What About My Daddy?

Abortion hurts women. It’s a well known fact. But many times we don’t even think about the men involved in the abortion. They need their pieces picked up too.

This past week I attended The National Right to Life conference in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania where I was able to hear Dr. Greg Hasek speak about the effects of abortion on men. He explained the perpetuation of the abuse, addiction, abortion, addiction, abuse cycle that most affects men.

Men subjected to abuse as an adolescent are more likely than men not subjected to abuse to develop addictions to sex, drugs and alcohol, and work. These addictions predispose these men to involvement in abortion resulting in unresolved grief.

This unresolved grief leads the men to cope by continuing their addictions which in turn leads to abuse of their partners and current children, if they have any. The man’s unresolved grief then turns to complicated grief which results in chronic grief reaction where his grief is never resolved. This causes his life to become stagnant and now new emotional growth cannot happen.

This chronic grief leads a man to wear masks to hide his psychological and emotional torment. The most common masks men hide behind are anger, detachment, performance, and depression.

Healing for these men is hard but not impossible. In order for the man to be fully healed from the pain of abortion he must first be free from his addiction and other psychological traumas suffered prior to the abortion. This can take anywhere from 6 to 8 months or longer.

After he is free from his addictions healing from the abortion itself can take place. He must be able to realize what he has done which can be difficult since strong emotional and psychological pain causes a man to become desensitized to the loss of a child. Then he must be able to forgive himself and the individuals involved in the abortion and the decision making process which led to the abortion.

Dr. Hasek’s session on men gave me a lot of insight on how men react and how they internalize their pain. It made me realize that while saving babies is our main priority we cannot forget about the men who suffer in silence.