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eowyntheavenger · 3 months

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By Emily Strasser | August 9, 2023

At the theater where I saw Oppenheimer on opening night, there was a handmade photo booth featuring a pink backdrop, “Barbenheimer” in black letters, and a “bomb” made of an exercise ball wrapped in hoses. I want to tell you that I flinched, but I laughed and snapped a photo. It took a beat before I became horrified—by myself and the prop. Today is the 78th anniversary of the bombing of Nagasaki, which killed up to 70,000 people and came only three days after the bombing of Hiroshima that killed as many as 140,000 people. Yet still we make jokes of these weapons of genocide.

Oppenheimer does not make a joke of nuclear weapons, but by erasing the specific victims of the bombings, it repeats a sanitized treatment of the bomb that enables a lighthearted attitude and limits the power of the film’s message. I know this sanitized version intimately, because my grandfather spent his career building nuclear weapons in Oak Ridge, Tennessee, the site of uranium enrichment for the Hiroshima bomb. My grandfather died before I was born, and though there were photographs of mushroom clouds from nuclear tests hanging on my grandmother’s walls, we never discussed Hiroshima, Nagasaki, or the fact that Oak Ridge, still an active nuclear weapons production site, is also a 35,000-acre Superfund site. At the Catholic church in town, a pious Mary stands atop an orb bearing the overlapping ovals symbolizing the atom, and until it closed a few years ago, a local restaurant displayed a sign with a mushroom cloud bursting out of a mug of beer.

Oppenheimer does not show a single image of Hiroshima or Nagasaki. Instead, it recreates the horror through Oppenheimer’s imagination, when, during a congratulatory speech to the scientists of Los Alamos after the bombing of Hiroshima, the sound of the hysterically cheering crowd goes silent, the room flashes bright, and tatters of skin peel from the face of a white woman in the audience. The scene is powerful and unsettling, and, arguably, avoids sensationalizing the atrocity by not depicting the victims outright. But it also plays into a problematic pattern of whitewashing both the history and threat of nuclear war by appropriating the trauma of the Japanese victims to incite fear about possible future violence upon white bodies. An example of this pattern is a 1948 cover of John Hersey’s Hiroshima, which featured a white couple fleeing a city beneath a glowing orange sky, even though the book itself brought the visceral human suffering to American readers through the eyes of six actual survivors of the bombing.

The Oppenheimer film also neglects the impacts of fallout from nuclear testing, including from the Trinity test depicted in the film; the harm to the health of blue-collar production workers exposed to toxic and radiological materials; and the contamination of Oak Ridge and other production sites. Instead, the impressive pyrotechnics of the Trinity test, images of missile trails descending through clouds toward a doomed planet, and Earth-consuming fireballs interspersed with digital renderings of a quantum universe of swirling stars and atoms, elevate the bomb to the realm of the sublime—terrible, yes, but also awesome.

A compartmentalized project. The origins of this treatment can be traced to the Manhattan Project, when scientists called the bomb by the euphemistic code word “gadget” and the security policy known as compartmentalization limited workers’ knowledge of the project to the minimum necessary to complete their tasks. This policy helped to dilute responsibility and quash moral debates and dissent. Throughout the film, we see Oppenheimer move from resisting compartmentalization to accepting it. When asked by another scientist about his stance on a petition against dropping the bomb on Japan, he responds that the builders of the bomb do not have “any more right or responsibility” than anyone else to determine how it will be used, despite the fact that the scientists were among the few who even knew of its existence.

Due to compartmentalization, the vast majority of the approximately half-million Manhattan Project workers, like my grandfather, could not have signed the petition because they did not know what they were building until Truman announced the bombing of Hiroshima. Afterward, press restrictions limited coverage of the humanitarian impacts, giving the false impression that the bombings had targeted major military and industrial sites—and eliding the vast civilian toll and the novel horrors of radiation. Photographs and films of the aftermath, shot by Japanese journalists and American military, were classified and suppressed in the United States and occupied Japan.

The limit of theory. Not only is it dishonest and harmful to erase the suffering of the real victims of the bomb, but doing so moves the bomb into the realm of the theoretical and abstract. One recurring theme of the film is the limit of theory. Oppenheimer was a brilliant theorist but a haphazard experimentalist. A close friend and fellow scientist questions whether he’ll be able to pull off this massive, high-stakes project of applied theory. Just before the detonation of the Trinity test bomb, General Leslie Groves, the military head of the project, asks Oppenheimer about a joking bet overheard among the scientists regarding the possibility that the explosion would ignite the atmosphere and destroy the world. Oppenheimer assures Groves that they have done the math and the possibility is “near zero.” “Near zero?” Groves asks, alarmed. “What do you want from theory alone?” responds Oppenheimer.

