:: The S.I.C.L.E. Cell ::

:: Tuesday, November 30, 2004 ::

I got an email today... the mom with cancer died this morning. A relative was holding her hand and reading to her from Psalms. Her children, including the one she refused to kill and gave her very life for, do not understand.

I'm really not ok with this.
I wanted the happy ending.
I wanted it on my terms.
I wanted it now.
Right now.
N-O-W.

Once again, I didn't get what I wanted.
I'd throw a tantrum if it would help.
But it wouldn't, so instead I slump in my chair and cry.

No matter what...
no matter what
Mother made the right choice.
The beauty and honor of it bring me to my knees.

A healthy child will live and love and laugh
because Mother loved
in truth and selflessness.
Mother loved
like a lion
a lion gone
to be with the Lamb.

This Christmas please remember the grieving children of a mother who was too good for this world.

(Click on "index".)

:: ashli 4:08 PM # ::
...

It's Patte time!

Sidewalk Talk:

"Tuesday, 23 November, 2004
(Late Abortion Day)

*"Johan" arrived at 8:15 a.m. Her rounded belly rose out from below her t-shirt, revealing a belly ring. She told me that she was seventeen weeks pregnant with her very first child and didn't want to have "it". I explained to Johan tha tshe would be having her baby. Abortion at seventeen weeks is childbirth. "You will push your little child's body out, Johan. You will see her face, feel her body slither out of yours." She assured me: "No, I won't see, because htey will take the baby away. I won't have to look." Johan went on to say, "I've already prayed about this." Sje reasoned, "This baby will go right to God. Everything will be fine. I amy not go to heaven, but my baby will." When I told Johan that she needed to fear God more than her circumstances she smiled and said, "I'm not afraid of God." I invited Johan into the mobile unit to have a free ultrasound. She refused saying, "Oh, no. I don't want to see it." When I tried to show Johan the photo of aborted infant Little Mary, Johan quickly looked away. "No, don't show me that." As she walked into the abortion clinic Johan said, "Just pray for me now. You do that."

*"Precious" came walking by with her children: Nicodemus (4) and Alana (3). I introduced myself and discovered that although Precious was not heading into the abortion clinic, she was considering abortion. I invited Precious to have a free ultrasound while we watched her two sweet kids outside. Mark was able to get a very good picture of the infant because Precious is about thirty-four weeks pregnant.

*When "Maria" told her husband that she was eight weeks pregnant he quickly instructed her to "get rid of it". With five children back in Mexico (that Maria has been sending $300/month to) she couldn't imagine having another one. We were praying hard for Maria to soften to the reality of her child. I reached out to her saying in Spanish: "God forbids the shedding of innocent blood," and "Abortion is a mortal sin." I also told her, "Your child is a gift from God." Maria nodded and replied "Si." Marilsa from A Chosen Child adoption Agency spoke with Maria on my cell phone. Maria was insistent: "No adoption." After several more minutes of serious counseling, admonition and pledges to help her, Maria kissed me! She looked into my eyes and said, "Gracias." Maria realized that killing her baby was the wrong choice! We are helping to reunite her with her children in Mexico and we are providing her with medical care.

Pray for the women we met today who are laboring and delivering their aborted babies at Orlando Women's Center as you read this."

For those who don't know, Orlando Women's Center is where my husband and I aborted our first child, due to maternal health issues, in a late-term, second-trimester abortion. It was the wrong choice.

:: ashli 4:28 PM # ::
...

Remember the mom with breast cancer? The mom that doctors advised to abort her daughter at 5 months? She had a breast removed during pregnancy but not her baby. For a while, it was looking good for this young mother. But, as is often the case with cancer, it has come back with a vengeance. Things are pretty bleak.

I want to reiterate that there is no indication that this mother would have survived cancer-free if she had aborted. I have read plenty of medical studies where physicians advised late term abortions for maternal cancer, and plenty of those mothers aborted only to die any way. I realize the moms were frantically trying to survive, but I think it would have been better for only one person to die instead of two. The thing is... doctors can't really offer certain stakes. It's all hypothetical. Life or death with maternal disease of this caliber? Sometimes. Sometimes not.

