My Health, My Bodily Autonomy, My Boundaries: Why I’m Fundraising for TEACH as a Disabled Reproductive Health Lawyer
As a reproductive health lawyer, I’m proud to be fundraising for TEACH, an organization fighting toward a future in which abortion is fully integrated into family medicine — not siloed, stigmatized, or treated as an exception — in California and nationwide. My interest in abortion isn’t just professional: it’s deeply personal.
It took me three decades to access a diagnosis for my genetic condition, Ehlers Danlos Syndrome (EDS). By that point, I was very sick: unmediated chronic pain, chronic fatigue, chronic nausea, chronic dizziness, chronic everything. Flooded with new information about the condition’s lifelong complications (including pregnancy risks) and comorbidities, I was trying to understand what this diagnosis meant for my body, my future, and my capacity to parent. As much as I wanted to be a mother, I knew that if I became pregnant, choosing abortion would be the most loving, responsible, and self-honoring decision I could make, both for myself and for any potential child.
Today, after several years of rigorous, often weekly specialty care, my health has improved and I am less afraid of pregnancy and parenthood. More research is emerging on treatments for EDS’s many health complications. I hope to one day become pregnant and work closely with my medical team, including my family medicine physician, to mitigate pregnancy risks. But there’s still a real possibility that I may need to end a pregnancy for my health and safety. Abortion access remains essential to my health, my bodily autonomy, and my boundaries, yesterday, today, and in whatever future lies ahead.
Abortion is a moral good, a public health imperative, and an act of love. It is health care, an act of bodily autonomy, safety, and sometimes, also survival. Everyone capable of pregnancy must have access to this care, without barriers and without stigma.
That’s why I’m so proud to serve on the Advisory Board for TEACH. There is no equitable health care access without abortion access—and abortion access requires meeting people where they are. TEACH’s work is critical because most people in the U.S. receive care from family physicians, especially in underserved communities. By training and supporting primary care clinicians to provide abortion rooted in reproductive justice values, TEACH helps build a more equitable, integrated, and compassionate health care system for all.
Please join me in supporting TEACH’s work to make abortion accessible, integrated, and stigma-free for everyone who needs it. I'm committed to raising at least $500 by December 31. Please join me.