Can the theoretical motivate humanity to action?

One telling scene shows Oppenheimer at a lecture on the impacts of the bomb. We hear the speaker describe how dark stripes on victims’ clothing were burned onto their skin, but the camera remains on Oppenheimer’s face. He looks at the screen, gaunt and glassy-eyed, for a few moments, before turning away. Americans are still looking away. As a country, we’ve succumbed to “psychic numbing,” as Robert Jay Lifton and Greg Mitchell call it in their book Hiroshima in America, which leads to general apathy about nuclear weapons—and pink mushroom clouds and bomb props for selfies.

On this anniversary of Nagasaki, the world stands on a precipice, closer than ever to nuclear midnight. The nine nuclear-armed states collectively possess more than 12,500 warheads; the more than 9,500 nuclear weapons available for use in military stockpiles have the combined power of more than 135,000 Hiroshima-sized bombs.

If Oppenheimer motivates conversation, activism, and policy shifts in support of nuclear abolition, that’s a good thing. But by relegating the bomb to abstracted images removed from actual humanitarian consequences, the film leaves the weapon in the realm of the theoretical. And as Oppenheimer says in the film, “theory will only take you so far.” Today, it’s vital that we understand the devastating impacts that nuclear weapons have had and continue to have on real victims of their production, testing, and wartime use. Our survival may depend on it.

#oppenheimer #nuclear weapons #nuclear testing

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grandlinedreams · 5 months

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Do you have any thoughts about who would Corazon, Doflamingo, the crew, Luffy etc be in the modern AU?

I DO hehe but I'm up for suggestions for Usopp, Franky and Robin ㅡ for the modern au, I have so far as follows:

Corazon is absolutely an elementary school teacher who has Law come in for career day and brags about him and the kids ask if Law is his son (he says yes, and Law almost cries).

Doflamingo absolutely is involved in the rise and fall of global economics/world trade and stock investments. Shady as fuck, definitely guilty of some less than legal things, but nobody's been able to get proof yet.

Penguin and Shachi are either RNs or instrument techs for Law or radiology techs. They're also his wingmen (he doesn't want them to, but alas) and try constantly to get him a date.

Ace is an EMT ㅡ Marco is his partner, but Ace also has a way of calming down both young patients and older ones. Always has some kind of stuffed animal in the back of the rig, makes silly jokes, generally does his best to keep patients calm.

Sabo works in dispatch for Ace 'n Marco ㅡ also helps clean out the rig if he needs to, also helps get paperwork turned in when Ace inevitably forgets.

Luffy i haven't decided whether to put him as a firefighter or have him as a pediatric nurse because he, like his older brother, has a way of putting kids at ease and showing them the hospital isn't so scary.

Sanji is absolutely works in a Michelin starred restaurant that has months out in booking, but as far as where exactly he is is up for debate because he's multifaceted.

Zoro I'm also not sure with because there is the idea that he either teaches Kendo or he's a personal trainer

Nami is absolutely a meteorologist with a higher percentage of accuracy bc she knows how weather patterns work.

#ㅡanswered.

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vsingers · 2 months

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thinking about completely changing my career path and applying for the radiology program at my local cc

#going from humanities to stem. what a turn #i've realized id be better off in a field i like that pays the bills rather than a field i love that doesnt. yknow what i mean #the jobs i wanted to try for with my comms degree are literally hobbies i could still do While making a livable wage like #t

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cuttergauthier · 1 year

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Doctor

Female Doctor reader x Mason McTavish

Warning: Hurt Jamie, fluff Mason, Hospital

word count: 1.0k

Sorry for taking so long, this week has been busy & i haven’t had much time to write!

let me know what you guys think🤍

I was at work since 7:00 p.m. I had the night shift today, It’s now 10:00 p.m. I live in Anaheim, I grew up here, now I’m a doctor at Anaheim medical center, I work in Orthopedics.

“Doctor Y/n you’ve got a new patient” Nurse Emily told me, before giving me a file.

“Thanks Em, which room?” I asked

“Room four” she said smiling.

