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What Planned Parenthood means to her

By adamg on Sun, 11/29/2015 - 9:11pm

Post updated to reflect change by author.

The Colorado Springs murders get Vera Papisova to thinking:

My senior year of high school, I drove 5 different friends from 3 different towns to 2 different Planned Parenthoods at 260 Elm Street in Somerville, Massachusetts and 1055 Comm Ave in Boston. Two for abortions, one for emergency contraception after being raped, and two for birth control prescriptions. Nobody wanted their parents or any of our friends to know, and we knew we could count on Planned Parenthood to do what it has always done: help us. ...

Free tagging: 
Planned Parenthood


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Comments

By ppemployee on Sun, 11/29/2015 - 9:16pm.

Thanks to Vera for sharing her story.

In other news, I'm terrified to go to work this week. Ugh.

By ANon on Sun, 11/29/2015 - 9:17pm.

I 100% support planned parenthood. But. The planned parenthood at 160 Elm Street is an express location -- it doesn't provide abortion services (source: former employee). I only point this out because i'm afraid that anti-choice people will come out of the woodwork to berate her for this detail. Or claim that the story is fabricated.

Does anyone know if they provided them there at one point in time, or is this person confusing the smaller clinic with the larger one in allston?

By ppemployee on Sun, 11/29/2015 - 10:03pm.

I'm pretty sure she's confusing them. To my knowledge, the Somerville location has never provided abortion. I could be wrong but I'm not sure why they wouldn't still provide them if they did at one time.

By Anon on Sun, 11/29/2015 - 10:28pm.

There are many different types of abortion. Though most people think of a "regular" abortion being surgical. However, many now have the option to choose non surgical abortions known as the abortion pill, which would not require a surgical procedure and therefore can be given from a facility that does not do surgery.

By ppemployee on Sun, 11/29/2015 - 11:06pm.

As my username suggests, I am very familiar with the different kinds of abortion. To my knowledge, we do not provide just medical or just surgical. It's either both or neither, especially since we need to provide counseling and an ultrasound beforehand regardless of the method.

Website checks out, Somerville provides referrals for abortion only: https://www.plannedparenthood.org/health-center/massachusetts/somerville...

By Ron Newman on Sun, 11/29/2015 - 11:38pm.

Source. At the time at least, this location did not provide abortion services.

By anon on Mon, 11/30/2015 - 6:56am.

She's updated her post to say that those visits were to the Comm Ave location.

By adamg on Mon, 11/30/2015 - 7:19am.

To reflect that change.

By MatthewC on Mon, 11/30/2015 - 8:54am.

There's nothing like the heroic actions of a woman going to pick up her birth control to inspire me for the day. Meanwhile, the two police officers who were killed fighting this nut case... Yeah, this Vera character is a the bigger hero.

By Dot net on Mon, 11/30/2015 - 11:07am.

She didn't say anything of the sort about the officer(s) killed and you should know it. In fact, she mentioned the one we knew was killed at the time, by name, thanking him as a hero. Way to try to cloud the issue.

By the way, I'm not seeing anything about a second officer KIA either. So it seems like you don't fully read Facebook posts you disagree with, AND the accurate news you don't care for.

By Malcolm Tucker on Sun, 11/29/2015 - 9:25pm.

I hope we all behave ourselves, but I will say this: it shouldn't matter why someone goes to Planned Parenthood. Whether they need a general checkup, a cancer screening, contraception, or an abortion - we all deserve bodily autonomy. We all deserve to seek out compassionate healthcare without fear of judgment - and certainly without fear of nutjobs bursting in and imposing their (myopic) worldview on us. I've had nothing but great experiences at Planned Parenthood for the various reasons I've gone (never an abortion, though), and I feel strongly that everyone deserves that kind of respect and care.

If you disagree, you're a terrible person.

By Markk02474 on Mon, 11/30/2015 - 12:55am.

Like not offering abortions at the location you claim, while the morning after pill is plausible.

By Dot net on Mon, 11/30/2015 - 7:39am.

I'm sure you always have 100% recall and never make mistakes, Mark, lol. At least she corrected her story without making a snarky excuse, ahem: http://www.universalhub.com/crime/20151121/jp-man-arrested-after-gunfire...

By ladycommentariat on Mon, 11/30/2015 - 8:06am.

Source: http://ec.princeton.edu/questions/ecabt.html

By Malcolm Tucker on Mon, 11/30/2015 - 10:42am.

You certainly seem unfamiliar with them.

By SwirlyGrrl on Mon, 11/30/2015 - 11:17am.

Suppression of ovulation isn't abortion. That's birth control.

We are talking physiology 101 here - go look it up. Things have moved well beyond the "sperm as complete human homunculus" era.

By Christie-Baker 2016 on Sun, 11/29/2015 - 9:35pm.

