Welcome to Sweden

I just came across this must-read article about reproductive culture in Sweden: Welcome to Sweden: Notes on birthday condoms, home abortions, and hysterical Americans.

Author and Wisconsin midwife Ingrid Andersson writes about Sweden's approach to sex, parenting, education, and family life--a stark contrast to America's oversexed prudishness, violence, and hysterical opposition to reproductive choices.

Her son's first day at public school was a welcome contrast from their American schooling experiences:

My son’s teacher said he did not need to bring anything apart from his curious, well-rested, breakfasted self. School will supply all his school needs, including an iPad and hot meals made from scratch. His first lunch —eaten over an hour at a round wooden table, sitting on a real wooden chair, in an actual dining room filled with windows and art—is baked salmon in rich cream sauce, dilled potatoes, steamed broccoli, salad with homemade dressing, bread, butter, and organic milk, served in all-you-can-eat buffet style. The kitchen uses 30 percent organic ingredients, locally produced when possible. My seventh grader is disoriented but delighted by trusting adults and an open campus with unlocked doors. (Every morning since Sandy Hook, my son’s school in America was all locked up by the time the kids were reciting the Pledge of Allegiance.)

Reproductive information, birth control, and abortion are discussed openly and frankly and are accessible to anyone:

Any Swedish teen or adult can walk into one of the common health centers and talk confidentially with a counselor or midwife about any personal or social issue or need, including pregnancy. She or he probably will already have been introduced to a youth health center on a school class field trip at age twelve or thirteen.

Youth and young adult health centers in Sweden offer a limitless supply of free condoms, free testing and treatment for chlamydia and other diseases, and free emergency contraception. Pregnant minors are encouraged but not required to involve a parent. Counselors and/or psychiatrists meet with girls and are available to all women. Abortion is free or low-cost and available on-demand up to eighteen weeks of pregnancy. A dating ultrasound is required, and if the pregnancy is earlier than three months, girls and women can choose between vacuum extraction or pill-induced abortion and to complete the abortion at home.

Abortions are performed up to twenty-two weeks of pregnancy, but after eighteen weeks there must be a medical indication and a psychiatrist is involved. All girls and women are encouraged to include support persons. Midwives, who are prescribing professionals associated with health and wellness, support all girls and women through normal pregnancy and birth, as well as contraception and abortion choices.

Records from ancient times to the present day indicate that women tend to prefer coping with unwanted pregnancy privately and using measures within their control, or within a circle of trusted family or friends. Preference for autonomy and privacy is evidenced even when clinic-mediated options are accessible. Thanks in part to research at Sweden’s Karolinska Institutet, home abortion is now predictably safe and effective. For women from Stockholm to Nairobi, it has become a first-choice abortion method.

America stands as an exception. For American women, politically driven drug restrictions, costs, and lack of funding for education and support make obstacles to home abortion formidable....

“Publicly protesting abortion or anything related would be seen as hysterical in Sweden, not even the Christian party would do that!” says Ella, a twenty-eight-year-old hospital gynecology nurse who plans to continue studies to become a midwife.

To read the rest of the article, click here:

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Currently reading

Sometimes I come across a topic I want to know more about and start reading everything I can get my hands on. One recent interest was abortion providers. I wanted to learn why someone would choose this line of work given the violence and persecution they face. I first read Suzanne P. Poppema's book Why I Am an Abortion Doctor, followed by Susan Wicklund's book This Common Secret: My Journey As an Abortion Doctor. The writing in both books was so-so, but the stories were gripping. During my searching I also read a lecture by Dr. Garson Romalis, also titled Why I am an Abortion Doctor. I just finished the book Dispatches from the Abortion Wars: The Costs of Fanaticism to Doctors, Patients, and the Rest of Us by Carol Joffe and am still wanting to read more.

I have to say that the more I read about abortion debates in North America, the more incensed I become at the whole mess. In the past, I'd never strongly identified with either of the two ideological camps. I had understood abortion as a morally complex issue laden with shades of gray. It wasn't something I would have chosen for an unintended pregnancy after consensual sex (I've never been in that situation, so it's easier said than done), but definitely something I would have considered for other situations--rape, incest, threats to my health, etc. I've  never felt that abortion should be illegal or inaccessible. There are so many reasons, so many situations, that bring women to that decision and I find it incredibly arrogant that some people want to take away that option across the board. Abortion won't go away simply by being illegal or inaccessible.

As I've been reading more, I find my feelings intensifying. I dislike how both pro-life and pro-choice rhetoric victimizes women: Pro-life groups portray women as victims of their abortions ("abortions hurt women"); pro-choice groups portray women as victims of their pregnancies and of the lack of access to abortion. Is there a way to talk about abortion without casting women as victims?

The hypocrisy of many pro-life arguments, which glorify motherhood (by wishing all women to become mothers, however unwilling) yet do nothing to actually support mothers or babies, incenses me. I'd much rather see that energy focused towards helping women avoid unwanted pregnancies; securing universal health care, paid maternity/paternity leave, affordable quality childcare, and flexible work arrangements; and ensuring that all babies are wanted and that women can become mothers willingly and joyfully. That is pro-life. Not the hateful rhetoric that values an embryo more than the woman whose body carries it.

Overall, I find the North American obsession with abortion puzzling and troubling. It distracts people from more pressing issues. It's focused on symptoms, not on underlying problems. It's like nit-picking over whether or not a bandaid is the right shape while the patient is hemorrhaging to death.

Iknow that discussing abortion will bring out the crazies, but I had to get this out. I cherish my children and my babies. I love being pregnant and giving birth. I also want abortion to be safe, legal, accessible, and, ideally, rare*--not because I don't value life, but because I value it so highly.

[Deep breath]

I remember reading a book during my graduate student years by a sociologist (or maybe anthropologist?) who spent time with both pro-choice and pro-life groups and explained the worldviews and values of both camps. I can't remember the title but it was really interesting. Any more recommend readings on this topic? 

Note to commenters: Keep it civil and on-topic otherwise I will employ the Almighty Delete Button. 

* Dr. Wicklund mentioned that, ironically, one goal of abortion providers is to work themselves out of their job by helping women avoid unwanted/unplanned pregnancies in the first place. But the challenges are immense: lack of access to health care and contraception, partner sabotage of birth control (including threats of violence for using birth control), our hyper-sexualized yet hyper-prudish culture, etc.

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