I personally know a mom who was given pretty daunting odds unless she aborted her baby. She had breast cancer and chose NOT to abort. She and her baby are fine today. She is 100% cancer-free. That isn't to say that a year from now her cancer won't come back and kill her. Cancer is nasty. It doesn't play fair. And doctors don't know everything. So sick moms are left to make a choice that they may or may not really have to make. What's a mother to do?

Oh you hear moms say, all the time, that they would "die" for their children. It's so cliche; the weakest of all weak things is virtue untested by fire. But moms who put their money where their mouth is, moms who don't kill their children to save their own hides... well these moms are too good for this world.

I'm not trying to attack sick moms who have aborted. I have a pretty nasty pregnancy related maternal illness myself. Death has been a real consideration at times. One good staph infection in your PICC line is really all it takes, and I had that. Treatments can be risky, but you have to have them.

I've not had cancer in pregnancy, but I understand, at least, scared moms who are sick of suffering and don't want to die. Believe me, I do. I've been one of them, and I've sacrificed a child's life in the second trimester because of suffering and fear. But I have also suffered and been afraid for my life and not sacrificed a child, and by far that was the more admirable, more compassionate, more right thing to do... no matter my own personal outcome. I can understand abortion for maternal health reasons, but I don't regard it as honorable.

My husband and I were pondering hyperemesis gravidarum last night and marveling at how the mother suffers and depletes until she resembles, nutritionally, a dried piece of chicken jerky... but the child takes what she needs and is healthy as a plum.

Evidently, when there is a problem, nature dictates that the child's needs come first and that it is the mother who must sacrifice. In studies where moms developed such truly, imminently life-threatening complications such as Wernicke's encephalopathy, the baby often died (followed by the mother if not treated). So in cases where Mom is down to the wire... it seems only then is nature willing to give the child up in a last ditch effort to give the mother a fighting chance. The body may be generally more certain (than a physician) in the knowledge that it is dying; physicians may give up too soon.

I'm no medical professional. I realize there may be other instances where the child's health is "naturally" sacrificed before the mother's in high risk pregnancies. I simply don't know of them. Email me if you have something real to offer on the subject. I'm curious to ponder it.

Anyway... I've veered waaay off the path of the original post intent. It's a sad and fascinating subject.

I really only wrote to introduce the mom with cancer, the one that many of us have been praying for, the one that many of us sent donations and gifts to, the mom who did not abort her daughter to save her own skin, the mom who is too good for this world...

She is not doing well
BUT
She made a courageous choice of honor that saved her daughter's life
AND
She is not sorry.

Here is her picture (notice her two crowning glories):



For those that attend prayer groups, please oh please print out this image and share it. If any want to send Mom or her children anything, please let me know, and I will help you make arrangements.

:: ashli 9:49 AM # ::
...

More excerpts from the journal of a "sidewalk counselor":

"Thursday, Nov. 17, 2004
Donna & Ralph, a power couple, arrived in their brand new Mercedes SUV. They walked into the clinic carrying the tell-tale comfort items associated with late-term abortion: a blanket, a pillow and refreshments for the long, dark night of delivering their dead, aborted infant. Donna wouldn't respond to our offers of help, answer our questions or take our information packet.

Saturday, Nov. 20, 2004
Delores shouted, 'If you can't afford it, get rid of it, b*#ch!' Her friend Lindy (the mom aborting) said: 'It costs a million dollars to raise a child!' I told Lindy that adoption was free."

Obviously Donna and Ralph were financially destitute and "needed" to abort their child in order to avoid starving to death.

And poor Lindy sounds like she came straight from Planned Parenthood with her million-dollar quote.

Ever wonder where that type of notion originates or how it breaks down? Go here.

Someone should have told Lindy that often times less is more and that a dry crust of bread eaten in peace is better than a feast eaten in strife. And if a gal has a functioning conscience, killing her own child can be a little on the perpetually stressful side.

:: ashli 2:24 PM # ::
...

