39 | |
-It's sly, yeah. -It's proper unfair. | 0:22:40 | 0:22:43 | |
-It's unfair, but that's... -Like, I know it's her choice to do | 0:22:44 | 0:22:47 | |
whatever she wants to do with her body, but it's also his baby. | 0:22:47 | 0:22:53 | |
Yeah. | 0:22:53 | 0:22:54 | |
-That's when you'd have a conversation. -I'm sure... | 0:22:56 | 0:22:58 | |
..a baby is more important than a body. But then I think, again, | 0:23:00 | 0:23:06 | |
after saying that, if I was in that situation and a lad really | 0:23:06 | 0:23:12 | |
wanted to keep the baby... | 0:23:12 | 0:23:14 | |
..I don't know what I could do, because I don't know if I could, | 0:23:17 | 0:23:20 | |
like, carry this baby in me for so long and then just let it go and not | 0:23:20 | 0:23:26 | |
do anything for this child. | 0:23:26 | 0:23:28 | |
But then, I don't want it killed. | 0:23:31 | 0:23:34 | |
-So what would you do? -I'd say no! | 0:23:34 | 0:23:36 | |
-Cos the time's ticking. -I'd probably kill myself! | 0:23:36 | 0:23:38 | |
-Then you're killing you and the baby. -I know, I might as well | 0:23:40 | 0:23:43 | |
just kill the baby! | 0:23:43 | 0:23:44 | |
-No, I don't mean that. -No. | 0:23:46 | 0:23:48 | |
The time I was pregnant with Paitlyn, well, Paul, my partner, | 0:23:48 | 0:23:52 | |
had put pure emotional pressure on me to have the baby. | 0:23:52 | 0:23:55 | |
So then, this time when I got caught pregnant again, | 0:23:55 | 0:23:58 | |
well, I knew straightaway what I needed to do. | 0:23:58 | 0:24:00 | |
I couldn't manage another baby. | 0:24:00 | 0:24:02 | |
I didn't want to tell Paul before I'd done it, | 0:24:02 | 0:24:04 | |
I didn't want him getting in my head and making me | 0:24:04 | 0:24:06 | |
do something that I didn't want to do. | 0:24:06 | 0:24:08 | |
The relationship already wasn't in a good place, | 0:24:08 | 0:24:10 | |
and he wouldn't do anything to help me with Paitlyn, wouldn't even | 0:24:10 | 0:24:13 | |
change a nappy. | 0:24:13 | 0:24:15 | |
Like, he was there, but not there, if you know what I mean? | 0:24:15 | 0:24:17 | |
So I just went and had the procedure and decided I'd tell him | 0:24:17 | 0:24:20 | |
when it's all over. | 0:24:20 | 0:24:21 | |
When I decided to specialise in obstetrics and gynaecology, | 0:24:23 | 0:24:27 | |
at that time, everyone did abortion. | 0:24:27 | 0:24:31 | |
And so, I just did abortions, | 0:24:31 | 0:24:32 | |
and I didn't really stop to think about whether it was good or bad or | 0:24:32 | 0:24:37 | |
how I felt about it. | 0:24:37 | 0:24:38 | |
But I suppose, over the years, I've become more of an advocate | 0:24:40 | 0:24:45 | |
for the need to provide abortion care. | 0:24:45 | 0:24:48 | |
So I think we need to recognise that a woman's lifetime chance | 0:24:50 | 0:24:53 | |
of having an abortion in the United Kingdom is one in three, | 0:24:53 | 0:24:56 | |
and so I find myself thinking that gynaecologists should | 0:24:56 | 0:25:03 | |
do abortions and that if you don't want to do abortions, | 0:25:03 | 0:25:07 | |
then perhaps you should think about taking another speciality, | 0:25:07 | 0:25:12 | |
so become a dermatologist or a chest physician, | 0:25:12 | 0:25:15 | |
or something like that. | 0:25:15 | 0:25:16 | |
