the rough magic blog

by Sydney Gayle Amanuel

Northern California looked like fall but it was August. Their draught was and still is, really bad. I remember thinking, ‘The planet is dying and our solution is to give it a slow death.’ I lived in NY but I was teaching at Berkeley for the summer. My boyfriend, who lived in Boston at the time, was on a tour with his band down the East Coast. We were at almost perfect ends of the United States, Northern Cali and South Florida, when I called him and told him I was pregnant. We'd been dating for almost a year.

We have what most consider a good, solid relationship; we are open and honest in our communication, we like to be around each other, he's seen me poop and vomit, all the basics. We talk about everything from politics to pop culture and like to debate with one another, so we’ve already discussed our stances on women's rights long ago. We agree that a woman has the right to decide what's best for herself, her life, and her body.

It was comforting to know that conversation already happened and there wasn’t some “hills like white elephants” situation in the room that we had to step over, but it was still hard to tell him knowing what came next: my personal choice to have an abortion.

I'm very close with my mom, so I was able to talk to her about my pregnancy and my plan to have an abortion. My best friend and roommate was an activist and grass rooter for planned parenthood and knew more than I did. I definitely did spend my time around like-minded people, but to have my mother, best friend, and my partner support me immediately, no questions asked, was more than relief, more than luck. I can't imagine the emotional upheaval for girls in less ideal situations. I was surrounded by positivity for my decision, something you don't see or hear about often and something that is more common than you think. Statistics say 1 in 3 women will have an abortion in her lifetime. It was only after I had decided to have mine, that women I knew spoke up and shared their experiences with me. As soon as I got back to New York I called my local Planned Parenthood and made an appointment.

As comforting as it was to have support from friends, the week before the abortion I found myself doing what everyone does, googling. How much does it hurt? How much does it cost? Will I feel physically bad after? Is the bleeding like a period? What method will be used? How long does it take? What are the risks?

It was almost like google was typing back, surprise! Feel ashamed you careless idiot! Every story I read, every personal account of an abortion, was a tale of woe and regret, of guilt and shame over the death of a child. And these weren't even sites with a blatant religious slant, these made up the first full page of my google search, presented as fact. The internet is not really your friend, not in our post-fact world, alternative fact world. You would think with the abundance of fact checking capabilities and resources, we could sift, see past misinformation, but it’s not so easy. Especially if you are alone. If, unlike me, you didn’t have a mom or a best friend to turn to and say things out loud, make them real. I wasn't really phased by the stories, I've always been strong in my convictions and I've never sat on the fence about a woman's right to choose, but I was stunned at the amount of forums screaming, "Don't do it."

After hours of clicks and scrolls I found myself deep in Youtube looking at abortion photos week by week up until stillbirths. *Not for the faint of heart* If you don’t like blood, don’t look. But for me, it was helpful and kind of amazing. I felt like I was rediscovering my vagina in a way. I remembered when I learned women can masturbate just like men do and orgasm too—I felt tricked. The woman is taboo, and everyone wants to talk about us, just not truthfully and not with us in the room. I closed my laptop.

The day of my procedure. I’m about to get down to details here, feel free to turn back, I’m not censoring anything so, content warning folks.

My roommate went with me to the clinic—turned out guests couldn’t really go further than the front door, they had a whole separate waiting room on the bottom floor. I sat in the designated patients waiting room, staring at glossy pamphlets, wondering if the girl across from me was also here for an abortion. I looked around trying to nonverbally communicate and tell her, “It's okay, I’m scared too.” I didn't know this at the time, but Planned Parenthood not only provides many services for women’s health, but also they have their own staff dedicated to insurance as well as counselors to talk to. Planned Parenthood didn't take my insurance, so they lead me to their insurance floor where I sat and talked with an agent. She explained that through the Affordable Care Act (Obamacare), I would be covered for my abortion as well as a new birth control method. I asked what the co-pay was or what she guesstimated the bill to be. She told me I was completely covered, I wouldn't owe anything, that's what the ACA is for. It helps people—that's what it does.