In the id skid of the century a spokeswoman for the Planned Parenthood Mid-Michigan Alliance refers to pregnancy termination as "a tragedy".

The whole article is really BEE-zarre. Apparently, a 16-year-old girl and her boyfriend participated in a do-it-yourself abortion via several purposefully-aimed baseball bat whacks to the stomach. This made for an interesting womb environment and eventually caused the intended "miscarriage".

Now, it seems, there is some legal question about the child's death. Was it murder? Michigan law considers whether the child was quick or not. Roe v. Wade defined a quick child as one at 16-18 weeks. Some Webster definitions for "quick" or "quickening" are: alive, pregnant, speedy and able to cause detectable movement in the womb.

We all know that a gestating child is alive before 16-18 weeks, is not pregnant and is not particularly speedy. So Roe v. Wade legislators must have been referring to detectable movement "quickening". But I felt Elise move at 13 weeks. Mind you, I was on tube feedings and was skin and bones, but I FELT her move and that satisfies the definition of a quick child. Of course, she was moving way before that as was detected by sonogram.

So does "quick" mean "detected by maternal nerve endings" or "detected by sonogram"? Could it be that 16-18 weeks is just some arbitrary number some malevolent ignoramuses pulled out of their big fat butts? Boy, I'm so glad a law that kills millions of kids and hurts millions of survivors is based so heavily on well-defined, rational facts.

While I was reading this article I honestly wondered for a moment if it was a joke.

It's the new millennium. George Tiller is a red, white and blue late-term killin' machine. Hollywood is out and proudly donating to his cause. The partial birth abortion ban can't even pass when it already has. Abortion is as sacred as ever.

Am I reading the article wrong? Can people actually get in trouble for willingly killing their unborn child? I mean, if this country loves and protects abortion, then who cares? Who cares if sister-girl was 9 months along, in labor, jumped off her roof and did a belly flop onto her driveway to abort her baby? Or tied a pork chop on her abdomen and got a pack of wolves to eat through to the chewy baby center? Or got a guy to shoot poison into the baby's heart with a syringe? Or got someone to enter her womb, poke a hole in the delicate fetal skull, and Hoover out baby brains? Or got her boyfriend to hit her in the stomach with a baseball bat? Who in the legal world cares? When a mom willingly kills her gestating child, that is just legally fine and dandy in this country.

You can't have it both ways. Either it's acceptable or it's unacceptable.

Defense attorney Elizabeth Jacobs said the case obviously "would be hard to take to a jury because it shows a complete disregard for human life," and added that it sets a new standard for self-centeredness. What? How is this "obvious" in a Roe v. Wade worshipping society?

And why did a Planned Parenthood spokesperson call the termination of this pregnancy a tragedy when her own abortion business makes a killing off of the premise that no pregnancy termination is a tragedy? Is it because her organization didn't turn a profit in this case?

It can't be because abortion is cruel. After all, friends of the deceased child's family tell reporters how kind and selfless the involved parties are and how they would never hurt anybody intentionally. I guess repeatedly using his girlfriend as a pinata was an accident. Oopsie.

Maybe the PP rep's comment was in reference to maternal health.

"'Any miscarriage can have serious health ramifications', said Buccellato, the obstetrician and gynecologist."

As can any abortion. Which is why it is important for parents to be informed about surgery on their teens.

In the article the PP rep insinuates that parental consent laws caused the baseball bat tragedy. In the same breath she also talks about how teens can hide an unplanned pregnancy from parents for many months and believes that: "Teens are still kids, and if they can convince themselves [pregnancy] is not happening, they think it will go away."

Well, with that kind of clear-headedness it is no wonder the PP chick thinks a teen can handle the "hardest decision a woman ever has to make" all by herself.

Still, I don't really know what PP's beef is with parental consent. The grandparents of the battered baby helped to give the little slugger a proper Zip-Lock burial in the back yard, uh huh.

:: ashli 4:59 PM # ::
...