“Thank you” I smiled before we both made our way to room four.

When we got there, I knocked before going in.

“Hey, I’m doctor y/l/n, I see you hurt you’re left shoulder?” I asked as I walked into the room. I looked up from the file to see the patient on the bed and his friend sat in the chair next to the bed.

His friend was good looking, I smiled at both.

“Yeah” my patient said.

“I would like to get an x-ray so I can see how serious it is, and we can go from there” I told him. he nodded.

“How did this happen?” I asked as I looked at his shoulder.

“Hockey injury” he said in pain. I nodded.

“Okay the swelling as gone down, so I’m going to take you to X-Ray so we can see how bad the injury is”

He nodded and Emily and I brought him into the x-ray room. Jenna the radiologic technologist got him ready for the x-ray as Emily and I went to the other room and met with the radiologist.

“Dam poor kid, this is only his second season and he’s already injured” the radiologist Paul said. I looked at him confused.

“Huh, what do you mean its only his second season?” I ask confused, I know he said it was a hockey injury but how would Paul know it’s only his second season.

“Do you not know who he is?” Paul asked me.

“No, all I know is he’s, my patient.”

“I thought you grew up watching the ducks?”

“I did, haven’t watched them play in a while though. What does this have to do with him?” I was still confused, did he mean this guy played for the ducks?

“He’s on the team, he’s number six, he’s pretty good to” Paul said, and I nodded.

“Dam then this must really suck then” I said sadly. This is his career, I can’t even imagine what I would do If I couldn’t be a doctor because I got injured.

The X-ray came through and Emily got Jamie back to his room. I had to wait and see with Paul to look at the x-ray.

“Crap it’s a torn labrum” Paul said.

“He’s going to need surgery” I said sadly. Paul nodded. He gave me the x-ray and I made my way to room four so I could tell Jamie the news.

I knocked on the door before entering.

When I got Jamie and his friend were talking, but they stopped when they saw me.

“How bad is it doc?” Jamie asked.

“I’m sorry Mr. Drysdale, but you can see here that you have a torn labrum, and you will need surgery.” I said sadly as I showed him his x-ray. He was devastated.

“When can I have the surgery? And how long will the recovery be?” he asked. His teammate looked at him sadly.

“To have the surgery we need to make sure there is no swelling, the swelling is almost gone, so I can give you some medication and I can schedule the surgery tomorrow morning” I told him.

“And his recovery?” his friend asked me.

“Four to six months” I said.

“Dammit” Jamie said.

“I’m sorry, I know you want to get back to playing, but we need to make sure your shoulder is fully healed so you don’t injure it more” I said sadly.

He nodded and agreed.

I schedule the surgery and said he could go home.

I walked out but his friend followed me.

“Hey, can I talk to you for a second”

“Of course, what can I help you with?”

“You’re really pretty and I was wondering if I could get your number?” he asked nervously.

I smiled and nodded.

He handed me his phone and I put my number in it, before handing it back to him.

“My names Mason by the way, I’m Jamie’s teammate” he said smiling.

“It’s nice to meet you Mason, you can call me y/n, text me sometime” I said smirking before walking away.

………

About a week later Mason called me and asked me on a date. I have a day off so I said yes.

I was getting ready, he said he would pick me up at 6:30 p.m. for dinner.

I’m excited but nervous, I really hope this goes well, especially since I’m his teammates doctor.

Once I was ready it was 6:15 so he would be here soon. I sat down on the couch waiting. A few minutes later the doorbell rang.

I made my way to the door and opened it.

“Hey” I said smiling

“Hey, you look stunning” he said smiling.

“Thank you, you look handsome”

“These are for you” he said handing me a bouquet of flowers.

“Thank you, these are beautiful, come in” I said making my way to the kitchen so I could put them in a vase.

Once I was done, I turned around and looked at him smiling.

“Are you ready to go?” I asked.

“Yes, let’s go” he said leading the way outside.

He opened the passenger door for me. I looked at him and smiled before getting in.

“What a gentleman” I said and he smiled.

“Of course,” he said smiling.

We made our way to the restaurant.

The date went really well, Mason was an amazing guy.

When he dropped me off back at home, he walked me up to the door. I looked at him smiling.

“I had a really great time tonight” I told him. he smiled.

“So did I, I was hoping we could do it again sometime?” he asked

“I’d love that”

“umm… can I kiss you?” he asked nervously. I chuckled before nodding.