It is important after terrorist attacks like the one in Colorado to remember what the terrorists hate (freedom, people who are different than they) and to not let them win by being scared. Stories like Vera's remind us how important it is to stay strong in the face of extremists.

By MatthewC on Sun, 11/29/2015 - 10:50pm.

Based on the reports we're getting about the shooter's rambling incoherence, this hardly sounds like a meticulously planned out attack. Dude sounds more like a certified nutcase than a "terrorist".

By BostonDog on Sun, 11/29/2015 - 11:25pm.

He managed to keep the police at bay for ~4 hours and clearly came ready for war knowing his target fairly well. This wasn't some guy who snapped on the way home from work.

It's kinda amazing how people are willing to disregard this guy as some isolated lone nutcase. He and people like him are far more of a threat then any imaginary refuge terrorists.

By MatthewC on Mon, 11/30/2015 - 8:53am.

All I'm saying is people need to tone down the rhetoric. This incident was not an all out assault on women'a reproductive rights. The more important issue is not the heroic story of a woman getting her birth control from planned parenthood, but rather the fact that two police officers are dead. Everyone is the clinic is safe.

By ppemployee on Mon, 11/30/2015 - 9:22am.

One police officer is dead.*

Two patients/"civilians" are also dead. Are their lives not as important as the officer's life?

By BostonDog on Mon, 11/30/2015 - 11:17am.

That's the other frustrating thing about story. As soon as a cop is killed that's all the Media focuses on. I'm thankful that the police responded and sorry they paid the ultimate price for their job. But as a cop that's a known risk of the job. The other people killed and injured didn't go the clinic knowing their lives were at risk. They deserve sympathy just as much as the cop.

By Markk02474 on Wed, 12/02/2015 - 2:41pm.

Garrett Swasey was more than the cop between those killed, he probably had the richest backstory for news outlets to tell and show some footage of him, his hot former skating partner who is now head of some skating federation, and Nancy Kerrigan. Story of being co-pastor of some church, and wow, there actually are hetero, male, figure skaters, but then again, while very good, he wasn't world class.

By MatthewC on Mon, 11/30/2015 - 10:44am.

Typo. Relax. Anyway, you never mentioned the coo being dead, only the civilians. So it's clear who you, and others hear, actually care about. Not the cops, that much is clear.

By Michael Kerpan on Mon, 11/30/2015 - 10:05am.

... to the clinic are also dead -- and there is no sign you care about them at all.

And where do you get 2 police officers killed, I don't see any news story confirming this.

By lbb on Mon, 11/30/2015 - 1:22pm.

All I'm saying is people need to tone down the rhetoric.

So, where were you when David Daleiden made the fake videos about Planned Parenthood illegally handling fetal tissue?

Where were you when Carly Fiorina kept referencing those videos as if they were fact, long after they'd been debunked?

Where were you when Ted Cruz claimed that this most recent terrorist was a "transgendered leftist activist"?

Were you anywhere, at all, in any form, telling people to "tone down the rhetoric" then? Or are you only good for speaking up against people who are righteously enraged over anti-choice right-wing terrorism?

Sounds like you think that only some "people" need to "tone down the rhetoric".

By anon on Tue, 12/01/2015 - 5:45am.

? I did not read facebook post (dont have facebook) but was she calling herself a hero? Or was she pointing out that staff at Planned Parenthood do their jobs at threat of bodily harm - so that women get the health care they deserve? Thank god for their determination and belief that makes them continue to go to work despite the nut jobs that target them with violence for doing so.

By Ron Newman on Tue, 12/01/2015 - 7:15am.

You do not need a Facebook account to read it. (I just tested this in a Chrome Incognito window)

By erik g on Mon, 11/30/2015 - 10:06am.

Nothing says "shooter was white" like "shooter is in custody and uninjured."

Anyway, when do we get to hear GOP candidates start talking about creating a national registry for evangelical Christians? Seems like they're pretty prone to radicalization.

By Waquiot on Mon, 11/30/2015 - 11:18am.

Would you know who John Lee Muhammad and Lee Boyd Malvo are?

Sorry, this has been a growing thing that is not quite grounded in reality. As for the rest of this political debate, no comment.

By Michael Kerpan on Mon, 11/30/2015 - 11:41am.

...13 years ago. The new philosophy of "shoot whenever you have the slightest fear" (Force Science Institute) had not yet spread so widely to police departments across the country. (Thankfully Boston did NOT adopt this).

http://www.citypages.com/news/bill-lewinski-defends-cops-accused-of-exce...

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/08/02/us/training-officers-to-shoot-first-an...

By Waquiot on Mon, 11/30/2015 - 2:20pm.

You've got serial killers terrorizing a large metropolitan area that were captured without a shot being fired at them. Oh, and they were black.

The point about non-white suspects (and yes, the term is being used loosely) being more likely to be shot is a valid one, but there are plenty of examples of non-white perpetuators of violence being arrested peacefully along with white suspects being met with deadly force way too early in an interaction.