I'm a Christian and I am a gynaecologist, but I personally | 0:25:18 | 0:25:23 | |
have chosen not to do abortions because I feel very strongly | 0:25:23 | 0:25:27 | |
that the pregnancy that is developing is a mini person | 0:25:27 | 0:25:34 | |
that is created in the image of God. | 0:25:34 | 0:25:36 | |
And whilst I don't judge other doctors for performing abortions, | 0:25:36 | 0:25:40 | |
and I know that most doctors don't like to do abortions, | 0:25:40 | 0:25:43 | |
but they choose to do them for people to have choices, | 0:25:43 | 0:25:46 | |
I don't feel that's something that I am able to do. | 0:25:46 | 0:25:49 | |
The problem becomes if you work in a hospital where two or three doctors | 0:25:51 | 0:25:55 | |
say, "No, I won't do abortions because it's against my religion," | 0:25:55 | 0:25:58 | |
the burden then falls on a small number of others, | 0:25:58 | 0:26:03 | |
who then become fed up with being asked to do all the abortions | 0:26:03 | 0:26:06 | |
and then they eventually react by saying, "Well, I'm not going | 0:26:06 | 0:26:10 | |
"to do them any more either." | 0:26:10 | 0:26:11 | |
So, eventually, you end up with very few gynaecologists prepared | 0:26:11 | 0:26:16 | |
to do abortions. | 0:26:16 | 0:26:18 | |
-They're not humans yet, Sherry Ann. -They are humans. They're not growing | 0:26:18 | 0:26:21 | |
into Martians, they're growing into babies. | 0:26:21 | 0:26:24 | |
But what I'm saying is they're not anything yet, they're cells, | 0:26:24 | 0:26:27 | |
-they're a mass of cells. -So where should life start? | 0:26:27 | 0:26:29 | |
-So where should we have rights? -Once you enter the world, | 0:26:29 | 0:26:33 | |
independently, breathing for yourself. Not an umbilical cord... | 0:26:33 | 0:26:37 | |
-So then that means that you should be able to have abortions... -..connected to my stomach, babe. | 0:26:37 | 0:26:41 | |
..until full-term. So you should be able to have abortions | 0:26:41 | 0:26:43 | |
until you're full-term, then? | 0:26:43 | 0:26:45 | |
That's what you've just basically said, | 0:26:45 | 0:26:47 | |
you should be able to have an abortion until you're full-term. | 0:26:47 | 0:26:50 | |
-It shouldn't have rights until it's come out. -No. | 0:26:50 | 0:26:53 | |
Obviously, there should be laws to how far you can do it, | 0:26:53 | 0:26:56 | |
because obviously it feels pain and whatever, whatever, | 0:26:56 | 0:27:01 | |
but if the cells have not got a brain, they cannot feel pain. | 0:27:01 | 0:27:06 | |
Sherry Ann, they can't feel nothin'! | 0:27:06 | 0:27:09 | |
You can't be for abortion if you're going to say, | 0:27:09 | 0:27:12 | |
"But when they can feel, it's wrong." | 0:27:12 | 0:27:15 | |
-Yeah. -No. How's that make sense? | 0:27:17 | 0:27:20 | |
I don't agree with doing it while you can feel that it's a baby, | 0:27:20 | 0:27:25 | |
and you can get a scan and you can see it's got a head, | 0:27:25 | 0:27:28 | |
it's got arms, it's got legs, it's got a willy. | 0:27:28 | 0:27:31 | |
None of that. But if I was... | 0:27:31 | 0:27:33 | |
Well, babe, look at my 13-week scan, it's got a head, it's got a body, | 0:27:33 | 0:27:37 | |
it's got arms, it's got legs. | 0:27:37 | 0:27:38 | |
-I wouldn't get one then. -But you would, because how far were you | 0:27:40 | 0:27:43 | |
