I am voting Yes on Proposal 3 because I am unwilling to insert myself into another unknown woman’s heartbreaking choices.
Decisions about reproductive care are a woman’s to make with her family and her doctor.
When a woman becomes pregnant, who am I to demand that she carry to full term, a pregnancy that was forced upon her, or that she carries to full term, a pregnancy which will certainly end in still-birth?
Who am I to demand that she carry to full term, a pregnancy which will result in her death?
Who am I to demand that she carry to full term a pregnancy which will result with birth defects so severe that life will only be sustained by machines?
How am I to judge the depths of despair facing this woman? Only if the woman is me.
After five years of infertility, I was pregnant with my first child. No one inserted themselves into my decision to utilize a fertility drug, and no one prevented me from having an amniocentesis.
I was lucky that my child was born without complications. I was not faced with the kinds of heartbreaking choices many women face.
My experience is not universal; there but for the grace of God, went I.
Mere support for Proposal 3 is not action; voting is.
Please vote yes with me on Proposal 3 on November 8.
Cheryl McNeil
Independence Township