Madeline Beckwith

Because women matter

I thought I was having a miscarriage while I was at my job, which was located between two award-winning hospitals. Out of fear, I chose not to go to the Catholic hospital, because I thought I’d be safer at a university hospital. I went in through the emergency room and got caught in a turf war between an emergency room doctor and an obstetrician-gynecologist. My ob-gyn was convinced I was having an ectopic pregnancy and needed emergency surgery to remove the fetus. The ER doctor wasn’t so sure.

Incapacitated by pain and unable to advocate for myself, I listened to them argue over my body as if I weren’t even there. The unnecessary procedures the ER doctor put me through along with the loss of agency were excruciating. After he gave me a trans-vaginal ultrasound, the ob-gyn took care of my already diagnosed ectopic pregnancy.

When I fully regained consciousness, I had lost both my baby and my right fallopian tube. But I woke up because of my ob-gyn’s courage and skill. She was able to fight for me with the armor of Roe v. Wade.

In Donald Trump’s America saving my life like in 2006 would be illegal. Project 2025 would make doctors terrified to stand up for patients like me.

Getting pregnant is still one of the most dangerous things a woman can do. Yet Trump and Vance want to continue to erode abortions rights, even in the case of rape or incest, and eliminate birth control and emergency contraception for poor women. Brown women are three times more likely to die in pregnancy than white women. In Trump’s America that number could reach as high as the moon. I’m voting for Harris-Walz because pregnancy is a gamble for all women, and as a Black woman, I know the stakes are too high to bet on Donald Trump and JD Vance.

Madeline Beckwith is a spoken word poet, published author, and WOMAN.