when you got one? | 0:27:43 | 0:27:45 | |
Eight weeks. | 0:27:45 | 0:27:46 | |
Well, are you sure about that? | 0:27:48 | 0:27:50 | |
It's partly an emotional thing, because there is no doubt that | 0:27:51 | 0:27:54 | |
as the foetus grows, it becomes less like a ball of cells | 0:27:54 | 0:27:59 | |
and becomes a baby, becomes a recognisable object | 0:27:59 | 0:28:04 | |
which looks just like a baby. | 0:28:04 | 0:28:06 | |
And once you start to see foetal movements, | 0:28:06 | 0:28:08 | |
it feels more of a cruel procedure and, depending on how it's done, | 0:28:08 | 0:28:15 | |
it's also an unpleasant procedure. | 0:28:15 | 0:28:18 | |
So dilatation and evacuation, when you're pulling out bits of | 0:28:18 | 0:28:21 | |
foetuses is extremely unpleasant. | 0:28:21 | 0:28:24 | |
So people automatically, I think, react by saying, | 0:28:24 | 0:28:28 | |
"Well, I think I'll stop at 12 weeks." | 0:28:28 | 0:28:30 | |
As we know, abortion law allows us to abort to 24 weeks | 0:28:30 | 0:28:35 | |
and sometimes even later. | 0:28:35 | 0:28:37 | |
But I don't think there's a sudden cut-off that you can say that | 0:28:37 | 0:28:40 | |
this is... This is a foetus that | 0:28:40 | 0:28:43 | |
doesn't have rights, and then it suddenly becomes a foetus | 0:28:43 | 0:28:46 | |
that does have rights. And I guess my cut-off is at implantation, | 0:28:46 | 0:28:51 | |
because that's very clear to me that life has begun at that point. | 0:28:51 | 0:28:54 | |
But then I think you have to say, "Well, who are the women | 0:28:56 | 0:29:01 | |
"who are having abortions beyond 12 weeks?" | 0:29:01 | 0:29:05 | |
And, to me, those women are often less able to get their lives | 0:29:05 | 0:29:11 | |
into control, and particularly the very late terminations, | 0:29:11 | 0:29:15 | |
often the very young or the very old, in reproductive terms, | 0:29:15 | 0:29:20 | |
who have taken a long time to recognise that they are pregnant | 0:29:20 | 0:29:23 | |
or who have problems with mental health or something else. | 0:29:23 | 0:29:26 | |
So, to me, if you're going to do abortions, then I think you have to | 0:29:27 | 0:29:33 | |
say, "Well, why am I doing them?" | 0:29:33 | 0:29:35 | |
If it is to make life better for those who have | 0:29:37 | 0:29:40 | |
unintended pregnancies, then I don't see the logic | 0:29:40 | 0:29:44 | |
in having a time limit. | 0:29:44 | 0:29:46 | |
Saturday. | 0:29:59 | 0:30:01 | |
7:45am. | 0:30:02 | 0:30:03 | |
She wakes up, splashes cold water on her face and takes out | 0:30:05 | 0:30:10 | |
the piece of paper that's been burning a hole in her pocket | 0:30:10 | 0:30:14 | |
for the past three days. | 0:30:14 | 0:30:16 | |
So... | 0:30:19 | 0:30:20 | |
..she steps on the bus. | 0:30:22 | 0:30:23 | |
The 427 headed out of town. | 0:30:25 | 0:30:27 | |
Shades on, eyes ahead, shoulders back. | 0:30:30 | 0:30:33 | |
The eyes of the kid on the bus lock with hers. | 0:30:36 | 0:30:39 | |
An old woman smiles. | 0:30:39 | 0:30:41 | |
Disengage, headphones on, chin up, shoulders back. | 0:30:41 | 0:30:46 | |
And her hand slowly falls and rests subconsciously on her belly. | 0:30:49 | 0:30:55 | |
And I gently nod my head to the beat of the music. | 0:30:55 | 0:30:57 | |
And the beat goes on. | 0:30:59 | 0:31:01 | |