After the insurance was settled, I was called to have a quick checkup and ultrasound. Then they sent me to meet with a counselor who looked a lot like a girl I used to do a radio talk show with in college. I didn't know meeting a counselor was mandatory and I felt uncomfortable, afraid she was going to talk me out of getting the abortion or make me feel the shame the internet implied I should feel. When she asked, “What brings you here today?" I think I may have just said "Abortion." I was so confused and anxious. She nodded and we started to discuss birth control. I wanted to explain: I’m not careless or uneducated, I taught sex-ed to middle and high schoolers, my mom supported me, I use condoms, I’m in a healthy relationship, I’m normal. I wanted to be told that an abortion was normal. She eased me through any questions I had or topics I wanted to discuss. I asked if I could see the sonogram they took of me. She told me I was six weeks along and there, in the shaded grey was a barely visible white dot on my black open uterus. A sack of cells. I kind of wanted to keep the picture, but then thought she might think that was weird, and I realized, yeah that is weird, so I didn't ask. We decided on a new form of birth control together. I had been on the pill since I was 15, I had no choice at the time. I had ovarian cysts and had to regulate myself before they got any worse, but didn't like the negative hormonal effects from the pill. I had mood swings, weight gain, acne, and I never remembered to take it which made me sick and reduced its effectiveness. AKA I had an ineffective form of birth control, which is why I got pregnant. I decided to have an IUD which, she told me, could be put in right after the abortion. No one I knew had an IUD, even my Gyno never mentioned it. But its description was like a light at the end of the tunnel I was walking down again, my taboo female body had been left in the dark.

When it comes to an abortion, there are two options: a surgical abortion or a medical abortion. Surgical abortions take place in a hospital or center, while medical abortions are induced by pills you can take at home. If you have the surgical abortion, you have the choice to be put to sleep or stay awake.

I wanted to have the surgical. I wanted to stay awake. I wanted to fully understand the procedure, be present and remember everything. If I chose to be put to sleep, would I remember anything? Or would it feel like those waking dreams, the ones you can’t discern from reality, and leave you only feeling sad when you wake up. Wishing you could go back in and feel it, even if it was bad. I wanted to know, so I could tell my friends, any woman, that her choice is her choice and it's okay.

In my hospital gown, with blue booties on my feet, I sat in a semicircle of chairs. Other girls also had gowns and booties on, we were all the same. Sitting.

I was given a small white paper cup containing two tylenol pills.

I laid on a white table in a small white room. There were three women in the room, a doctor, her assistant and myself. The doctor explained the numbing solution she was going to put on my cervix can make a person’s lips numb too, like novocaine. I laid back, she numbed me, and kept talking, explaining the next steps. The numbing stuff actually made me lose hearing, quite quickly. The doctor had been talking to me in a calm, slow voice and suddenly a ringing started that got higher in pitch until my ears felt like they were underwater while also on an airplane. I tried to talk, to tell her I couldn’t hear, but I realized I couldn't form the words. So I just sort of grunted to let her know I was okay. She turned on a large machine next to the table I laid on. It looked like a vacuum—it basically was. The machine made a loud sucking and groaning noise which I could hear clearly. This was when the pain started. Special absorbent rods were then used to dilate my cervix. I assumed it was similar to induced labor—your insides sort of start pushing and pumping and it is very, very painful. Women: imagine your worst period cramps x20 and also giving birth all at once. The machine pulled and sucked up the blood as it was being pushed out and my body worked in overdrive to assist the process. This lasted for maybe 10 minutes, but it felt like 30. The whole time I held my hands clasped together, pressed hard into my chest and stared at a florescent light above me. Its plastic covering was painted to look like clouds. I barely remember her putting in the IUD. When the doctor turned the machine off, everything happened fast. They sat me up, placed a pad between my legs and scooted me into a wheelchair. I involuntarily started crying, but I wasn't sad. I think I was happy, relieved.

I was wheeled to a recovery room and placed in a big comfy chair, pad between my legs and hot compress on my uterus to help with the pain. I was exhausted, but also very concerned with accidentally bleeding through my gown and kept drunkenly patting myself to make sure I wasn't. The doctor put a hand on my shoulder and said “We have to do an ultrasound to make sure we got everything.”

