Lost babies

M has gone off to my cousin in N. London by train and I’m trying to deal with the paper mountain on my desk. I declined the invitation to go with him and have lunch with my cousin and husband, because I really needed this opportunity to deal with some of the post left over from our holiday. M is hoping to solve a technical problem for them, and I’m always best out of that. In fact I saw my cousin on Sunday at the Diamond Wedding lunch, which was most enjoyable. Unfortunately, M decided to mix business with pleasure then, and we went back from Ilford via Croydon, where he wanted to call in on some restaurants who are installing extraction systems. I can’t tell you how long and boring the journey was. We went via ten thousand traffic lights, and when we eventually stopped at the customer and I tried to read my current Reading Group book (The Emigrants), I found that pretty boring too. (Sorry Mr Sebald – unbroken text, with no interruption for dialogue, or quote marks – however worthy and literary the book is, it’s not for me.) I spent yesterday, tired and stiff from sitting in the car, and generally cross all day.

They are talking a great deal about abortion at the moment, and strong views are held on either side. I find myself very divided on the topic. Although (as I’ve said before) I’m not a died in the wool feminist, for example, I don’t mind the fact that M and I divide our roles in the household along fairly traditional lines, I nevertheless, am sympathetic to the principle that women should have control over their bodies. But when I hear it said that women don’t have abortions lightly – it’s a serious decision – I find it difficult to believe that one can generalise about this. I think for many women, abortion’s there as an option; the option after birth control – or even possibly instead of birth control. I have no right to say this, based on gut feeling, rather than serious research, but I can’t believe that this many abortions would be occurring each year if legal abortion were not a possibility. My judgement is coloured by the fact that I have lost two babies through miscarriage as well as having a cot death. I can remember, when I miscarried, how angry I felt at the lack of funds going into research into miscarriage, and how vocal were the women who wanted the right to abort their babies. At that stage of life, one’s sympathy is tempered with bitterness at the many women who want to lose perfectly healthy babies, when one is desperately trying to have and to keep another child oneself.