Bus brakes hard. | 0:31:05 | 0:31:07 | |
Her white and gold Adidas shoes step off the bus | 0:31:07 | 0:31:11 | |
into the heat and the dust of the midday sun. | 0:31:11 | 0:31:14 | |
The eyes of the street vendors burn a hole in her back. | 0:31:15 | 0:31:18 | |
Chin up. | 0:31:20 | 0:31:21 | |
She looks defiantly on the door... | 0:31:23 | 0:31:25 | |
..and waits for what seems to be forever and a day. | 0:31:27 | 0:31:30 | |
Until an old woman answers. | 0:31:33 | 0:31:35 | |
And says... | 0:31:37 | 0:31:39 | |
"Come this way." | 0:31:39 | 0:31:42 | |
The room is dark. | 0:32:03 | 0:32:05 | |
Like a womb. | 0:32:07 | 0:32:08 | |
Bed on the floor. | 0:32:10 | 0:32:11 | |
Shiny metal on the table. | 0:32:12 | 0:32:14 | |
Hips in the bowl. | 0:32:16 | 0:32:18 | |
She lies down and waits. | 0:32:20 | 0:32:23 | |
She closes her eyes and she waits. | 0:32:24 | 0:32:27 | |
And she waits. | 0:32:29 | 0:32:30 | |
And the beat goes on. | 0:32:33 | 0:32:35 | |
Beat, beat, beat, beat. | 0:32:37 | 0:32:42 | |
Tick, tick, tick. | 0:32:42 | 0:32:46 | |
I remember having, like, butterflies in my stomach | 0:32:46 | 0:32:50 | |
and just waking my mum up to talk to her about it. | 0:32:50 | 0:32:54 | |
And then I remember being on the plane and just thinking, | 0:32:54 | 0:32:56 | |
"I don't think I can do this." | 0:32:56 | 0:32:58 | |
And my mum says, "It's your choice, you know, we can just take | 0:32:58 | 0:33:01 | |
"the money and go shopping", cos she wanted to go shopping. | 0:33:01 | 0:33:04 | |
But on the plane then, I thought, "No, I'm doing it. | 0:33:04 | 0:33:07 | |
"I need to do it and I want to do it." | 0:33:07 | 0:33:09 | |
But right up until the door, she was like, "You know, it's your choice, | 0:33:09 | 0:33:13 | |
"it's your call." | 0:33:13 | 0:33:14 | |
Have you been to that abortion clinic on Aigburth? | 0:33:14 | 0:33:17 | |
Well, it's just like a big house. | 0:33:17 | 0:33:19 | |
It's literally on a street and it was just like a dead big house. | 0:33:19 | 0:33:23 | |
And then we landed in Liverpool and we got the taxi to the | 0:33:23 | 0:33:28 | |
Merseyside Clinic, and it was just like a house type thing. | 0:33:28 | 0:33:32 | |
So we went in, our Shana was with me, and we were in the waiting room | 0:33:32 | 0:33:36 | |
and it was just, like, loads of people in there. | 0:33:36 | 0:33:39 | |
I remember seeing an old Indian woman who was just smiling, | 0:33:39 | 0:33:42 | |
like the whole time. | 0:33:42 | 0:33:45 | |
Just... It's weird also to see another Asian person | 0:33:45 | 0:33:48 | |
having an abortion. | 0:33:48 | 0:33:50 | |
There was a girl in there that I'd went to | 0:33:50 | 0:33:51 | |
school with and she was with her mum, but I don't know whether | 0:33:51 | 0:33:54 | |
she was getting the abortion or her mum, because they both looked | 0:33:54 | 0:33:57 | |
dead sad. But I just said hi to her and just sat down. | 0:33:57 | 0:34:01 | |
I was like, "This is just not what I was expecting." | 0:34:01 | 0:34:04 | |
Like, they had piles of magazines, little thingy water machines | 0:34:04 | 0:34:08 | |
and tellies all round the room, and Jeremy Kyle was on. | 0:34:08 | 0:34:11 | |
And everyone was just like getting on with what they were doing. | 0:34:11 | 0:34:14 | |