In another room, a nurse pressed the plastic ultrasound probe through the cold gel onto my skin. My uterus felt like a used punching bag. They missed part of the sac and I was told they had to go back in to remove the rest, it would be dangerous to leave it. Once again, I was back in the small white room looking up at the fake painted clouds. Another nurse was in the room this time using the ultrasound while the doctor performed my second abortion so that she could clearly see the remaining sac. When she asked how I was doing, I almost laughed. The nurse smiled and held my hand. She told me I was so brave to do this and that I was doing well.

In less than an hour, I technically had two abortions. They also had to insert, remove, and reinsert my IUD. I was told what happened was very rare, and they usually get everything with no complications. I was also told the blood and sac were dark, meaning the blood was old and had been sitting. This could indicate different things, but most likely I would have had a miscarriage if I didn't have an abortion. After my second abortion I was back in the recovery room again, soon changing back into my clothes and eating crackers they tell you to eat before you snip your bracelet off and sign yourself out.

My roommate and I took the subway back to our apartment and within three days I felt fine with no pain or IUD side effects. A month later I got a letter from Medicaid saying I owed nothing but if I wanted to re-up on my insurance I could join and start a plan. A year later I was working in California again, feeling lucky to be alive. I called my partner and we talked about how different our worlds would have been without my abortion, without my right to choose. Now, two years later, the leader of our nation believes in punishing women who undergo this procedure.

I felt compelled to write about my experience, mostly for girls like me. I wanted to tell those girls, those women, that I did it and I am fine. I did it and I am normal and so are you. I am not ashamed, or embarrassed, nor am I guilty or regretful. I'm not saying my decision was easy, but I knew immediately what my decision would be. When I think to myself that 100 or even 50 years ago this was not an option for women, I feel sick. But the truth is, we haven’t really come that far. Look at us, at our country as a whole at the March for Life, the grab em by the pussys, the repetative rape culture. I can only understand these issues through my experiences being a woman in this country. And I fear for marginalized lives, those not as privileged as I am. I fear for those who are people of color, non-white passing, non-cisgendered, for anyone in the LGBTQ community, for anyone of Islamic faith, and for any woman whose rights will be taken away or compromised.

I had my abortion legally, safely, through Planned Parenthood. I now have an effective form of birth control for the next eight years. Both my abortion and birth control were covered under a health program created to give affordable healthcare to Americans that need it. Planned Parenthood offers healthcare and services to both men and women. They provide STI and STD testing as well as HIV testing. Planned Parenthood helped me—they are there to help. To remove funding for services and centers, to create laws that ban certain procedures, and to shut down care centers nationwide is to tell all women in this country that their reproductive rights and health care is not important. It tells women that you do not support them and will actively regress and erase years of an uphill battle that they alone have climbed. What is most hurtful, most frustrating, is that the people who need to read this message will not take the time to. But to those who have, thank you. I hope we can change things, I hope we don't have to end up always fixing them, again, forever.

by Paige Chaplin

I will never be someone's favorite band because I am a woman. I am only one. I try not to let this break my heart.

Two months ago, I played an excellent show. In an ideal world, this would be the last sentence to this post. In an ideal world, I would walk away from an excellent show feeling satisfied, good enough, accomplished, but I don’t—not always.

I have been the opener for almost every show I’ve ever played, since I first started playing shows in 2007. I never used to question this, I was mostly just grateful to be playing at all. But as I got older and more experienced, I started asking myself: Why? The answer: Because somebody somewhere decided that “standard show protocol” means having the solo singer-songwriter open every show. Because most of the time, the other acts on the bill consist of louder acts. Louder acts, at least in the Boston area, consist of, more often than not, men. Because somebody somewhere decided that it makes sense to have women open for men, to have women be the “primers”. Because showgoers care more about seeing bands than they do about seeing solo female singer-songwriters. Because we are naturally seen as less talented than our male counterparts. Because we are below the big names on the show posters, we are at the bottom of the totem pole, we are the part of the show that isn’t a part of the show. Somebody somewhere decided this.

