Betty Remembers Before Roe vs. Wade

In the fifties long before Roe vs. Wade, abortions were illegal but available if you could raise the money. I had to make difficult phone calls using code names until I finally found a person who could help. With five one hundred dollar bills in my purse, half of it mine and the other half from my boyfriend, I met my contact at the Stage Delicatessen on Sixth Avenue. Fay was a well-dressed attractive married woman in her forties. She explained how their operation had to move around like a floating crap game to keep the cops off their trail. That night, we drove to Jersey City. My heart was frozen with fear and barely beating as we walked up three flights of tenement stairs. I entered a kitchen with a white metal table sitting in the middle of an ugly little room with worn linoleum on the floor and a bare light bulb glaring overhead

There were several women present, and I was introduced to a large woman named Mary who was the doctor. When Fay said a few cross words to her about drinking, she said she'd only had one beer to steady her hand. Dr. Mary turned to me with the assurance that she was "a good doctor" and I didn't have to worry. Not only did I want to believe her, I had to. At that moment, my life was in her hands whether they were steady or shaking. One woman present just had an abortion, and she was still alive, so I hung onto that fact as I lay down on the porcelain table while the doctor aimed a gooseneck lamp between my legs.

During the procedure, Fay held my hand and gave me a washcloth to bite on while my cervix was opened without any anesthesia. I was told not to move so the metal instrument wouldn't puncture my uterus. The most dreadful pain of my young life consumed me. The cramps were so intense that my body broke out into a cold, clammy sweat. But I never moved, or cried out. After resting for an hour, we walked back down the tenement stairs to the car and drove home.

At the time, I was sharing a large apartment with three other women on West 55th Street. A housemate's mother was visiting, and since I'd told everyone I was in bed with a cold, her mom kept coming into my room to cover my chest with warm Vic's Vaporub. Meanwhile I'm bleeding to death from an illegal kitchen table abortion.

The second day, still bleeding and scared out of my mind, I called one of my roommates doctor who said he'd lose his license if he treated me. His only advice was to go to the emergency room of any hospital, tell them what had happened, and be prepared to get grilled by the police. No thanks! I'd rather go ahead and die. On the fourth day the bleeding finally began to slow down.

After an experience like that, you'd think I would have asked myself, "What is this thing called love?" But I didn't. I just fell into it again, and again, and it was always accidental - similar to stepping into dog shit while walking the sidewalks of New York City. Not only did I fall in love again but I also got pregnant two more times which convinced me that I was mentally deficient. I remained a victim of romantic love throughout my twenties.

The Romantic Love Wars: One day in my studio, the nude I was drawing turned into an X ray of my body. Scars from the abortions didn't show on the surface, so I drew a sanitary napkin leaking blood to represent these emotional wounds. The world knew all about the horrors men suffered in war to defend their country's ideals of freedom. But I couldn't talk about the horrors I'd experienced to defend my right to reproductive freedom. Instead of feeling like a hero, I was made to feel like a criminal. Going back over that first abortion, I silently awarded myself a purple heart.

The last abortion was legal and far more humane. It took place in Switzerland in a doctor's office with nitrous oxide. At the time I was living in Germany with Victor. One night I was spotting blood and thought I was getting my period. But I was ovulating instead. We made love without my diaphragm in place. Although I claimed I wanted to get married and have the baby, I probably unconsciously picked him knowing he'd never go through with it. I was right. He accused me of entrapment with my "so-called accidental pregnancy" and said we could discuss marriage after I had an abortion. Swiss law required seeing a psychiatrist and signing a paper that said I'd commit suicide if the pregnancy wasn't terminated. Actually, I was far closer to committing homicide. In retrospect, that abortion was worth an oak leaf cluster.

Next I put in the surgical scar from my broken ankle. The accident took place at a cocktail party, not respectably on some ski slope. Right after returning from Paris, I was 28, flat broke and already pressuring my next lover Dr. Juan to get married. But all I got that year was crutches and an engagement ring. "Ah ha," I thought, "I couldn't stand on my own two feet." When my husband left me, bursitis crippled my left arm because I'd lost "my other half." According to Wilhelm Reich, the history of my body was the outward expression of different inner states, not just mysterious accidents. Reich felt the conflict between sexuality and morality was manifested in the body. He called it "character armoring."

As much as I respected Reich, I'd have to be living in a different society than the one I found myself in, or be some kind of martyred saint not to armor myself against The Romantic Love Wars. Without benefits or social recognition, I was a veteran in the battle between the sexes, bitter and scarred from fighting on the front lines of the bedroom, negotiating boundaries in relationships, signing peace treaties, and once again declaring war over broken agreements. The enemy was the man I was supposed to love. No surprise I was conflicted about sex, at war with my body, filled with self-hatred and doomed to fail as I loved a myth instead of learning to love myself.

Although I thought the myth of the prince was put to rest in 1969, if I'd been able to look into a crystal ball that told my future, I would have written, The Myth of the Prince Never Dies. The Prince simply changed forms and returned in the guise of a woman, an ideal, a religious devotion, a political movement or a business venture - the search for some one or some thing that would complete my life and provide me with a sense of security was endless.

Excerpt from Betty's Sexual Memoir © 2008 Betty Dodson