I'm Teed Off
Last week I had a golf-ball sized cyst removed from between my bladder & uterus.
After having some lingering back pain for several months, my doctor suspected kidney stones & sent me for some scans. The initial CT revealed a tiny mass right behind the bladder but they weren’t sure what it was so they wanted to do some more tests. They preemptively scheduled me for a few rounds of bloodwork, an MRI, and a biopsy. It wasn’t until I went in for the biopsy procedure that I found out the small mass was actually the size of a golf ball. Whether it had grown or they didn’t get a clear picture of it the first time, they weren’t sure. They just knew they wanted it out. It was situated perfectly between my bladder & my uterus.
Before the procedure, as they were hooking up my IV and getting me prepped, they asked me when my last menstrual cycle was. I told them that I was on a contraceptive pill that stops my cycle. The nurse asked again, “So when exactly was your last one?”I told her I had been on this birth control for close to 13 years. The last cycle I remember was shortly after getting back on it after giving birth to my son, which was almost three years ago. She frowned and jotted something down before asking, “Well would you mind taking a pregnancy test for us then before we get started?”
At this point, I was already hooked up to an IV and situated in the hospital bed wearing nothing but a gown & grippy socks. I politely told her that I just had bloodwork done last week (in that office) and the results confirmed that I was not pregnant. She jotted something down again & then raised her eyebrows at me, “So are you refusing the pregnancy test then?”
On Friday, June 24th the U.S. Supreme Court made a 6-3 decision to overturn Roe v. Wade, ending close to 50 years of protection on abortion rights. The decision does not outright ban abortion, but instead, turns the decision back to each state. Under the protection of Roe v. Wade, it was illegal for states to regulate abortion in the first trimester. In the second trimester, states were able to impose regulations but only if they were “reasonably related to maternal health.” A state could only fully regulate abortion terms once the fetus reached the point of “viability” in the third trimester.
Now that Roe v. Wade has been overturned, the right to an abortion in the first trimester is no longer federally protected. States are still allowed to make abortion in every trimester legal, but this ruling also means that states can impose stricter regulations at any point of the pregnancy. Like in Oklahoma, for example, who has banned abortions at the point of conception - which (at the moment) is the nation’s strictest abortion law.
Back to my procedure. I told the nurse that I wasn’t comfortable taking a pregnancy test because 1) I was already hooked up to an IV and didn’t want to get out of the bed and 2) I didn’t want to give another urine sample when they already had one and bloodwork from the week before. I also reminded her that I had been instructed not to eat or drink anything prior to the procedure so my bladder was pretty empty as I hadn’t had anything to drink all morning. She seemed flustered and said, “Well I will have to go get some forms for you to sign saying that you refuse the test and that you know you’re not pregnant. Are you okay to sign those forms?” I nodded in agreement.
I live in the state of Georgia, which has another extremely strict abortion law. Abortions are banned in this state “once a heartbeat can be detected.” The careful language around the wording “can be” was pretty deliberate. It’s not once a woman has discovered that she is pregnant and has heard the heartbeat. No, it’s once the woman is far enough along that you could hear a heartbeat. Usually this is around six weeks, which is well before many women even find out that they are pregnant. Sometimes even before certain pregnancy tests are even able to turn pink.
Georgia’s abortion ruling is not only strict because of how early the ban is imposed, but also because of the punishment. Under the new HB 481 law, women receiving abortions after the six week mark would face life in prison and are eligible for the death penalty. This law also has language for women who miscarry “because of her own conduct.” Prosecutors are legally allowed to interrogate women who miscarry and if they find evidence of culpability, these women can be detained and charged with murder.
The papers I signed before my procedure stated that I refused to take a pregnancy test to confirm that I wasn’t pregnant. Another page that I signed basically said that I was confirming, to the best of my knowledge, that I wasn’t pregnant. Another page had a lot of language about legal liability. Despite the fact that they already had previous lab work that confirmed that I wasn’t pregnant, because I couldn’t provide them with a date of my last menstrual cycle it made me a risk for pregnancy. And since they were performing a procedure near my uterus, I was legally liable should anything happen to a developing fetus should there be one in there.
If they had opened me up and discovered that I was in fact pregnant, and the fetus didn’t survive, I would risk legal ramifications. Under Georgia’s new HB 481 law, a prosecutor would have taken those signed papers and used them as evidence of culpability. I would be facing a lifetime in prison and would be charged with murder.
I wasn’t really planning on writing or publicly sharing about this procedure. I told a few friends and family members but I didn’t think it was necessary for the whole world to know what was happening in my uterus. Also for the record, they were able to remove the entire cyst safely and it was benign. They didn’t find anything else in there either. After the ruling today, though, I felt compelled to share about this experience. I know there’s a lot of people out there who feel like the decision to overturn Roe v. Wade doesn’t affect them. Some people think it’s not relevant to them because they don’t have a uterus. Others think it doesn’t matter because they’re not the type of person who would ever have an abortion.
I grew up in a very conservative Southern-Baptist home. I took an elective class in my (public!) high school that was called Christian Learning Center: Culture Studies. We learned how to argue and debate topics like this. The idea of “abortion bad” and “protect unborn babies” was ingrained in me from an early age. But that’s all it ever was - there was no education about the reproductive cycle, miscarriage, stillbirth, maternal death rates, etc. The focus always shifted toward “why don’t you just adopt?” or “how could you kill a baby if there’s people out there who would love it?” I grew up so sheltered and naïve, having no idea the realities of pregnancy.
Thankfully I grew up and moved away from that mindset, but unfortunately there are a lot of people out there who still think that way. They hear the word “abortion” and have this picture in their head of a 9-month-pregnant 16-year-old with an attitude of “I can’t have this baby, I wanna party!” That’s the way abortion used to be depicted to me. I was taught to believe that all abortions were selfish, to only see black & white, and I know that’s how a lot of people still view it despite the many, many gray areas.
I only share this story of my recent medical experience to show that it’s not that black & white. There are real consequences out there that people will face thanks to these laws that will have devastating affects. Women of color and trans women will be affected by these decisions the most. I have friends with their own stories not that far off from mine. I have a friend who miscarried at seven weeks pregnant who didn’t even know she was pregnant. She also takes a daily migraine medication that’s not safe during pregnancy. Could she be prosecuted for the death of that baby now? I have another friend whose baby’s heartbeat stopped at 22 weeks. She was forced to carry it until her water broke and give birth to a baby who wasn’t breathing. That was four years ago and she is still deeply traumatized by it. But they wouldn’t allow her to terminate the pregnancy - she would’ve been held criminally responsible.
How does this relate to golf? Why are you writing this on Golf Unfiltered? The cyst inside of me that they removed, the one that led to this whole discussion, was the size of a golf ball. That’s pretty much the only connection this has to golf.
But when that ruling came out this morning, I was so filled with rage the only thing I knew to do was write it out. So that’s what I’m doing. I don’t have a fancy solution or nice way to wrap this up with a call to action. I’m just mad. I’d love to see some pro golfers take a stance on this and publicly speak out about it. But I know that’s unlikely. Just be nice to your friends with a uterus over the next few weeks. And if you have a uterus, just know you’re not alone if you feel overwhelmed/frustrated/exhausted/angry.
Idk, I’m just ticked off. Maybe I’ll just hit the driving range and take my rage out for now.