A friend I love very much was in charge of booking the aforementioned show, so when he asked me to play a few months prior, I was overjoyed. I specifically asked him if I could not open the show, because I knew I was the only female solo act on the bill, and because I knew that most of the crowd wouldn’t show up until a bit later in the evening, and I wanted to have a decent audience because it was my first show in quite a while—I had been on a bit of a performing hiatus. My friend agreed. He said I wouldn’t be the opener, but I would play second. I was, again, overjoyed.

Fast forward to one week before the show, and my friend posts the set times. All of a sudden I am the opener, and I felt the agreement between my friend and I get swiftly and quietly flushed down the toilet. I cried. I had given up. I wanted to return to the scene strong with this show, really make an impression, but once again, I felt pushed down and ignored, amongst a bill full of mostly male-dominated bands. It had happened again.

For the first time in my life, I called my friend on the phone and I put up a fight. When I called him out, he told me, “I understand. You’re definitely more right than I am,” and I wondered: Why can’t I just be right? Why does my rightness have to be in comparison to yours, why does it have to be lesser than yours? He asked, “Would you put up this kind of fight with another promoter? Probably not, because I am scared, and because you are my friend, because you are a man that I trust. I trust you to help me navigate this unfair space. Use what you have that I do not have, to help me. He said, “Whoever is most active in the scene plays last.” But even when I was active in the scene, I was playing first. I’ve always played first. How am I supposed to be active if no one will let me?

He listened to me when all was said and done, and I played second, but I had to fight for it, and that hurt me more than anything, more than the initial let down.

The show ended up being great. I felt well-received and appreciated by the audience, who genuinely paid attention and seemed to enjoy my set. I heard sniffles during quiet moments. I knew I was doing my job, and that gave me an intense and joyous feeling I hadn’t felt in such a long time. But right beside that pride and happiness was the anxiety from the effort I had to put in in order to get what I wanted, how I felt like a “bitch” for having done that—for finally voicing my opinion and attempting to justify to my friend the unfair dynamic of booking shows. It was my first time fighting for a spot other than the opener, an argument I know my male counterparts probably never have to have.

As anxious as I felt about the altercation with my friend, I felt as though fighting for my spot made the turnout even better. It made my performance one of power and ferocity. I wasn’t afraid to be angry. I wasn’t afraid to sound ugly—to not sound like an angel. I wasn’t afraid to let the songs speak for themselves. I just wasn’t afraid anymore.

It took me a very long time to realize that there is a special kind of vulnerability you must be willing to offer an audience if you’re a woman on stage with a guitar, playing by herself. I know this now, and I recognize the strength in it.

I am still living inside this narrative. I know there will be other arguments. I know there will be times when I am too afraid to fight for what I want. I know my absence of fear is not permanent, I know that it may be fleeting.

So, to male musicians, bookers, promoters, audiences:

by Taylor Liljegren

This guy that I used to spend time with would consistently pick the same fight with me. The last time it happened, it went like this:

"You have to separate the art from the artist.  Just because Woody Allen is a shitty dude doesn't make his art not art."

We are standing on Newbury Street and I am finally realizing that I am not being listened to.  I will probably never be listened to in the way that I need to be.  I am here to punctuate his soliloquy.  I punctuate:

"I don't think men who hurt women are capable of creating authentic art."

And yes, women can hurt men.  Yes women can be abusers.  Yes we should boycott female artists who are.  But the systematic way in which women are left out of art—made into the muse, at whatever cost—is unforgivable.  He retorts with the most telling thing he has ever said to me, the reason I am here writing about this conversation instead of continuing to have it with him:

"What does that mean though?  Hurting women?"

Because if you have to ask, you are probably complicit in it happening.   If you have to validate the art of men who hurt women—instead of validating the lived experiences of the women they have hurt—you are part of the problem.  If you just haveto watch Annie Hall again, you are letting all survivors of sexual assault know that in the face of a good flick, anything can be forgiven.