He leaned in and kissed me. I put my hands around his neck as his go around my waist pulling me closer, our lips moved in sync.

We pulled away breathing heavily. We both smiled as his forehead leaned against mine.

“Wow” he said smiling.

“Wow is right” I smiled back.

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wachtelspinat · 1 year

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Hey Wachtel! Please take your time to respond to this and also maybe don't respond to this at all but if it's not too personal or something you would like to not think about at all, can I ask what discipline you decided to go for? People are right to admire you for your art skills but personally you were also always a huge inspiration to me when it comes to studying medicine (especially at an older age) and deciding to forego the artist professional career path. Did you choose surgery after all?

hey! no worries, this is not too personal, also my brief episode of extreme denial after my last exam has passed and i have to get in shape again anyways since i‘m starting as a resident in radiology at the beginning of april 🕺 which was my goal tbh for a long time, at least ever since i took an internship in the field a few years ago. this or nuclear medicine. because not only have these two disciplines a better (not a good, but better) work-life-balance than a lot of others in the medical field, the prospect of getting out of the hospital at one point in the future and working in the ambulant sector (i don‘t think this is a wildly known concept outside of germany and a few other countries, but basically medical care that‘s not provided in hospitals) is more likely achievable than in, for example, surgery. PLUS… i really love working in fields that use medical imaging. and radiation. i‘m massively fascinated by radiation and its effects.

so yeah… i know i once stated that i considered choosing surgery once i became a doctor but my experience as a surgical nurse and on top of that my time there in my elective showed me that this is just something that‘s not going to happen. and i‘m glad i realized that at some point, but on the other hand it wasn‘t that hard of an insight. i‘m done with cutting people open in my life.

thanks for your words and your interest in this, i know it‘s becoming more uncommon with the years to study medicine when you‘re not fresh out of school, esp. in germany with the new entry requirements they implemented a few years ago. i have to be honest, i would not choose to study medicine again if i had the choice now. but i made it, i got through it, and i know the first months will be hard, but i‘m actually really looking forward to working in radiology (and moving, and a bit of change in life)

that‘s it! hope you have a nice day

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heardatmedschool · 3 months

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A quick guide on what different titles mean in my posts

(Since education AND healthcare systems vary around the world).

Medical Student (4.5-5 years)

You can get into medical school straight out of high school. College degrees do exist, but they are not the norm, not for medicine, and not for any career, tbh.

You fist 2-3 years are mostly theory. Calculus, chemistry, biology, anatomy, histology, embriology, physiology, pathology, physiopathology, microbiology, pharmacology…. That period end with semiology, and you get a Bachelor’s Degree in Medical Science.

Then, for the next 2 years, you have your clinicals, in which you spend half of the day in the hospital, with patients, and half the day in class, but definitely more focused on patient care and management.

Med student in clinicals = baby of the team (most of the time).

When you finish, you get your Academic Degree, Licenciate in Medicine.

Medical Intern (1.5-2 years)

No longer a student, you are now in your professional practice. Although you are technically still in med school in your university, you can say goodbye to classes, since you’re now a worker.

Probably bottom of the food chain, and probably does all the paperwork that nobody wants to do, but it’s a period where you gain a lot of independence and knowledge through work.

When you finish, you get your Professional Title, Médico Cirujano, but also need to pass a national test (EUNACOM) in order to be able to work.

Once you are a Doctor, you can work with that, or you can specialize.

Resident Doctor

A doctor, who is both working and studying towards a specialty.

Staff

Doctor who is on charge of a team. Tends to be an specialist.

Other titles that may cause confusion:

CNA: I use CNA to refer to TENS (Técnico de Enfermería de Nivel Superior). Technical degree (2.5 years). Takes care of patient’s basic needs, vital signs, may administer non-prescription medications.

Scrub tech: An specialized TENS. Takes care of the surgical instrumental and the sterile field in the OR.

Other TENS specializations: (that aren’t shared with other workers) Ambulance paramedic, anesthesia tech, trauma tech (takes care of plasters).

Medical Technologist: University degree (5Y). In charge of handling the machines and advanced technology equipment. They have 5 sub-specialties: ENT, ophthalmology, morphophysiopathology, blood bank and radiology.

Kinesiologist: University degree (5Y). They encapsulate both Physical Therapy and Respiratory Therapy.

