[Guest article by Andrea Anderson in response to "Dear Doctor Performing My Abortion"]

Dear Doctor Counseling Me the Day after My Miscarriage,

As an OB/GYN, you have a difficult job. You work closely with women who write bewildering things like this. That is why I am expressing my appreciation of you now.

Thank you for looking at me with compassion. I know am not the only woman who has lost a child in the womb, but it was easy to feel like no one else understood the pain of that experience. But, you did.

Maybe you just came from the next room, advising a woman on the options of voluntarily ending her pregnancy – letting her know how she is legally permitted to end the life of the child in her womb.

Thank you for telling me how much my miscarriage – the involuntary end of my pregnancy – must hurt. Thank you for telling me that it was not my fault.

Maybe the woman in the next room is hurting too.

Thank you for telling me that this is the worst part of your job – that babies are supposed to be born to women under your care, not taken away from them.

Maybe the woman in the next room thinks that aborting her baby will be the best option for herself and her future children. Maybe she even thinks it’s a worthy sacrifice.

Thank you for showing me my baby’s heartbeat just 24 hours ago.

Maybe that woman hasn’t heard her baby’s heartbeat. Maybe she can only hear her own. Maybe she hasn’t seen her baby’s body. Maybe she just thinks it’s her body, her choice.

Thank you for telling me how it is good to grieve the death of my child. Thank you for telling me that I would get pregnant again, that I would have another child.

Maybe the death of her child will bring her relief. Maybe her pregnancy is inconvenient – the wrong time, the wrong man, the wrong way.

Thank you for telling me that my miscarriage would help me see how special my next child would be. I’m glad I will be able to tell him some day that the grief of my miscarriage produced the joy of his life.

Maybe the woman in the next room plans to tell her future children who she destroyed for them, finding relief in thinking it will make their lives better.

Thank you for reminding me of my beautiful one-year-old daughter and my husband who will cry with me.

Maybe the woman in the next room is alone. Maybe she only has the support of people justifying her right to choose. Maybe someday they will see the irony of rejoicing with her, but weeping with me.

I wish I could have done something to save my baby. I wish I could do something to save hers.