For Texans who want a child but have difficult pregnancies, the new abortion law just made that journey even harder – By Bekah McNeel (The Texas Tribune) / Oct 29 2021
Genetic screenings can help determine if a fetus will have certain conditions — or even be viable. But those usually occur at the end of the first trimester, long after Texas’ new abortion law bans people from terminating their pregnancies.
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At her sonogram appointment in late September, Kendra Joseph received ominous news. Signs pointed to an impending miscarriage, but she wasn’t far enough along for the doctor to know for sure. He told her to come back in a week.
The 39-year-old San Antonio mom of one began to worry. Under Senate Bill 8, Texas’ new abortion law, even if the medical and developmental condition were still grim, if they could hear cardiac activity, she would have to wait out the pregnancy or leave the state to end it.
For nearly three years, Joseph and her husband, Eric, had been trying to have a second child, and laws intended to limit abortion access had, ironically, already made the process more difficult. With SB 8 in effect, given the risks her pregnancies entail, Joseph is hesitant to keep trying at all — one of the many unforeseen consequences of the new law.
CONTINUE > https://www.texastribune.org/2021/10/29/texas-abortion-law-complications/