Midwife: University Degree (5Y). Kind of like L&D nurses. Also in charge of reproductive health (i.e inserts IUDs, tests for STIs). Can assist births without a doctor if uncomplicated.

Other professionals that may not need further explanation:

Nurse.

Nutritionist.

Speech therapy.

Occupational therapy.

#blog stuff

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dontmeantobepoliticalbut · 1 year

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A ‘twisted’ experience: How KY’s abortion bans are depriving pregnant patients of health care

BY ALEX ACQUISTO

On the way to her 20 week ultrasound, Amy English texted her family group chat inviting guesses on her baby’s biological sex.

“Baby boy English muffin!” her father in-in-law texted.

“I thought boy at first but I’m thinking girl now,” her sister-in-law said. “My official guess is a girl :).”

It was December 28. Earlier that morning, Amy, 31, her husband David, and their 20-month-old daughter Annie had celebrated a belated Christmas at their house in Louisville with family visiting from out of state.

Amy and David had planned this pregnancy, and it was, in a way, perfectly timed. Their baby’s due date was five days after Annie’s birthday. Her children would be two years apart almost exactly to the day — a reality Amy was “ecstatic about.”

Sitting in a fluorescent-lit room inside Baptist Health Louisville, Amy looked for familiar shapes on the screen as an ultrasound tech probed her abdomen. Familiar with radiology in her career as a physical therapist, she has a baseline understanding of how to read ultrasounds: gray shapes usually indicate fluid, and bone shows up as white.

Amy remembers seeing her baby’s arms, legs and the curve of its back. But there was no recognizable outline where the skull should be.

“I couldn’t see the top of my baby’s head,” Amy said in an interview with the Herald-Leader. “I kept waiting for the tech to move the probe in a way where we could see what we should be seeing. I could tell she was searching for it, too.”

Amy had also learned in school about anencephaly, a severe fetal birth defect impacting the brain and skull. A lack of folic acid early in pregnancy increases the likelihood of this happening. This possibility flashed in her mind but she quickly batted it down; she’d been taking her prenatal vitamins, rich in folic acid, for months even before discovering she was pregnant.

The tech paused, then spoke.

“What we’re looking for here is an outline of the baby’s head, and right now I’m not really seeing that,” the woman explained before calling in Amy’s longtime OBGYN.

Over the next few minutes, Amy remembers the room blurring as she heard her doctor use the word “acrania,” which is when a fetus matures through pregnancy without ever developing parts of its skull. It can spur anencephaly, when the brain, too, is underdeveloped and partially missing. Pregnancies with either of these conditions are nonviable.

Amy’s baby, which they learned was a boy, had both. He would not survive into childhood, likely not beyond a few minutes after birth.

This, alone, was devastating news. Her dismay was compounded the next day when she learned that terminating her nonviable pregnancy, even by way of an early induction — a commonplace and provider-recommended method of treatment for such a diagnosis — couldn’t happen.

Even though Amy’s baby would never survive outside her womb, the pregnancy still had a fetal heartbeat — a technicality, considering the diagnosis. Coupled with the lack of immediate threat to her health, her doctors explained they couldn’t induce labor, much less give her an abortion. Kentucky laws forbade it, they said.

“I don’t know what was more shocking: to find out the baby had anencephaly, or that I would have to go out of state to get this care,” Amy said.

Kentucky’s abortion bans do not legally permit the standard of care treatment for a nonviable pregnancy like Amy’s. As a result, doctors must refer patients needing otherwise medically-recommended terminations out of state in droves, along with people desiring elective abortions, according to interviews with seven providers across four hospital systems. Providers who terminate pregnancies in violation of the trigger law can be charged with a felony in Kentucky.

Though this scenario is increasingly common statewide, it’s one arbiters of the state’s laws have yet to remedy, and one lawmakers are not publicly working to resolve.

Kentucky’s trigger law, enacted in late June 2022, criminalizes abortion except to prevent a “substantial risk of death,” or to “prevent the serious, permanent impairment of a life-sustaining organ of a pregnant woman.” The fetal heartbeat law also includes these exceptions but otherwise bans abortion except in a “medical emergency” once fetal cardiac activity begins, usually around six weeks.

Any time a pregnancy is terminated, each law requires a provider to document in writing why it was necessary to, in the case of the six-week ban, “prevent the death of the pregnant woman or to prevent a serious risk of the substantial and irreversible impairment of a major bodily function of the pregnant woman.”