They brought me into the room and... Of course, me and my mum, | 0:34:25 | 0:34:28 | |
whenever she comes to hospital appointments, she doesn't leave. | 0:34:28 | 0:34:31 | |
So she thought that she came with me, but they put her out and | 0:34:31 | 0:34:34 | |
spoke to me. They asked if I did the scan and they asked | 0:34:34 | 0:34:38 | |
if I wanted to have a picture of the scan. | 0:34:38 | 0:34:41 | |
I was like, "No, I don't even want to look at it, just do whatever | 0:34:41 | 0:34:43 | |
"you have to do." And until the very point, you know, you're like | 0:34:43 | 0:34:47 | |
taking your clothes off and getting changed, you're sort of still | 0:34:47 | 0:34:51 | |
thinking, like you have that in the back of your head, like, | 0:34:51 | 0:34:53 | |
"Is this right?" | 0:34:53 | 0:34:55 | |
And then I went upstairs and got undressed into, like, a nightie, | 0:34:55 | 0:34:59 | |
lay on the bed and they put like a cream on your hand and that was it. | 0:34:59 | 0:35:04 | |
I woke up and I was like, "Is that it?" | 0:35:04 | 0:35:06 | |
And they were like, "Yeah, that's it, it's done." | 0:35:06 | 0:35:08 | |
And I was like, "Where's my mum?" | 0:35:08 | 0:35:10 | |
And my mum came up and she just gave me a hug and that was it. | 0:35:10 | 0:35:14 | |
My friend actually has a picture of hers, so she does. | 0:35:19 | 0:35:23 | |
She just keeps it. I don't know what she does with it. | 0:35:23 | 0:35:26 | |
She looks at it like, but, yeah, she has. | 0:35:26 | 0:35:30 | |
I was just like, I don't even want... Just turn the screen, | 0:35:30 | 0:35:33 | |
and they did, so... | 0:35:33 | 0:35:34 | |
You go on the Saturday, you take the tablet, | 0:35:35 | 0:35:38 | |
go home and then you come back on the Sunday | 0:35:38 | 0:35:41 | |
and take two more tablets, | 0:35:41 | 0:35:43 | |
and that breaks the pregnancy away from your womb and your... | 0:35:43 | 0:35:48 | |
Like, it comes out, which was a bit horrible. | 0:35:48 | 0:35:50 | |
But it wasn't anything, it was literally, like, a blood clot, | 0:35:50 | 0:35:56 | |
like the size of a conker, if that, do you know what I mean? | 0:35:56 | 0:35:59 | |
You had like... | 0:35:59 | 0:36:00 | |
You were in a room and you had, like, a back room attached | 0:36:02 | 0:36:04 | |
to the side and they give you this like... | 0:36:04 | 0:36:09 | |
What are they called? You know those green trays what they give | 0:36:10 | 0:36:13 | |
the old women to wee in and stuff in the ozzy? | 0:36:13 | 0:36:17 | |
One of them. And every time you go for a wee, unless you were going | 0:36:17 | 0:36:20 | |
to have a poo, you wouldn't use it. But if you were going for a wee, | 0:36:20 | 0:36:23 | |
you had to put that in like the hole of the toilet and wee in that | 0:36:23 | 0:36:27 | |
because they need to check it so they know when the baby had | 0:36:27 | 0:36:33 | |
come out, when the foetus had come out. | 0:36:33 | 0:36:35 | |
So they give you like loads of sheets of brown paper | 0:36:35 | 0:36:38 | |
and they say to you, "Don't ever look in the tray. | 0:36:38 | 0:36:40 | |
"Just put the paper over and pull the..." | 0:36:40 | 0:36:43 | |
You had like a little red lever, pull that, | 0:36:43 | 0:36:45 | |
and every time you wee, they come and took the tray away. | 0:36:45 | 0:36:48 | |