Sorry about the wrong link to the "choicester" profiles yesterday. This is the correct link. Go there and be dazzled by compassionate sentiments such as this one from a nurse at a military base:

"I have the right to assist in abortions and the proper, medically sound decision making process, whether cancer or fetus tissue is in discussion. Period."

(I have received "big heap" emails from hyperemetics on military bases, and they tell me the medical care is just dandy - not!)

:: ashli 12:28 AM # ::
...

Who knows what the time stamp says at the bottom of this entry. The owls are hooting outside my window, and it is nearly 2:30 A.M... again. My brain is a shriveled walnut at this point, so I will defer to a friend who sent this interesting tidbit:

"NARAL has formed an online group of 'Choicesters'; the 30 or so profiles of people who filled out questionnaire forms can be found here. Go to the questionnaire and you'll see that there's not much of a 'choice' in the category for the 'Politically Aware Celebrity I Resemble Most,' or in one's ability to submit a pro-choice poem (I guess they figured lengthy odes rhapsodizing about abortion might actually start seeming distasteful).

I originally found this part of NARAL's site because I was curious if they'd voiced any objection to the conviction of Scott Peterson for Conner's death. When you search on 'Peterson' you get nothing; when you search on 'Laci' you get a single reference to one of the 'Choicester' profiles objecting to 'tricks' to erode Roe v Wade by passing legislation like Laci and Conner's law."
-----------

Let me just reiterate that California has had an unborn victims of violence law on the books for as long as I can remember, and they are one of the most abortion-lovin' states in the U. S. of A. They aren't anywhere NEAR restricting abortion, and this law of theirs hasn't hurt their romance with "choice" one bit.

What the unborn victims law does do is to protect a woman's right to choose to have her baby. The "choicester" is probably a grassroots granola feminazi who hasn't been informed that in the new millennium we admit they are living human children and fill out sentimental paper hearts to tape on abortion clinic walls in lieu of actually caring. Either that or s/he is a grossly misinformed newbie.

But hey... I simply can't imagine an abortion-supporter being misinformed! Surely people who call themselves "choicesters" are grand examples of reason and intellect, realize what is at stake if they are wrong, and live life as I do, with information on the subject spilling out of every shoebox and file folder existing in the home.

P. S.
I noticed that the gift shop sells a t-shirt that says: "It's your choice, not theirs!" Propaganda. Phermones in the air for a stinging swarm of yellow jackets. They know this message is one of "Our team against yours, you right-infringing religious zealots! And we're going to win!" Do people still fall for this? I guess they do. I mean, I've read the comments, and I acknowledge America's passion for Monday night football.

But really, if the "choicesters" were genuine (or in the very least, smarter) wouldn't their message be more compassionately attractive? Wouldn't their shirts say: "Abortion: A Necessary Sorrow."? It would be a big fat lie of course, but more appealing... like, for instance, the word "choice".

(And for any abortion-supporters who want to steal my t-shirt idea, be forewarned: we'll just spoof your shirt with our own, which will say: "Abortion: Unnecessary Sorrow." And then we'll snap pictures of you attempting to somehow violate our right to choose to wear our t-shirt. But don't worry. Your "team" owns the media, so no one will ever know.)

I'm talking about t-shirts. I HAVE to go to bed.

:: ashli 1:43 AM # ::
...

My son knocked a pretty gnarly scab off of his ankle while we were at the park hanging out with other conservative hippies who are in total denial about being hippies. He sat on the ground rocking back and forth in a panic and apparently speaking in tongues as blood gushed from his surprisingly vascular wound. He was inconsolable and incoherent as I tried to communicate to him that everything would be all right.

Finally, in bad mother form, I threw my hands up in the air and walked away curtly declaring, "I can't help you when you are like this!" He relented and removed his hand from the crimson-flowing booboo. I recovered it with the Squidward glow-in-the-dark adhesive bandage (purchased prior to receiving the boycott info on BandAid) and told him it was no big deal and to go play.

