The Weight of Shame

At the Women’s March in January 2017

Coming out can be messy. There are of plenty of factors eager to complicate the already indefinite search for one's sexuality or sense of self. In my own experience, I have found trauma to be one of those factors that has clouded any sense of security I have held with my identity.

I am currently in my first year at Smith College and I identify as a queer woman. I came out to most of my friends sometime between my sophomore and junior year of high school, and came out to my parents, as well as became more public and open about my identity at the end of my junior year. Concurrently, while trying to make sense of how I felt and who I was, I was also aiming to navigate the impact that trauma had on my sexuality. In January of 2017, a week after I had participated in the Women's March on Washington, I visited some good friends on a college campus, where I found myself in the basement of a frat house being raped by a complete and utter stranger. My rape felt (and still feels) painfully like each story and statistic I had been perpetually warned about, “naive girl gets drunk at frat and is' taken advantage of.’” The words "no" and "stop" sat in my mouth the entire time, as I choked on my tears, and physical pain gutted me with no warning. It was raw and unsparing; and the thought of it still stings. The immediate period of time following my rape was nauseating and confusing; I felt as if I was constantly trying to invalidate each passing emotion, and it was exhausting.

The author’s favorite spot on Smith’s campus

I now attend a women’s college in one of the most queer cities in the country, Northampton, Massachusetts. My choice to attend this school was influenced by the fact that I was assaulted, and living here feels safe and liberating in ways I could have never imagined. Though, it doesn’t mean that I didn’t carry my trauma with me to college, and still struggle to navigate when friends leave campus and ask me to go to frat parties with them. Or that attending a women's college means that we don’t have our own issues of rape culture on campus, because we do. The remnants of my rape are scattered everywhere, no matter if I go to the queerest college in the country or back to the campus that stole from me.

“I have learned to greet shame with honesty, and allow it to stay as long as it needs and to interrogate the place that it is has come from.”

Shame is a heavy thing; it is insidious and seeks to pull us away from our core, from the feelings we know to be true. I have learned to greet shame with honesty, and allow it to stay as long as it needs and to interrogate the place that it is has come from. I have found this to be the only way to become unrestrained from the notion of being "allowed" to feel a certain way, or take up a certain space. This unbinding has lead me to a newfound lightness, one of freedom and clarity. This isn’t to say that letting go of these feelings that have held me hostage is easy, because it hasn’t been. It has taken many angry journal entries, poems, therapy sessions, and time to recognize these realities. I still have hard days. Still mourn the steady trust for people I used to carry. Still mourn the girl I was that January day, unscathed from the trespassing that was yet to come. Still mourn my belief of a world in which women’s bodies are their own. Though, today I sit easier in my own skin, knowing there is a reckoning occurring in the midst of our pain, a world of women eager to rise.

Eliza is a Psychology and Education major at Smith College in Northampton, Massachusetts. On any given day, Eliza can be found reading poems, jamming to SZA, or FaceTiming her twin brother. Follow her on Instagram @emankin.

Abortion is healthcare, and college students need it too

“What would make me, a 21 year-old student, want to have an arrest on my permanent record? The even bigger fear of not having reproductive choice for the rest of my life. ”

I was one of seventy people to get arrested for protesting Brett Kavanaugh’s confirmation hearing on September 4th. What would make me, a 21 year-old student, want to have an arrest on my permanent record? The even bigger fear of not having reproductive choice for the rest of my life.

I am concerned that Congress will not vote the right way, even given Kavanaugh’s track record with regressive rulings in the past. Despite the hard work of activists and Senate Democrats, if we don’t get any Republicans to vote against him, Kavanaugh may yet be confirmed. Protecting reproductive freedom cannot rest on Congress’s unreliable shoulders anymore. This is why universities in the District, and across the country, must do their part and provide medication abortion in their health centers.

Washington, D.C. boasts 20 colleges within its borders. In 2016, 43 percent of all people in the District were students. With five crisis pregnancy centers and even fewer clinics that provide abortion, universities in the District should ensure students have access to the health care they need by offering medication abortion in their health centers and covering abortion with student health insurance.

The responsibilities college students are juggling are already tremendous without having to worry about something like an unintended pregnancy. For those that seek an abortion, the cost, time, and emotional toll can be daunting. Making the abortion pill* (used for medical abortions) accessible on D.C. college campuses would alleviate many, if not all, of these challenges.