And then, eventually, they come in and go, "You've just passed it." | 0:36:48 | 0:36:50 | |
After the abortion, I got picked up by my boyfriend's cousin | 0:37:10 | 0:37:15 | |
and I really wanted a koobideh kebab from Rusholme chippy. | 0:37:15 | 0:37:19 | |
So we got me a koobideh kebab | 0:37:19 | 0:37:21 | |
and then we went to watch Pirates of the Caribbean in the cinema, | 0:37:21 | 0:37:23 | |
and I fell asleep. | 0:37:23 | 0:37:26 | |
When I went home, I was in agony, because after that, | 0:37:26 | 0:37:29 | |
you have a dead, dead heavy period. | 0:37:29 | 0:37:31 | |
But I was just thinking... | 0:37:31 | 0:37:33 | |
SHE SIGHS | 0:37:33 | 0:37:34 | |
But then I was thinking, "I can't even feel sorry for myself." | 0:37:34 | 0:37:37 | |
I felt like a weight had been lifted off my shoulders. | 0:37:37 | 0:37:40 | |
So I was like, "I can move on from here." | 0:37:40 | 0:37:43 | |
But it wasn't my fault, I was on contraception, | 0:37:43 | 0:37:47 | |
and I was only young and, you know, you don't read the leaflet | 0:37:47 | 0:37:50 | |
and what comes with your pill and all the rest of it, | 0:37:50 | 0:37:52 | |
and there was loads of things on the list | 0:37:52 | 0:37:54 | |
what cancelled your pill out. | 0:37:54 | 0:37:56 | |
And I'd definitely been taking it religiously. | 0:37:56 | 0:37:59 | |
But maybe I'm just on antibiotics, or whatever the thing was, | 0:37:59 | 0:38:03 | |
so I was just like, "It wasn't really my fault, I did think | 0:38:03 | 0:38:06 | |
"I was covered." So... | 0:38:06 | 0:38:08 | |
I don't know how I kind of stopped crying, but, yeah, I did. | 0:38:08 | 0:38:14 | |
And then as it went on, I kind of felt a wee bit gutted... | 0:38:15 | 0:38:19 | |
..or guilty. | 0:38:19 | 0:38:20 | |
I was having dreams and stuff and seeing the actual child, | 0:38:20 | 0:38:24 | |
and I can still the child today, actually, | 0:38:24 | 0:38:26 | |
the image of this child that I was going to have. | 0:38:26 | 0:38:29 | |
But then, looking at my life now, I know it was the right thing | 0:38:29 | 0:38:33 | |
-that I did. -I am religious. | 0:38:33 | 0:38:36 | |
I'll always say that I don't think that I made the wrong decision, | 0:38:36 | 0:38:41 | |
like from a Muslim perspective, because why would my god | 0:38:41 | 0:38:47 | |
want me to suffer? Why would my god want my unborn child to suffer? | 0:38:47 | 0:38:52 | |
It's not... You know, it's not what anyone wants. | 0:38:52 | 0:38:56 | |
I 100% made the right decisions about the abortions, | 0:38:56 | 0:38:59 | |
but with Paitlyn, this sounds terrible, | 0:38:59 | 0:39:02 | |
but sometimes I look at her and I love her to bits, | 0:39:02 | 0:39:05 | |
but I do always ponder where I might be | 0:39:05 | 0:39:07 | |
if I had not gone through with that pregnancy either. | 0:39:07 | 0:39:10 | |
Not that I'm... | 0:39:10 | 0:39:12 | |
Well, not that my life's not good now and I wouldn't change it, | 0:39:12 | 0:39:15 | |
but, you know, it is hard. | 0:39:15 | 0:39:18 | |
Especially now I'm a single parent and I've lost my house | 0:39:18 | 0:39:21 | |
and everything. Well, yeah, I do think about it, about that | 0:39:21 | 0:39:24 | |
decision, all the time. | 0:39:24 | 0:39:26 | |
