Another lady has come forward to share the terrifying story of how her life was threatened by the Supreme Court’s decision four months ago to overturn Roe v. Wade.
Three different women’s experiences in obtaining abortions for medical reasons have been featured on CNN: one from Houston, one from central Texas, and one from Cleveland.
A lady from Austin, Texas, who almost died because she couldn’t have an abortion in time, has spoken up.
What follows is her life account.
The tragic death of a so-called “miracle” infant
Amanda Eid and Josh Zurawski, now both 35 years old, started dating as preschoolers at Aldersgate Academy in Fort Wayne, Indiana in 1991.
Amanda said, “Josh has been in love with me since since we were four,” a statement that Josh has repeated to her many times.
They tied the knot in the capital city of Texas three years ago, and have since both established successful careers in the technological sector.
They made several attempts to start a family but were unsuccessful. Amanda got pregnant after undergoing fertility treatments for almost a year and a half.
After more than a year and a half of fertility therapy, Amanda Eid got pregnant.
Baby Zurawski is due in late January, Amanda announced in July on Instagram. Amanda and her husband were wearing “Mama” and “Dad” hats in the shot, and they were carrying a strip of ultrasound pictures of their unborn daughter.
That we were pregnant at all was a miracle, and we were overjoyed, she added.
Amanda was just four months along when her water broke at week 18.
Her unborn child was losing vital amniotic fluid. Her doctor, she claims, warned her the baby would not make it.
Saying, “We learned that we were going to lose our kid,” Amanda explained the tragic news. ‘I knew I was going to miscarry since my cervix was dilatation totally 22 weeks early.
Both she and Josh pleaded with the doctor to try to rescue the baby.
To paraphrase, “I kept wondering, ‘isn’t there something we can do?’
Amanda said, “I asked, and the response was no.
Legal restrictions on abortion in Texas
A woman’s chance of contracting a potentially fatal infection increases dramatically if her water bursts. Even though Amanda and Josh’s unborn child, whom they had named Willow, was doomed to die, physicians claimed they could not abort the pregnancy because of Texas law since the baby still had a heartbeat.
Amanda recounts how her doctor told her, “Well, right now we simply have to wait because we can’t induce labor,” despite the certainty that she would lose her baby. The way the legislation is worded in Texas prevented [the physicians] from doing their own duties.
According to Texas law, abortion is legal if the mother “has a life-threatening health condition worsened, caused, or emerging from a pregnancy that puts the female at danger of death or offers a severe risk of substantial impairment of a key bodily function.”
A physician convicted in violation of the legislation in Texas might lose their license to practice medicine and receive a life sentence in jail, but state legislators haven’t defined the term.
Katie Keith, head of Georgetown University Law Center’s Health Policy and Law Initiative, stated, “They’re incredibly imprecise.” They don’t offer a clear outline of when a woman may have an abortion.
CNN reached out to 28 Texas politicians in September who backed anti-abortion legislation, asking for comment on the September reports about the women in Houston and central Texas.
Not even a single lawmaker bothered to reply.
“There are unforeseen repercussions, as there are with every legislation. State Senator Eddie Lucio, who will be departing the Senate at the end of the year, said that lawmakers had a duty to “avoid any unexpected repercussions” and “correct any defects” in any legislation.
The Zurawskis appeared in a commercial supporting Beto O’Rourke’s ultimately doomed run for governor of Texas.
Rapidly deteriorating
Amanda’s physicians sent her home after her water broke with instructions to monitor for indications of infection; they claimed they would only terminate the pregnancy if she was “considered unwell enough that my life was at danger.”
She recalled her doctor telling her that the process “may take hours, could take days, might take weeks.”
After hearing “hours,” they concluded that going to another state for an abortion was out of the question.
