After an abortion

The body still has to finish what started. The after is not a slogan. It is bleeding, a follow-up, and sometimes grief sitting next to relief. Both can be true in the same week. That does not make you a problem.

You’re not alone. A nurse can talk with you in chat. Free and private. A listed center may run recovery groups at their location. Their phone is theirs.

Talk with a nurse — free, private.

You will not be pressured here.

What the body can do

Uterine bleeding happens in almost all patients after a medication abortion. Vaginal bleeding or spotting lasts 9 to 16 days on average. Heavy bleeding has a median of 2 days. Up to 8% have some type of bleeding more than 30 days. It is often heavier than a heavy period. About 1% need surgical evacuation for heavy bleeding. About 85% report at least one adverse reaction. Abdominal pain and cramping are expected.

Cramping can be severe — worse than a period. That does not make it labor as a medical term.

Expected is not the same as ignore it.

Serious and sometimes fatal infections and bleeding occur very rarely following spontaneous, surgical, and medical abortions, including after mifepristone. No causal relationship between the use of mifepristone and misoprostol and these events has been established. Prolonged heavy bleeding may be a sign of incomplete abortion. Soak through two thick full-size sanitary pads per hour for two consecutive hours: that is an emergency-room threshold. If you are crashing before the second hour, do not wait. Fever of 100.4°F or higher lasting more than 4 hours: same. Serious infection can present without fever.

Pain and bleeding can also be a ruptured ectopic pregnancy. The regimen is not treatment for ectopic pregnancy. A ruptured ectopic can be fatal.

FDA labeling says follow-up about 7 to 14 days after mifepristone is very important to confirm the pregnancy has ended and to evaluate bleeding. Lack of bleeding usually indicates failure. Prolonged or heavy bleeding is not proof of a complete abortion. If listed contacts cannot be reached, go to an ER.

Soak two thick pads an hour for two consecutive hours: that is an ER. If you are crashing before the second hour, do not wait. Tell the ER the medicine names — mifepristone, misoprostol, or both, if you know — so they can treat you.

Bleeding and cramping can look like a miscarriage. Symptom overlap is not the same sentence as “it was just a miscarriage.” The sources do not say the tissue, pain, or infection risk is identical.

The Act’s target is not the woman upon whom an abortion is performed or attempted. Still tell an ER the medicine names. This is not legal advice.

> Emergency. Heavy bleeding, fainting, severe abdominal pain, fever, one-sided pain, or pain at the tip of your shoulder: call 911. If you may harm yourself, call or text 988. That is not the nurse chat.

How it can feel

Researchers and professional bodies have reached different conclusions about abortion and later mental health. Some people feel relief, some feel grief, some feel both. An unwanted pregnancy is itself hard. If you are struggling, you are not alone — talk with a clinician or counselor.

Grief next to relief is ordinary enough that you do not have to pick one word for the whole month. If the after is still happening and you want someone on this site, a nurse can sit with the practical part. If one-sided pain or bleeding that will not stop is happening now, Sharp pain on one side, or bleeding that won’t stop leads with 911.

If you have taken only mifepristone and you want this pregnancy to continue, that conversation lives on Changed your mind after the first pill?. Talk with a nurse here first. If you already took misoprostol, that is not an APR page. If you are crashing, 911.

We will not invent a story and put someone else’s name on it.

Local recovery groups, only where a listed center says so

These are independent. Call them on their number. Do not assume a schedule from this list. The groups belong to those centers.

• Her Choice Birmingham Women’s Center — post-abortion recovery groups. 205-252-0706. 2120 7th Avenue South, Birmingham.
• Huntsville Pregnancy Resource Center — post-abortion counsel. 256-533-3526. 220 Rands Ave SE.
• First Choice Women’s Medical Center, Montgomery — abortion recovery. 334-423-9900.
• Pregnancy Resource Center Hueytown — abortion recovery support. 205-491-2626.
• Care Net of Chilton County, Clanton — post-abortion support. 205-755-6767.
• Wiregrass Hope Pregnancy Center, Dothan — counseling, including post-abortive. 334-793-0001.
• Mary’s Haven, Prattville — post-abortive care resources. 334-365-6262.

More addresses from this starter pass: Find a center near you. Call the center before you drive.

If the remaining question is still the two drugs — what bleeding can look like, what to tell an ER — the fuller pill site is abortionpillsAL.com.

A nurse can use an interpreter. This site is written in English first.

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Independent pregnancy centers named on this site are not a chain and not each other’s branches.

Chat is not medical care. An emergency room is.

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