Just how necessary is access to safe abortion for college students? College aged-women were the highest age demographic obtaining abortions in 2014 (the most recent year for which data is available). Women aged 20–24 accounted for the largest proportion of abortions, 34 percent, and had the highest abortion rate, 28 per 1,000 women in this age-group, among all age-groups studied.

Nearly one-third of all aborted pregnancies are terminated by using the abortion pill. Simply put, medication abortion is an incredibly common, safe procedure. Using this medication to induce abortion does not need to be done in a medical office. It is safe enough for use in any place where you feel comfortable, including at home. The pill is so safe that complications from a medical abortion are incredibly rare, with less than one percent of users experiencing abnormal side-effects. Indeed, Iit is safer to have a medically induced abortion than it is to actually give birth.

But the abortion pill can be expensive. Finding a medical provider that not only takes your insurance but is also within a reasonable traveling distance can be a struggle. And for college students, these are barriers that can feel insurmountable.

What does this look like in the life of a student? When Katelyn, in college at the University of California, Berkeley, found out that she was seven weeks pregnant--despite using safe sex methods--she knew abortion was the right choice for her. But despite being one of over 500 students who are estimated to obtain an abortion each month in California, she she soon discovered how difficult actually accessing an abortion would be.

Knowing her campus health center could not offer her the pills necessary to induce, she went to the emergency room and was referred to a Planned Parenthood facility, only to discover that her university insurance would not cover the procedure. By the time she was able to secure coverage by the state, too much time had passed for Katelyn to have a medication abortion. She was ultimately able to terminate her pregnancy by paying out of pocket, but it cost her over $200 dollars more than it would have if she hadn’t been delayed. For obtaining a medication abortion without incurring high costs, time is of the essence.

California is one of the most pro-choice states in the country, and still failed this college student. But California lawmakers are hoping to do something unique: require health centers on their college campuses to provide access to medication abortion pills for students.

This bill would set a huge precedent. Between 2008 and 2014, there was a seven percent decrease nationwide in the number of abortion clinics. Five states currently have only one clinic. Finding an off-campus facility is not always feasible for a busy student, both in terms of the amount of travel time it would take to reach one and the amount of money it would cost to get there.

“Abortion is an incredibly safe and incredibly common procedure, with nearly one in four women and femmes having an abortion in their lifetime. Requiring them to jump through burdensome hoops to obtain this form of healthcare further enforces the false belief that abortion isn’t normal and that people aren’t having them.”

Additionally, it’s imperative that universities are contracting with health insurance providers that cover abortion. Generally, colleges buy these plans from companies and then sell the plans to their student bodies as a part of their tuition. The Affordable Care Act requires these plans to cover certain essential health benefits such as emergency care and hospitalization, mental health and substance abuse services, prescription drugs, preventative services, labs, disease management, and contraceptives for free. With insurance that covers these necessities, it is not unreasonable to also cover the costs of medication abortion under school plans

On-campus abortion access would likely lead to a decrease in the cost of the procedure, since students usually have the option to use their campus insurance or their own insurance in their health centers. This can drastically reduce the cost of the pills, which can range anywhere from $300-$800.

Perhaps most importantly, supplying the medication necessary for a medical abortion on college campuses could drastically reduce the stigma around abortion. Abortion is an incredibly safe and incredibly common procedure, with nearly one in four women and femmes having an abortion in their lifetime. Requiring them to jump through burdensome hoops to obtain this form of healthcare further enforces the false belief that abortion isn’t normal and that people aren’t having them.

Supplying this medication on college campuses provides access to abortion for students who want to exercise their right to have one. It’s time for D.C. campuses to hop on board.

Resources:

Check out Georgetown University’s amazing Hoyas for Choice here, GW’s Voices for Choices here, and American University’s Students to End Abortion Stigma here.

For more info about abortion and abortion rates in the United States, check out Guttmacher.

To donate to local D.C. people struggling to afford abortion costs, donate to the D.C. Abortion Fund.

To find an abortion provider, call the National Abortion Federation at 1-877-257-0012.

To learn more about crisis pregnancy centers in the DMV area, check out Expose Fake Clinics and ReproAction’s activist toolkit.

To learn more about self-managed abortion care, check out ReproAction.

Steph is a Women's Studies major at American University in D.C., a city she loves. Steph can be found reading next to her cat Goose, writing about feminism and Judaism, or protesting around the city for basic human rights. Follow her on Twitter at @stephreflects, Instagram @stephrose1620, or check out her website at stephblack.blog.