Question about abortion, adoption and healthcare

First off, I want to say that I have never been pregnant and I do not know someone who has publicly discussed choosing to give a child up for adoption.

I'm in a huge debate with a close friend about abortion and his retort is that "adoption is always an option." Aside from the fact that I know he doesn't understand the physical, emotional, mental or monetary costs of being pregnant, I don't know if adoption is always an option, especially when someone tries to make that decision during an early unplanned pregnancy.

My question is about how to set the process in motion. I assume that a person would have to talk to their medical provider about being matched with an adoption service. What if a person doesn't have access to medical care? I consider myself to be fairly affluent, but since most terminations are sought by the poor and low-income, I assume that they don't have the same access to or knowledge about the internet and how to find valuable information.

So, is adoption always an option? Are there people who can't access the information about how to reach that service? And what about the medical costs? If one doesn't have health care, who pays for the birth? Will adoption services pay for the cost of giving birth and other medical costs associated with pregnancy?

I'll be happy to discuss it with you later if you want to PM me, but I'm headed to bed right now.

Thanks

abortion procedure. And if the child isn't perfect, but has any kind of problem, adoption isn't an option.

And then there are women who just can't carry to term, for many reasons. Plus prenatal care and delivery are very expensive, unless, again, you're having that perfect (usually white) baby and find a well-off couple who will pay for all of it.

And if 'adoption is always an option', why are there so many children in foster care and in orphanages?

this always gets me ..

"why are there so many children in foster care and in orphanages?" - If the anti choice people are so concerned with the lives of these children, what are they doing in the community to help the kids who don't have a stable home?

than not born at all. That to be alive is all that matters.

I completely disagree with him and I'm trying to get the most information in order to competently counter him. He says it better to be alive in foster care than not at all and that knowing a child will cannot be cared for is not enough to terminate the pregnancy.

I believe that foster care is not the best option (especially considering the state of today's child welfare services) and that it is irresponsible to bring a child into that situation. Then again, I can't make a decision for other people, but I don't want to limit their access to choice.

I don't think anybody is incapable of thinking to go to a church or social worker and asking about adoption.

The problem is married women in abusive relationships. Hoping and saving and planning to get out, and then bammo. Or a middle-aged woman who just cannot do it again, which I totally relate to, but would never give up my child for adoption. Someone who was raped or molested and doesn't want to tell. Maybe a woman in her last year of law school or first year on the job. Just doesn't want to deal with the questions. All kinds of reasons adoption is unreasonable for some women.

just because the saying is "to have a bun in the oven" doesn't mean that pregnancy is like cooking a turkey. You don't just walk away from it while it's happening...or afterward. It has an impact on a woman's whole life, one that only she will know.

I don't think they get it. And they're the first to denigrate you if you're single and pregnant too, so it's not as if they don't understand what that's all about.

to bring another life into this world. Educations cut short, careers ended, women abandoned and alone, forced to raise a child that they cannot care for. Who is to say that I should sacrifice my life to bring forth another, even if I can't provide for it.

Men get to enjoy all the pleasures of sex without the responsibility of what comes after. If they choose to walk away, they can. This isn't about abortion, it's about control over women and gender equality.

How about a married woman whose husband had a vasectomy? True, she had sex with another man since is pregnant, but does not want to have her marriage end nastily with her being pregnant and losing custody of her other child since she is "obviously" a slut.

How about a young woman who knows she is not able or ready to deal with the stresses of parenthood and will have to deal with the aftermath of "why did you, how COULD you, give up your child for adoption"?

Just tossing out a couple other situations in which adoption may not be a workable option.

There are lots of traumatic adoption stories, from multiple perspectives of all involved.

It is NOT some easy, flip, option choice.

Besides, what if the woman simply does not want to be pregnant and forced to give birth with all it's traumas?

You cannot force pregnancy & birth on a woman who is unwilling (or unable).

You can look in the phone book and find lawyers specializing in adoption. Most if not all will have a list of waiting prospective parents. I went through one of these. They had packets made up with brief biographies and sometimes photos of the people, their homes, a sketch of what their lives were like and other children they might have. We chose an older couple with no other children, since they were a) good people and b) not likely to get another chance.

The adopting couple paid for my medical costs (the ones not covered by insurance anyway- if I had been uninsured they'd have been responsible for all of them) and 1/2 our living expenses for the four-month time period after we accepted them as adoptive parents and the paperwork was signed.

I don't know how it's done for agencies and "closed" adoptions. I assume it's more or less the same for expenses but without the personal contact with either the adopting parents or the child.

Edit to add: and no, it's not always an option. For one thing, two signatures are required, so if the baby's father says no, you're screwed and so are the people whose hopes just got blown. For another, it's physically and mentally hell on the woman (trust me on this one). It's nine very physically damaging months out of your life with zero to show for it at the end, and it's rough on you mentally on a LOT of levels. And that's the short version-if I took the time to tell you how awful it really is it would take up dozens of posts and still not properly describe it.

Given the choice- and I have done both- I'd vote abortion every time as safer, less damaging and less dehumanizing. Other people's MMV.