The law permits the Cabinet for Health and Family Services to audit any licensed health care facility to make sure its abortion reporting requirements are “in compliance” with the law.

Both bans allow physicians to use their “reasonable medical judgment” when deciding whether pregnancy terminations are medically necessary. But providers interviewed for this story said that guidance is antithetical with the rest of the law’s limits, which only permit terminations in medical emergencies. There are no exceptions for fetal anomalies, or for the gamut of conditions that may make a pregnancy nonviable but don’t pose an immediate or emergent health risk to a pregnant person.

Moreover, the lack of uniform guidance from the state on what’s considered an emergency means definitions across hospitals sometimes vary, the Herald-Leader found. This has created a legal thicket for health care institutions. As a result, the final say on some critical medical decisions affecting pregnant patients is falling not to medical experts, but to hospital attorneys and administrators, who are worried about legality, liability and reputation.

The Herald-Leader asked the University of Kentucky, UofL Health and Baptist Health for insight into how their respective risk management teams and providers are navigating the laws. None responded to multiple questions about respective protocols for deciding when terminations are legally defensible, or how risk management teams, administrators and providers go about deciding.

“Clinicians have a responsibility to provide compassionate, evidence-based care and counsel to their patients, and also comply with the law,” Baptist said in a statement.

“UofL Health is committed to provide comprehensive health care to all its patients and their families,” UofL said in a statement. “In the case of a nonviable pregnancy that poses a health risk to the mother, we explain options for care while complying with all state and federal laws.”

“Although we cannot discuss when or how our legal counsel gives advice,” UK HealthCare said, “in Kentucky, state law prohibits the University’s physicians and staff from performing abortions except when the mother’s life is in danger. In the case of a nonviable pregnancy, our health care staff work with patients to determine the best course of care for the patient that is consistent with state and federal law.”

‘WE COULD NOT PROVIDE THIS SERVICE HERE’

The morning after Amy learned her baby likely had a fatal birth defect, the diagnosis was confirmed at a second ultrasound with a high-risk specialist. The buoyancy and excitement of the prior day was replaced with dread and grief. Amy remembers the quietness of the room during the second ultrasound, the hollow clicking of the keyboard keys and the intermittent clicking of the computer mouse.

Baptist Health refused to make Amy’s doctor available for an interview. But their conversation was outlined in Amy’s medical records, which were provided to the Herald-Leader.

“I discussed this finding with the patient and offered my sincerest condolences — that this was not compatible with life and that I am so sorry she and her husband are in this situation,” the doctor wrote in her notes. “She was understandably tearful.”

Amy listened as her provider explained her two options: Amy could carry her son to term and deliver him via C-section. He would immediately be taken to palliative care, where he would live a few minutes, maybe hours. Grief counselors would be on standby.

Her second option was to terminate the pregnancy early by way of an abortion or preterm induction. “Choosing not to continue the pregnancy: we discussed that this is also a loving choice for a baby that will certainly not survive,” her doctor wrote.

Pre-trigger law, termination under these circumstances would’ve happened in a hospital, and Amy’s health insurance likely would’ve covered it.

“No part of me wanted to be pregnant anymore,” Amy said. “Every flutter and kick he gave felt like a literal gut punch reminder that I would never get to take him home.”

Strangers were already approaching her at the grocery to ask to touch her stomach. Her patients at work often asked how far along she was. It seemed emotionally unthinkable to continue subjecting herself to a life where, at any moment, she would be forced to repeat that her growing body was nurturing a baby that wouldn’t live, she said.

Termination was what Amy wanted. She erupted into sobs when her doctor told her that under her current circumstances (her life wasn’t immediately threatened, and there was still a fetal heartbeat) it wasn’t an option.

“We discussed that due to our current Kentucky laws, we could not provide this service here,” her doctor wrote in her records.

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m so sorry,” Amy remembers the specialist saying.

She gave Amy a list of hospitals and clinics in surrounding states that might be able to terminate her pregnancy. Her doctor recommended calling Northwestern Memorial Hospital in Chicago, or another clinic in Illinois, where abortion is widely available.

“Am I just supposed to Google the number, call the front desk and ask, ‘How do I get an abortion at your hospital?’” Amy remembered thinking.

Over the next few days, she, her husband and sister-in-law cold-called a handful of clinics to request a dilation and evacuation abortion, common in the second trimester. But a combination of abortion restrictions in Indiana and Ohio, including gestational limits on when abortion is legal — Amy was 21 weeks along at this point — left her with few options.