He reaffirmed his belief that this was indeed a life or death issue despite my consolation, and I gave him the option of leaving his friends, going home, cleaning up the wound, smothering it in salve, rebandaging it, and having him rest in the bed for a few hours while we bit our lips waiting to see if he would survive. Evidently, the power of God was upon him and a miraculous healing occurred, for he was instantly better and off like a shot to rejoin the merciless playground beatings of kindergarteners with sticks.

Later that night while filling the washer with a load of whites something just missed the basin and tumbled to the floor. Ah, a sock grenade. Unfurling it I notice the dark garnet patches of soaked and dried blood. At once tunnel vision. At once sucked through the vacuum of time. An emotional "out of body" experience, I see myself holding the socks I wore to the abortion clinic to abort my second trimester child. To kill, ladies and gentlemen, my precious, healthy little girl or little boy. The socks are covered in mother-child blood, the last time we would touch.

Oh I wanted to throw them away like everything, EVERYTHING else... but somehow, my hand held over the trash would not release. Instead I buried them. But not deep enough, because nearly 8 years later here it is; my dirty laundry roaring back.

Several times lately I am realizing in small snippets of stripped reality that um... I killed my child. That it really happened, and that it really was my little boy or little girl. A person. My person. My squishy little cooing fat puff... like the other fat puffs who've issued forth from my flesh.

Yikes. I like to stay back a little. I mean, I'm in it... I get close enough to feel the heat... but usually I blow a fuse before the emotional surge singes fur and skin off. But no. No buffer lately. Raw electricity of love eviscerated and lost. But it's that time, isn't it? I found out I was pregnant with my doomed li'l belly buddy the day after Thanksgiving. I'm too busy to rent space to this right now, but there you are. My psychic VW sits booted on the curb, and there's still Christmas shopping to do; I ain't goin' nowhere. It's a brick and I'm drowning slowly.

The cherry on top is the ensuing dream... I keep having these babies. Over and over I have them. They crawl out of me like joeys. They are all around 15 weeks of course. I'm Katy No-Pocket, defective and scrambling. Instead the thing to do is to sandwich each baby between a warm, white towel and hope for the best. In the dream this makes sense. In the dream this is an effective way to incubate a baby. But I am careless. I leave the towels on the floor where the babies are trod on. They are squished in half. Weeping swollen silver tears, I remove the outer layers of towel and peer in at the broken bodies. I resolve to try again, but I am never careful. Each child comes to ruin. Each life mangled and spent. I cry and cry and can not for the life of me understand why I keep making the same mistake over and over again when I care so much for the children I endanger and spoil.

I wake up and realize it's the same child. It's always the same child. My first, my heart's confection. What the world calls nothing is everything to me. It never ends. It's the perpetual loss of Tennessee.

:: ashli 12:39 AM # ::
...

How To Make Abortion Go Up In Smoke

Apparently our government wants smoking to decline to 12% of the population instead of 22%. How, you may ask, do they propose to make smoking rare? Utah, the only state to meet the goal, holds a clue or two:

1. strong social prohibitions
2. ban it in some places
3. hike up the price

Though America seems to be lagging behind its goal of making smoking rare, since 1998 the rate has steadily dropped. The CDC attributes the decline to:

1. media campaigns against smoking
2. banning the practice in some areas
3. hiking up the price
4. providing positive alternatives (insurance coverage for kick-the-habit-programs)

I read over this issue, and I have questions. Why is the government so concerned with smoking? First of all, it's bad for the body of the smoker. Smokers get sick and die, and that costs money, makes them sad, and can make others sad. Next, secondhand smoke disturbs others, threatens their health and causes, on occasion, life-threatening asthma attacks in children. So it's a good idea to ban smoking in places where others, who do not choose to smoke, would otherwise be exposed to it.

I am aware that some people feel that they need to smoke. My uncle, an alcoholic, feels that smoking helps him not to drink, a worse habit. He also feels that it relieves a tremendous amount of stress. He knows it's not good for him, but feels that life would be much worse without it and so it's worth the risk. Still the government dissuades him.

Do you see where I'm going with this?