I just don't like how the blanket claim is made.

By Michael Kerpan on Mon, 11/30/2015 - 3:24pm.

There has been a malignant change in the way police (in many localities) are trained to deal with (possibly) dangerous individuals since 2002. It is possible that this change in training has had a disproportionate impact in the lethality of police interactions with non-white individuals (as compared to whites) over the course of 13 years. Citing such an old example (which typified the way police _used_ to work) is not really germane.

By Waquiot on Mon, 11/30/2015 - 3:38pm.

In fact, I kind of agreed with you, mainly since the article notes that training says to treat potential threats as threats. I don't think changes in viewing people with their hands in their pockets relates to situations like this.

I think this might be facebook overload on my behalf. Too many memes. That said, I can go further back to Ruby Ridge and Waco and extrapolate that there may be nuances to how different law enforcement agencies have deal with situations. I certainly won't deny that race colors interactions between law enforcement and groups, but I can give examples of killing sprees where the perpetrators were not white and they were taken alive.

By MostlyHarmless on Mon, 11/30/2015 - 12:36am.

The thing you have posited as a binary is, in point of fact, not.

You can be both a certified nutcase and a terrorist.

By BostonDog on Mon, 11/30/2015 - 7:19am.

[Deleted Comment. Wrong Thread]

By anonamizzle on Sun, 11/29/2015 - 10:50pm.

Before we had universalish healthcare in MA, when the working poor couldn't qualify for Masshealth but couldn't afford thousands a month for private insurance when between jobs or before the insurance kicked in, my friends and I would use Planned Parenthood for the physicals you needed to get a job. They do women's health exams on a sliding scale, and a pelvic exam/pap smear along comes with a form saying "normal physical exam," which is sufficient for jobs that just want evidence that you've seen a doctor and they took your blood pressure and you don't appear to be dying.

By O-FISH-L on Sun, 11/29/2015 - 11:56pm.

Reading about the joys of "bathroom sex with total randoms" on her employer's site, she may want to keep the engine running, more rides to PP await.

By SwirlyGrrl on Mon, 11/30/2015 - 12:26am.

You may think your comments are cute, but slut shaming went out with starched collars.

Of course, I can tell that you never even bothered to read her essay, because of your hatred of women ... and cops who actually protect and serve, apparently:

I am writing this because, regardless of the intended target of the terrorist in Colorado, a police officer died protecting the clinic on 3480 Centennial Boulevard in Colorado Springs. Garrett Swasey, 44, of the University of Colorado Colorado Springs police department is a hero. Garret Swasey had a wife, son, and daughter who, with the rest of this country, will remember him as a hero.

By Roman on Mon, 11/30/2015 - 1:41am.

to disagree with what PP does but still agree that it has a right to do it. One hopes it's also practically possible.

By Dot net on Mon, 11/30/2015 - 8:13am.

Glad to see you're not as misinformed on legal precedent as you are on race issues.

By erik g on Mon, 11/30/2015 - 10:10am.

Wasn't expecting to see you in here... I figured you'd still be recovering from the cerebral hemorrhage caused by the cognitive dissonance of reconciling the fact that you can't mindlessly cheer-lead both of your favorite groups of people, anti-abortion activists and police officers.

By anon on Mon, 11/30/2015 - 7:55am.

Does PP have any kind of security or armed guards?

By lbb on Mon, 11/30/2015 - 8:49am.

Whatever Planned Parenthood does for security (and they do plenty), they're not going to put it out in public, are they? As an organization that's been targeted with terrorist attacks since when (and when they happened on Reagan's watch, he called the FBI off the case and used ATF instead, hmmm, wonder why?), they know enough to publicize the details of their security. But if you read the crap newspaper accounts carefully, you'll be able to deduce a few things.

By anon on Mon, 11/30/2015 - 10:47am.

And thought it was a fair question. Thanks, I guess.

By lbb on Mon, 11/30/2015 - 1:34pm.

...but they have probably forgotten more than most of us will ever know on the subject of security. There's a reason why there weren't many more victims in this case.

By Malcolm Tucker on Mon, 11/30/2015 - 10:45am.

I've only ever been to the one at 1055 Comm Ave, but they have metal detectors and bag checks as well as a security guard. Not sure if the guard is armed, because - thankfully - no crises happened when I was there.

By Ron Newman on Mon, 11/30/2015 - 12:01pm.

My friend and neighbor Jenny posted this and gave everyone permission to share it far and wide.

In the many years since [the abortion], I've finished my education, getting a PhD. I've taught at several universities, and consulted for NASA. I currently work at Harvard. I've reconciled with my mother, and we have a strong and supportive relationship. I've grown into the type of woman I never thought I'd be. I'm pretty certain none of this would have been possible if I'd been trying to raise a child while I was trying to pull myself out of the horrible place I was in at the time when I got pregnant.