A Genuine Pro-Woman Approach

This week’s post comes from Guest Blogger, Marsha Cluever. Marsha resides in New Braunfels, TX with her husband and 8 children. At home she navigates the delicate balancing act of laundry, meals, bathroom cleaning and affection. She is a Minnesota native but doesn’t miss Winter….at all! As a spokesperson for Women Speak for Themselves she hopes to use her voice to shed light on the desperate need for Pro-Woman Health Care. She believes the dialogue needs to change from pro-life/pro-choice to Pro-Woman, Pro-Truth. Seventeen years ago Marsha had her first abortion as a divorced single mom of two young children. One year later she had her second abortion. She knows first-hand the trauma abortion causes. She knows that the agendas of the two “life camps” are getting in the way of straight facts that women need in order to make decisions. She believes love, compassion, and truth are what will reach women. Guiding Star Project gives her hope for the future of Women’s Health Care.
At 27 years old I became pregnant with my 5th child. I was in a committed relationship at the time and a divorced mother of two children. Just prior to this relationship I had had two abortions less than a year apart. At the time I would have described myself as a Pro-Choice, liberal Feminist who was suspicious of Religion. My first concern upon discovering I was pregnant was to find a female doctor. The experiences I had with the birth of my first two children were less than ideal. I didn’t care for either doctor that had delivered my first two children. I hated that I was forced to see every OBGYN doctor “just in case” and I felt uncomfortable with the fact that the OBGYN department seemed like a “good ole boys club” of old men whom I could not relate to. My mom came with me to one of my appointments because my husband was at work. The doctor wouldn’t even make eye contact with me and spoke to my mother as if she was my caretaker.
Afterwards I was at the front desk scheduling subsequent appointments when a nurse walked up behind the receptionist and asked my name. After I confirmed my name she proceeded to tell me that the Doctor wanted to apologize to me for his behavior, she explained he had read my chart after I left and discovered I wasn’t as young as I looked and I was in fact married. I was baffled that I was suddenly human and deserving of a certain type of treatment based on two facts that the doctor now possessed about me, my age and my marital status. My mission was to find a female doctor to deliver this child, I was certain it would make all the difference. It did, but not in the way I expected.
I called a friend of mine who was always bragging about the Crosby Medical Clinic. I asked her whom she saw, and she told me Dr. David Goodwin. I told her I was looking for a female doctor and that’s when she told me David’s wife was a doctor. That’s how I chose Dr. Monica Goodwin. She was female and my friend recommended her.
The first time I met with Monica I was struck by her voice. She has a gentle, motherly voice that is inviting. She went over my medical history and I answered honestly about everything except the two abortions. I didn’t want those in my file. At the first visit I told her that I had gotten pregnant while using birth control pills. I shared with her all the horrible experiences of oral contraceptives I had tried and the side effects that I endured. I asked her for information on other oral contraceptives and methods. She asked me if I had ever read the pamphlet that came with “the pill”. I said I had not. In fact I didn’t know anyone that had read that thing. She sent me home with one and encouraged me to read it.
I took the pamphlet home and casually mentioned to my boyfriend, who is now my husband, that Dr Goodwin thought I should read it. I handed it to him and he immediately began to read it. I shrugged and walked away, certain it wasn’t going to reveal anything revolutionary. He was sitting on the bed in the bedroom and I was down the hall. He shouted at me to come to him. As I entered the bedroom he was waiving the pamphlet in the air and said “have you read any of this? Do you know one of the side effects is death? Death! I can’t believe that, I can’t believe any woman would take this knowing that death is a side effect. No man would ever take a pill that could cause death just so he could have sex. You women are stupid!” He stated that he would never allow me again to take the pill. So I researched other methods. I found the Merena IUD and decided that was the method I wanted immediately following this delivery. At my next appointment I informed Dr Monica. She went on to explain that if I wanted to pursue getting an IUD that she didn’t administer those but there were other doctors in the clinic who did and I could see one of them. I continued to see Dr. Monica and she delivered our beautiful baby boy in what was to be my most difficult labor and delivery. This relationship that she cultivated by just adhering to the Hippocratic oath would prove to be a major factor in changing my views towards birth control, fertility, and life.
Monica never used the words “pro- life” to me. She never lectured me about when life begins. She didn’t tell me a single thing about her beliefs. She did give me information on contraceptives. She did give me information on the Creighton Method and NaProTechnology. When I met Dr. Monica as a pro-choice, promiscuous feminist she treated me with the same care and affection as when I greeted her 12 years later, just prior to her delivering our 8th child, as a pro-life, New-Feminist.