There's much talk of "common ground" between liberals who are for abortion and conservatives who are not. In the midst of the bickering, there seems to be a consensus that abortion should at least be reduced. After all, abortion supporters are quick to remind, abortion is not a happy thing or even a good thing, but a necessary thing, so they are supposedly all for making it rare. So, abortion supporters, I appeal to you to follow the model the country is using to make smoking rare. That way, we all get what we want.

First, let's begin a public campaign against abortion. Newspapers, TV, radio, etc., should all be blitzed with the message that abortion is bad for women and children. Breast cancer and other abortion-related risks can be discussed along with the fact that abortion kills children.

Second, overturn Roe v. Wade. Many states will vote to ban abortion. This is OK for the abortion supporters, because they know Kerry-voting states like California and New York, to name a few, will remain open for abortion business like they did before Roe v. Wade. So, people who want to kill their children can still kill their children. Local government will just make it inconvenient.

Third, abortion should be extremely financially expensive. It wouldn't affect the affluent, but the middle class would think twice about repeat abortions, and the underprivileged might be discouraged altogether.

Finally, the government would have to provide positive alternatives to abortion. They would have to increase family and child welfare services and make them more visible/available than they are today. Where would the money for all that come from? They could take the funds from all the breast cancer cases that won't develop and won't need treating. They could pull the money from all the cancer-related funerals that won't take place. They could use the money from all the psychological appointments and associated pharmaceuticals that won't be necessary. Etc. In addition, going back to the first suggestion, the media could present the daily abortion tragedy in the same way that they presented the September 11th tragedy, and the Red Cross would be brimming with green, so much so, that they would have to stop accepting donations.

There you have it folks. The way to make abortion rare is to diss it publicly, reduce abortion access (ban it in some places and hike up the price), and increase access to better alternatives. I am 100% confident that every abortion advocate who says they want abortion to be rare will support these measures... unless, of course, they're lying.

:: ashli 2:49 PM # ::
...

You really MUST go here and read the comments, but please eat before you do, because it will be a while before you can scrape your stomach off the floor.

I think the comments are good for folks like us to take a gander at, because this does two things:

1. gives us an opportunity to exercise our well-thought out position before dealing with tragically misguided human beings henceforth
2. helps us to understand that these folks care about women and children but in a criminally wrong and hurtful way (i.e., it's perfectly healthy for women to kill their gestating children, and the children of a woman whose situation is bad enough to "warrant" abortion are better off dead anyway.)

It's a twisted, twisted world, my friends, and abortion supporters take logic to new lows daily. We who genuinely care in healthy ways are not accustomed to the highly unresearched opinions of those who are more interested in defending a position than exposing (and being exposed to) the truth.

It is difficult for me, former 25-year "pro-choice" fanatic, to subject myself to those (many of whom have not lost a child) who tell me that I don't care about women and want them to die. Yet I find that I must stay current, that I must understand what is going on in the minds of a particular subset of men (and women). And after recently opening a comment laden Pandora's Box I must confess that the answer remains:

very little.

:: ashli 12:44 PM # ::
...

1 passed. I can't believe over 2 million Floridians voted against it. Sickening. However, I do know that some of my abortion-opposing friends didn't understand the language and called me to inquire after it. They thought the judicial bypass exception meant they shouldn't vote for it... because they didn't want their daughters to have that option. You almost have to be a lawyer to read this stuff. Still, I am not confident that most of the people who voted against it misunderstood it.

"This law allows parents to put their arms around their daughters and say ‘we love you, we can work this out together,'" Roberts said.

Roberts' daughter underwent an abortion in 1987 at the age of 14. Her daughter suffered physical and emotional consequences from a botched legal in Virginia. Roberts and her husband were forced to spend $27,000 to provide medical care for her."

Over 2 million Floridians are nuts.

:: ashli 8:51 AM # ::
...

Where have I been this last week? Why no blog? 4 more years and not a peep from the raving anti-abortionist? What is up with me?

Ugh.

In-law troubles. Hijacks my attention. Grrr.

Lemme vent. Lemme try and sort things out on pixel. Maybe I will learn something about myself, my feelings and what my response should be.

Get some hot chocolate. Pull up a chair. Settle in. Here we go.