Oh, my God, my friend, Terrence, has just told me what happened | 0:39:39 | 0:39:41 | |
to his cousin in Africa. | 0:39:41 | 0:39:43 | |
So, the girl had been seeing this guy for a while, | 0:39:43 | 0:39:45 | |
but it had all been a secret, so they didn't even know | 0:39:45 | 0:39:48 | |
she had a partner, let alone was sexually active. | 0:39:48 | 0:39:52 | |
So then she'd got caught pregnant and the abortion what she got, | 0:39:52 | 0:39:56 | |
it wasn't in like a... | 0:39:56 | 0:39:58 | |
It wasn't even in a clinic, it was like literally like a room | 0:39:58 | 0:40:03 | |
and the woman done it like old school, like the way on... | 0:40:03 | 0:40:06 | |
What's that movie of the woman...? | 0:40:06 | 0:40:08 | |
Like, Vera Drake, it was like that. | 0:40:08 | 0:40:11 | |
And she'd gone back to the woman twice, because the first time | 0:40:11 | 0:40:15 | |
she'd done it and when the girl went home, still no bleeding | 0:40:15 | 0:40:19 | |
or nothing. Done a pregnancy test and she was still pregnant. | 0:40:19 | 0:40:22 | |
And then woman had said to her, "No, that can happen. | 0:40:32 | 0:40:35 | |
"It can still come up that you're pregnant, but you won't be. | 0:40:35 | 0:40:37 | |
"But I'll do it again if you're not sure, but you'll have to pay again, | 0:40:37 | 0:40:42 | |
"cos my time's not free." | 0:40:42 | 0:40:44 | |
So she's paid again, got it again, | 0:40:44 | 0:40:47 | |
and then went home and she was bleeding then. | 0:40:47 | 0:40:49 | |
And she was just like, "It's just my period," and whatever, | 0:40:49 | 0:40:52 | |
and then she was haemorrhaging. | 0:40:52 | 0:40:54 | |
So then her mum and dad were a bit like, "Well, what's going on | 0:40:54 | 0:40:56 | |
"with you?" And she come clean to them. | 0:40:56 | 0:40:59 | |
Now, the dad has like kicked off, but obviously the mum was like, | 0:40:59 | 0:41:03 | |
"Her safety's paramount at this minute, | 0:41:03 | 0:41:05 | |
"we'll deal with what she's done when we get back." | 0:41:05 | 0:41:08 | |
And they've took her to the hospital, but she died. | 0:41:08 | 0:41:11 | |
She had septicaemia. | 0:41:11 | 0:41:13 | |
She was only 21. | 0:41:13 | 0:41:14 | |
But they're really, really, really, really, really, really old-school, | 0:41:24 | 0:41:28 | |
like, traditional, and they buried her the next day in a wooden box, | 0:41:28 | 0:41:32 | |
didn't even have a proper ceremony or whatever. | 0:41:32 | 0:41:35 | |
Because obviously they can't say she's died because she's had | 0:41:35 | 0:41:39 | |
a backstreet abortion. So, from that, everything's had to | 0:41:39 | 0:41:42 | |
stay hidden. | 0:41:42 | 0:41:44 | |
It's just the shame, Terrence calls it. | 0:41:44 | 0:41:47 | |
But I wouldn't call it shame. | 0:41:47 | 0:41:49 | |
LEAH: Do you know what? I would love to get involved in something | 0:42:27 | 0:42:30 | |
to get help for women over here. | 0:42:30 | 0:42:31 | |
-PAIGE: -I just feel liberated and I can't believe how many people | 0:42:34 | 0:42:39 | |
want to hear these stories. | 0:42:39 | 0:42:41 | |
-TANAYA: -I really want to tell my nieces and nephews, | 0:42:43 | 0:42:47 | |
because if they ever got into that situation, they would have someone. | 0:42:47 | 0:42:52 | |
You know, so that they don't feel alone. | 0:42:52 | 0:42:54 |