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ASN December eBulletin: Tis the Season to help women

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ASN December eBulletin: Tis the Season to help women

 

Welcome to your ASN eBulletin. ASN on national TV. We’ve almost hit £1,000! ‘Tis the season to say thank you to those helping women – including our volunteers. And in November, ASN heard from 29 women. Hear some of their stories – and keep in touch!

 

  • ASN on 4Thought
  • £163 to go!
  • ‘Tis the season to be grateful
  • Women we’ve helped
  • Keep in touch

 

ASN on 4Thought TV

ASN’s Mara Clarke was invited to speak on Channel 4’s 4Thought on the topic of whether or not abortion clinics should be prevented from providing counselling to women seeking abortions. While we wish they hadn’t cut the part about ASN’s providing financial assistance and accommodation (our main purpose) we were glad to have the opportunity to provide our view. Well done Mara on flying the ASN flag and raising awareness among women who might need our help now or in future, as well as potential supporters and the general public. See all 7 4thought pieces on this issue here:

http://www.4thought.tv/themes/should-abortion-clinics-be-stopped-from-providing-counselling/mara-clarke

 

£163 to go

ASN’s campaign to raise £1,000 a month in regular income (standing orders from people in the UK and regular PayPal donations from those abroad), launched in March 2011 is going strong, and our monthly total is now at £837. If 32 of you give £5 a month, or 16 of you give £10 a month, we will reach our goal. Details of how to do this can be found here. Don’t forget to register for Gift Aid. And thanks!

 

‘Tis the season to be grateful

It is not possible for us to spend enough time thanking the family planning clinics and other organisations who send women our way, help them access the services they need, and fight for the rights of women living in Ireland and Northern Ireland to access safe and legal abortions in their own countries. Please consider donating, supporting or getting involved with one or more of these amazing and important organisations.

 

The organisations helping women access safe abortions

  • bpasadvocates for and provides high quality, affordable services to prevent unwanted pregnancies with contraception or end them by abortion with 19 clinics and 36 consultation centres located throughout the UK.
  • South Manchester Private Clinicpromotes the sexual health of men, women and young people. It offers abortion treatments and free pregnancy testing, sexually transmitted infection screening and a fully comprehensive contraceptive service.
  • Marie Stopes International is the UK’s leading provider of sexual and reproductive healthcare services. They are committed to providing all the help you need to make informed choices about your health.
  • The Calthorpe Clinic in Birmingham supports the right for people to limit their family. For 40 years, it has been providing surgical and medical terminations for thousands of women each year.
    Women on Web is an online medical abortion service that aims to reduce the number of deaths due to unsafe abortions in countries where abortion is highly restricted or illegal. WoW helps women in these countries gain access to a safe abortion using pills.

 

The groups fighting for abortion law reform – a partial list of the many, many organisations who are working to make abortion legal in Ireland and Northern Ireland – ASN is cheering you on and we happily wait for the day when your efforts successfully put us out of business!

 

Abortion Funds

  • The National Network of Abortion Funds (NNAF) is a network of more than 100 grassroots abortion funds and practical support organisations (including ASN, who wouldn’t exist without NNAF’s help and support!) that help to make sure that all women and girls can access abortions.
  • Before ASN, there was the Irish Women’s Abortion Support Group (IWASG), a group of Irish women in England who helped women from Ireland and N Ireland travel over for abortions from 1980 to 2000. Their story was told in Ann Rossiter’s book, Ireland’s Hidden Diaspora.

 

Pro Choice champions

ASN could not exist without our amazing ASN VOLUNTEERS, who answer calls from women between work, family and other commitments, write our materials, design our annual reports and websites, raise our funds, balance our books and get the word out about the work we’re doing. Our without our supporters, who provide the funds to help women access safe and legal abortions.

 

Thank you thank you thank you!

 

Women we’ve helped

In November, ASN heard from 29 women. We are immensely grateful to all of you who enable us to help women.

 

This month, we’d like to let women speak to you in their own words:


i have contacted ye in email and ye rang me back i couldn answer as i was with family i need this uregent as i dnt want a baby as i have a young baby and i had very bad postnatal depression after and was very hard cope i woudn be able deal with anther baby aswell as im jus getting back on my feet d last few mths  i need this done asap as its getting me down nd findin it very hard and i have noone to talk too bout this i cant cope with another baby would be to much

 

I really appreciate how much effort you have gone to in providing me with all of the information. I did not expect so much help at all and it was a great help. I really am very grateful, I had never heard of your organisation before and I’m sure there are probably many others who are in a similar situation to me who would like to know about it too.

 

I have just found out that I am pregnant and desperately need to have an abortion I need some form of urgent help. Although I am in a stable relationship, my partner is not supportive of me having an abortion, despite the fact that neither of us are ready for a baby. He has told me he will never look at me the same again ‘knowing that I have killed it’. But I can’t possibly have this baby! I can’t tell my parents because they will be so disappointed that I am pregnant in the first place but at the same time I don’t think they would support an abortion either. I feel completely alone and trapped. Whatever I do somebody gets hurt or is disappointed in me but I truly feel that abortion is my only option. A baby deserves a good life and right now I can’t provide that. Please help me in some way. I’m desperate.

 

To all at Asn,I would just like to express my deepest gratitude to all at ASN who have helped me in the last two weeks. Words cannot descibe how grateful i am to you all. You have helped me  by both providing practical advice and much needed funds to ensure that it would be possible to travel for a abortion. Me and boyfriend will never forget the help and support you provided. The abortion was done and was only possible because of the help we recieved, having a abortion is hard enough emotionaly without  the added stress of trying to arange travel and money. You all at ASN made it possible and I only hope that in the future I will be in a postion to help other women and girls the way you have. Thank you so much, Student 18.

 

ASN thanks these women and men for sharing their stories with us, and for permitting us to share them with you.

 

Keep in Touch

Want to make sure you have all the ASN news as soon as it happens? Follow us on Twitter or like us on Facebook. Also, from next month, this eBulletin will have a new look and feel, courtesy of MailChimp and another one of our fabulous volunteers.

 

Thank you thank you thank you!

ASN is funded almost entirely by the generous donations of individual supporters – like you! Without ASN, the many women we help wouldn’t be able to access vital financial and practical support towards covering the costs of their procedures and their journeys. Donations to ASN are vitally important to the lives of women faced with unplanned pregnancies.

We are entirely volunteer-run, and our small overhead costs are covered by a regular donation. This means that any money you donate goes directly towards the cost of a woman’s abortion or transport to England.

 Thank you again for all your support. Without you, we wouldn’t have been able to provide accommodation, financial assistance, and confidential, non-judgemental information to the women in difficult circumstances who have contacted us.