Then, Amy’s sister, a nurse anesthetist at Northwestern Medicine Kishwaukee Hospital in Dekalb, west of Chicago, stepped in. Her hospital lacked the equipment for a D&E, but they agreed to induce Amy.

On January 4, after driving close to 400 miles, Amy was induced and gave birth to a son she and her husband named Solomon Matthew. He didn’t cry. His heart beat for about two minutes before it stopped.

‘NOT KNOWING WHAT TO DO’

The Republican-led General Assembly has made no moves to amend or further clarify either abortion ban since both took effect seven months ago, even though the combined impact has harmed patients, doctors have told lawmakers.

The Kentucky Supreme Court still hasn’t issued a preliminary opinion on whether either law infringes on a person’s constitutional right to bodily autonomy and self-determination. Deciding so would temporarily block one or both bans from being enforced. Convened for a regular session through March, the Republican supermajority has yet to file any bills related to reproductive health care access and likely won’t until the high court weighs in.

In the meantime, there’s disagreement about whether or not either ban infringes on providers’ ability to dole out the standard level of care to pregnant patients.

Kentucky Supreme Court Justice Michelle Keller and former Deputy Chief Justice Lisabeth Hughes raised this point during November oral arguments in the pending court case from the state’s two outpatient abortion clinics challenging the constitutionality of both laws.

The trigger law “doesn’t recognize an exception for women who are under the care of a physician who tells them that the standard of care would be to terminate the pregnancy,” Hughes told Solicitor General Matt Kuhn, arguing on behalf of the Attorney General’s office.

As a result, “What’s really happening is physicians in (hospitals) all over the commonwealth are calling the risk managers and attorneys for the hospitals not knowing what to do,” Keller added. “You’re obfuscating what this trigger statute says. There isn’t a strict life of the mother exception.”

The law’s proponents, including Republican Attorney General Daniel Cameron, have cited the provision in the law that allows for use of “reasonable medical judgment” as protecting doctors’ autonomy, and that any challenge to that fact is overblown.

“The law has an explicit health exception, (which) depends on a ‘reasonable medical judgment’ from physicians,” Kuhn told Kentucky Supreme Court Justices that day. There’s been “a lot of misinformation” suggesting the law doesn’t adequately protect a pregnant person’s health, he said, citing two advisories Cameron’s office has issued since both measures took effect. Both clarify that in vitro fertilization, and abortions as treatment of miscarriages, preeclampsia and ectopic pregnancies don’t violate the law.

As for the host of other conditions not mentioned, “we are continuing to work with Kentucky doctors giving guidance on that,” Kuhn said.

But no written evidence of that guidance appears to exist. In response to an open records request from the Herald-Leader, Cameron’s office said this week it had no written or electronic records of communication between the Attorney General’s office and licensed health care facilities or providers regarding the trigger law or six week ban.

‘AN UNNECESSARY PHYSICAL AND PSYCHOLOGICAL RISK’

It was mid June when Leah Martin, 35, discovered she was pregnant with her second child.

Pregnancy at ages 35 and above is considered geriatric. Aware that her age meant she faced a heightened risk, she opted for genetic testing early on to gauge any abnormalities.

Her first ultrasound didn’t raise any alarm. At just over nine weeks, Leah took a prenatal genetic test. The results a week later showed “low fetal fractal numbers,” she said in an interview.

That result, her OBGYN told her, could mean there hadn’t been enough material collected to show a clearer result. It could also signal an abnormality.

Leah, wanting to be judicious, got a more exact genetic test just before 12 weeks. She quickly learned her fetus had triploidy, a rare condition that causes the development of 69 chromosomes per cell instead of the regular 46. It causes not only severe physical deformities, but triploidy stunts development of crucial organs, like the lungs and heart. It means a fetus, if it even survives to birth, will likely not live beyond a few days.

What’s more, Leah was also diagnosed with a partial molar pregnancy, which causes atypical cells to grow in the uterus and, as Leah’s doctors told her, could lead to cancer.

It was mid-July, and Kentucky’s trigger law and six week ban had been in effect for barely two weeks. Leah was familiar enough with what both laws restricted and assumed that because her pregnancy could cause her cancer and was nonviable, she would lawfully qualify as an exception.

So, she weighed her options with her doctors at Baptist Health Lexington, who included Dr. Blake Bradley, her longtime OBGYN.

