Written by Anna Reed, JD candidate at Georgetown University Law Center and current intern at SRHM. Anna is one of its executive producers Self-manageda new podcast dedicated to destigmatizing and demystifying the practice of self-administered abortion.
The hem of my pants is coming undoneI remark, as I pull a fistful of hangers aside to make room for my laptop and notes inside my closet. It must be quiet. As I twirl my laptop charger under the crack of the door, the irony is not lost on me that the first podcast episode of Self Managed: An Abortion Story in Eight Parts it will be recorded inside a closet. I look up at the hangers and pause for a moment before calling. There is no going backthink. And with the click of a mouse our project began.
It is no longer news that you can manage abortion at home with pills. But that wasn’t true in September. That’s when Antonia Piccone – a dear friend from a college clown class – and I first talked about self-administered abortion. It was raining and I was furious. “I’m a sex teacher, for Christmas! How did I not know you could do this at home?” I jumped on my phone on the way home from school. Doula Antonia was also lost. We both thought we were well informed about sexual and reproductive health. We did sex therapy classes for adults. We appear in community teachings about birthrightness and reproductive autonomy. We listen to the radio, we watch the news. Our moms are big and strong and fiery. We were taught about this thing. But in the fall of 2019, nearly twenty years after people in Brazil realized you could induce abortions with misoprostol and French scientists discovered RU486, the idea of a safe self-administered abortion was news to Anto and me.
“That information has been withheld from us,” Susan Yanow says quietly as the interview draws to a close. Her words seem to echo in my headphones. He’s right. Even I, a child privileged to attend a French public school where contraception and abortion are mandatory components of the national Biology curriculum, and who had spent years of my life organizing for reproductive justice, was never told that self-management was an option. Antonia and I want to change that and the podcast was our method of choice.
Self-managed is entirely dedicated to demystifying and destigmatizing self-administered abortion (SMA). Each episode features a different narrator sharing their SMA experience. They include two long-time activists focused on making SMA information safe and accessible, a person sharing their personal experience with self-management, a reproductive justice advocate working to decriminalize the practice of SMA, a nurse-midwife on the front lines of COVID-19, a “digital abortion” providing online support, and a full-spectrum pregnancy co-op. The episodes are free to listen and are currently available on our website, smapodcast.orgwhere they are also transcribed and translated into Spanish.
This series is our contribution to a larger movement to demedicalize and democratize reproductive health. COVID-19 has spurred innovation in the already growing field of self-help technologies in sexual and reproductive health. These technologies are revolutionary. But if they deny us the community and the stories we need to understand them, they will never reach their full potential.
SRHM is actively amplifying the murmurs of a global revolution towards self-help and DIY reissue, both in the context of COVID and beyond. The organization will soon announce its collaboration with WHO and the Children Investment Foundation Fund (CIF) on a special issue of the journal on self-care interventions and SRHR of at-risk and underserved communities. This summer, I am joining the SRHM community as a legal clerk and intern. It’s exciting to take this next step toward a future where providers trust their patients to decide what’s right for them, where more options than ever are on the table, and where we can bring abortion—boldly and fearlessly—out of the closet once and for all.
Please note that blog posts are not peer-reviewed and do not necessarily reflect the views of SRHM as an organization.