On my husband's birthday we went to the in-law's. I left early to get the children to bed on time. Hubby stayed to chat for five minutes in the yard. Evidently minutes turned into over an hour of Ashli Bashing. This is a sport for which my uber "religious" in-laws are zealous. "Happy birthday, Son. Over an hour of defending your wife."

Bringing up abortion and the disdain for my activism (which hasn't been so active lately), this Kerry-voting Mom and Dad informed their son that abortion is a woman's choice between her doctor and "her god". The son tried to educate the parents on the second-trimester loss of their grandchild. He reminded them of my incompetent cervix (and resulting bedrest I most recently endured) and told them about my lingering emotional distress and nightmares. They said there's no proof that my incompetent cervix was caused by the second-trimester, non-laminaria, "5-minute" abortion and that as far as my hurt feelings are concerned, I need to read a self-help book and get over it already.

Planned parenthood, NARAL, and NOW would be proud. Perhaps when my father-in-law retires he can move to Kansas and get a cush job "blessing" the aborted babies and revearing "choice" at George Tiller's fine infant-murdering establishment.

Lest we forget what my father-in-law, the preacher, is unaware of:
the man has more aborted grandchildren than living grandchildren.
(His youngest daughter has aborted two of her children.)

My husband reminded the "man of god" who raised him, "When Ashli was suffering in the hospital, you sat by her bed and told her that she could abort, everyone would understand, and that she could do what she 'had to do'. If she had listened to you your granddaughter would be DEAD right now!"

My husband was compelled to confront them with his feelings of abandonment during the first pregnancy. His horrified, angry mother informed him that she "knew" I wouldn't listen to her so she just didn't say or try to do anything. "What would have been the point with someone like Ashli? It was her choice. She did it." No abandonment there.

My husband told her that everyone plays their part when a child dies in an abortion and that she couldn't blame me for her own lack of effort. (Apparently, the preacher and his wife are not inclined to consider the book of Isaiah. For those not in the know, God tells Isaiah to warn Israel of their wrong-doing and to try and persuade them to turn from their evil ways... BUT there's a catch... no one will listen. He sends the guy on a mission that Isaiah KNOWS will fail! But that's not the point. The point is, Isaiah tried. He did what he was supposed to do regardless of the black and white fact that no one would listen.)

On and on for over an hour the stinging barbs flew as my husband pleaded for his parents to love his wife, the mother of his children. The culpability always belonged to me, never to the son, the age-old perspective. Things I did or said or didn't do or say months and even years ago, came bubbling to the surface and spilling over onto the birthday boy, in the name of Jesus, amen, until finally my father-in-law's attentions turned to some aggrivator at work or down the street and what a "fool" he was... to which my husband opined, "You should pray for the man, Dad, instead of standing around idly calling him a fool."

Evidently, I'm not the only one with in-law problems. Take a gander at this. Children complicate the issue.

In the past we have noticed that our son comes back from the preacher's house with foul words on his lips (crap this, crap that, "Grandpa said it!") and violent descriptions of melting faces and beating hearts being ripped out of people's chests (Raders of the Lost Ark). They send him back thusly, without boundaries, with poor behavior, and then say it is not proper for a boy of six to even know the word "abortion". They say it should not be spoken in the presence of a child. They scold that it is not proper to know that tummy tots need protection from a thing that can wrongly threaten them. Before you agree, consider...

The in-laws think it is OK for my son to go to Sunday school and see the Master hanging on the cross, blood pouring from his head, side, hands and feet, as nails and thorns stick out graphically depicting his murder by man. It is OK to know that Jesus was born in a manger because His folks were on the run from an evil king who wanted Him dead and so killed all the boy babies. It is OK to watch the Ten Commandments and see the soldier's sword dripping with a baby's blood over his cradel as his mother clings like a deadened zombie to a nearby wall. These things are OK to the preacher because, seemingly, they are only stories that happened ages ago, and their purpose is to make us feel thankful and happy. They are removed, not dangerous. Abortion, however, is too close. It is here, it is now, it is in our family, and it carries no sweet moral that persuades us to feel good or happy or thankful. Abortion is not their issue, it should not be my issue, and it should never, never ever be an issue to my children. Not, that is, until they're old enough to understand that killing an innocent, defenseless child is a choice between a woman, her physician and "her god"... by which point, they may already know, sorrowfully, much more about abortion than I ever taught them.

