Why This State Representative Revealed Her Sexual Assault While Testifying on an Abortion Bill - Cosmopolitan.com

"Telling my story was incredibly difficult. I tense up and shiver whenever I talk about this. But for someone for whom the trauma is so fresh, having to turn around and prove that she is eligible for an exemption to a health insurance company – that's abuse. Our state legislature should not be in the position to do harm. This harms people. This bill will harm people." - more at Cosmopolitan.com

5 Women Explain Why They Became Abortion Providers - Cosmopolitan.com

"It's absolutely harder to provide abortions in Ohio than it was in New York. There are fewer providers in Ohio, so the providers that are here are singled out a little more than they are singled out in New York, where there are more numbers. I have my name on multiple websites saying things that are not necessarily true. I get letters at my house from anti-choice folks, and no other doctors suffer this sort of harassment for the surgeries they perform." more at Cosmopolitan.com

Talking Points Memo - "Is 'Reversing' An Abortion Really A Good Idea?"

His name is Gabriel, and according to the press conferences, he’s not supposed to be here. His mother, Andrea Minichini, said she was at a clinic and told the provider she wanted an abortion, but changed her mind as she held the first dose of the medication abortion regime in her hand. Allegedly feeling pressured by staff, she took the pill anyway, then took herself to a hospital where she was told she would need to take the rest of the protocol or put the fetus at risk of deformities. Rather than follow their advice, she Googled until she found a website with a number to call, and after that call received the name of a doctor who would “reverse” her abortion. -- Read more at Talking Points Memo

Cosmo - "What It's Like to Be an Activist When Your State Is Hostile to Reproductive Rights"

Since 2011, reproductive rights activists from red states around the country have met up in Norman, Oklahoma, for the Take Root conference. There, they strategize about the movement's approach not only to abortion access but also to poverty, civil rights, marriage equality, and more. "Abortion services and other forms of reproductive health care are not isolated from social factors and histories that influence the access and discussion surrounding them," the organization explains on its website. At this year's conference, held February 20 and 21, attendance topped at over 550 advocates, allies, and organizers.

What is it like for activists trying to change a culture so hostile to the causes they care about? Cosmopolitian.com asked four women just that question. -- Read more at Cosmo.

Most Second-Trimester Abortions Could Soon Be Illegal in Kansas - Cosmopolitan.com

"Just by virtue of having multiple clinics and not requiring a mandated 72-hour wait like the one recently put into effect in Missouri, Kansas has by default become one of the 'easier' states to get an abortion — at least, when compared to most of its next-door neighbors. It is no wonder that lawmakers and activists have picked that state as their newest target for testing out a new piece of legislation that would essentially make it illegal to provide an abortion after the first trimester of pregnancy."
Read more at Cosmopolitan.com

"Joining the Other Side: My Two Days As An Anti-Abortion Activist at the March for Life"

“I should be able to protest Planned Parenthood for at least an hour, but if I go to the ‘die-in’ at the White House, there is no way I will make the legal symposium on overturning Roe v. Wade.” 

 For the last two years of reporting on the activities on abortion opponents, at some point during an interview the subject would inevitably ask me if I had ever attended the March for Life in Washington, DC. Part memorial, part celebration, the march has become an annual rite of passage for those who devote their energy, money and time to ending legal, safe abortion access in the US. What started in 1974 as a protest of the Supreme Court decision acknowledging a right to an abortion that no state could prohibit has evolved in the following four decades. Now it is a multi-day event that combines reunion, grassroots political organisation and a generational torch passing as the original pool of pro-life activists train those born after Roe and who will inherit the mission of bringing abortion to an end.

 Repeatedly, I was told that the best way to really understand what motivates the anti-abortion movement would be to join them at the March for Life. This year, I took them up on it. For 48 hours straight, I was going to attend rallies and seminars, even an abortion clinic protest. For two days, I would see up close what it was truly like to be an anti-abortion activist.

(read the rest at Contributoria....)

New at Cosmo - "In an Alarming Move, Activists Are Trying to Shut Down a Clinic Over Birth Control"

"It started with a Facebook page and an online petition. Next came the meetings, prayers, phone calls to the Chamber of Commerce, and a protest at the clinic's grand opening. Now neighbors are coming home to door hangers warning them about a new provider 'preying upon your community,' and abortion opponents have maintained a constant presence at the clinic's door.

All of this to stop a clinic that doesn't even offer abortions."

 Read the rest here, in my first article for Cosmopolitan Magazine...