Well, at least my in-laws practice what they preach. These liberals did not make of it an issue to their liberal children. Their youngest child aborted two children and their middle child lost one in a second-trimester abortion. We see the fruit non-issues bear. It is rotten and leads to sorrow and death, and we reject this for our own children. It must stop here. Right here and right now.

Visits with Grandma and Grandpa have been limited and visits alone have been eliminated entirely. Their words and actions only confirm the necessity of this. These loving parents (who never waste breath on "stubborn" people) warned their son that his children will run as far from us as they can, just as soon as they can, because we are "smothering" them. Bear in mind that his youngest daughter related that during her youth God was not really alive in her life because her preacher father followed Christ on Sunday while the rest of the week was up for grabs. She moved five hours away from her parents. The older daughter moved 3 or 4 days away. The son, my conservative, now-God-fearing husband who is "smothering" his children, is the only one that has stayed near his parents.

We are confident in Deut. 11:19-21 and Prov. 22:6. We have learned not to buy into fear, and our instruction was costly. We are done abandoning our children to a world of death. We will not strive to satisfy society's desire for them or for us. We will walk out of step. We will be set apart. This will aggrivate my in-laws until scales are removed and they can see fit to serve the Lord of their lips, the Lord of their Sundays.

And oh how we will pray, for us and for them, for no one is perfect in himself, everyone needs strength to love and obey, and coming together is the right thing to do.

:: ashli 10:12 AM # ::
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The uproar has begun!

:: ashli 10:11 AM # ::
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Telegraph refers to 10-month-old girl as "it".

:: ashli 5:19 PM # ::
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Oh, it's all well and good to profess not to support the death and emotional maiming of abortion, but I can not stress enough the importance of BEING anti-abortion.

"Let us, then be up and doing..."
Sir Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

"You know these things - now do them. That is the path of blessing."
John 13:17

Voting is one simple way to actively oppose abortion. Boycotting is another relatively easy way. If enough of us make a financial statement it can make (and has made) a difference. Some of the boycotting is sacrificial. With the exception of products that are necessary for good health (particuarly prescription meds), what items are too good to let go of in the face of what abortion does to women, children and families? And besides, boycotting abortion just makes you feel good!

Buy the LDI boycott list. Imho, this is the best, most reliable list around. They will back any of their claims up in court; they research everything extensively. They also stay current, which is VERY important. I know a guy who didn't take a good job that he seriously needed because he was told they donated to PP. Unbeknownst to him they had ended the practice. That decision affected his whole family! Gotta be careful with these online lists for sure. I don't trust anyone but LDI for boycott info.

Yes, yes, I know. You have to pay for it. "A TRUE friend of the anti-abortion movement would issue this information for free!" you might say. LDI explains that they did this, but abortion supporters began sending for the list en masse and it nearly bankrupted LDI. Also, LDI began to realize that gathering accurate information was enormously expensive. They claim they can not maintain the manpower to keep the list accurate and current (phone calls, letters, publication, travel, etc.) without "asking for a donation" (read: "charging"). I don't have a problem with it. Buying the list helps me to boycott many abortion supporters including:

Johnson and Johnson (the "baby" people)
Granimals (clothing for children)
Sesame Street Vitamins (for children's health)
Ben and Jerry's Ice Cream (and other frozen treat brands that children like)
Skippy peanut butter (a standard childhood favorite)

There's another product that I wanted to list because it's just mind-blowing, but I'm only allowed to publish five. The boycott works. The list changes often and is updated quarterly. Sign up for a year for the cheapest way to stand up for those who can not stand up for themselves.

Get the full, surprising, revealing list at http://www.fightpp.org

:: ashli 7:20 AM # ::
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