Similar to Amy’s diagnosis, Leah’s doctors told her that even if she opted to carry the pregnancy to term, her baby “would live a short life in palliative care, most likely never leaving the hospital. It would really be a quite painful existence,” she said.

“I have a 2-year-old at home, and I’m 35, weighing how I would like to expand my family. It seemed like the safest option for me and the compassionate choice for my unborn child was to terminate the pregnancy,” she said.

Like Amy’s, a medically-necessary abortion under these circumstances would typically take place at a hospital, doctors interviewed for this story said. Leah’s health insurance had already agreed to cover it. It was also the quickest way to help Leah to her end goal: getting pregnant again in order to birth a child that would survive.

It was July 21 and Leah was just over 12 weeks pregnant when she learned that Baptist’s legal counsel had blocked her doctors from giving her a dilation and curettage abortion.

“I was told the hospital refused to perform the procedure while the case was being litigated. I was dumbfounded,” Leah said. Hospital lawyers cited an ongoing lawsuit from Kentucky’s two outpatient abortion providers that’s pending before the Kentucky Supreme Court.

According to Leah, hospital providers, relaying the message from administration and risk management, reportedly said if her fetus died on its own, doctors would be able to terminate her pregnancy. But their hands were tied as long as it had a heartbeat.

“People minimize that pregnancy, even under its best circumstances, is associated with life-threatening risks, life-altering risks and emotional impacts,” Bradley told the Herald-Leader. “So, to compel a woman to continue a pregnancy that is by everyone’s assessment, doomed, by definition places that woman at an unreasonable and unnecessary physical and psychological risk, period.”

Baptist Health refused to make Leah’s high-risk doctor available for an interview.

The following Monday, July 25, Leah had an ultrasound at the hospital to confirm what she already knew. As an ultrasound tech probed her abdomen, a wheel of dizzying emotions spun in her head: she desperately wanted a baby, but she didn’t want to birth a child into a painful existence.

Already faced with a gutting dilemma, she felt further burdened by having such an intimate choice ripped from her. And she was furious at now being forced to remain pregnant despite there being no chance for survival, despite the risks continuing such a pregnancy posed to her own body.

She remembers staring at the ultrasound screen waiting to hear the muffled heartbeat of her fetus, racked with guilt because she hoped she wouldn’t.

“It was such a twisted experience being pregnant with a baby I desperately wanted, lying there hoping its heart had stopped,” she said shakily. “It was horrible to have to wish for that in order to receive care. It just felt so unsafe and cruel.”

Leah had already arranged to drive to Chicago to get an abortion when a Jefferson Circuit judge issued a preliminary injunction on July 22, temporarily blocking the state from enforcing both bans. She immediately called EMW Women’s Surgical Center in Louisville — one of the plaintiffs in the lawsuit against the state — and made an appointment.

On Wednesday, July 27, almost 13 weeks pregnant, Leah paid $950 out of pocket for her abortion. Her insurance wouldn’t cover it, since it was considered elective. The following Monday, the Kentucky Court of Appeals overturned the circuit court injunction, reinstating both abortion bans.

After Leah’s abortion, she sent a message to her high-risk doctor. Her doctor responded the following day. Leah shared that correspondence with the Herald-Leader.

“You’ve been on my thoughts a lot,” her doctor wrote. “Words cannot express the dismay I feel right now. I’ve spent my whole adult life learning how to care for mothers in heart wrenching or dangerous situations like yours, and the politics now make it not only impossible, but to work to take care of patients like they deserve — with compassion and science — in these horrible situations is wrong and immoral.”

“I hope your procedure yesterday was smooth, though I know it was hard,” her doctor wrote. “I’m so sorry we could not (were not allowed, rather) to take care of you here.”

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clericofgale · 3 months

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Thanks for the tag @hotnerdywizard

Let’s see…

1. Are you named after anyone? No, my name was picked out of a dictionary/baby name list.

2. When was the last time you cried? Yesterday! My therapist I see weekly has a talent for making me cry. I also just cry easy tbh. Funny story, how much I related to Gale told me I am Le Very Not Healed™ and got my ass back into it. Thanks Gale!👍

3. Do you have kids? No, and most likely never will.

4. What sports do you play/have you played? I am not a sports person...ever. The last athletic hobby was aerial arts which lasted a year. mostly aerial hoop(Lyra) and a few classes in static trapeze. I've also tried pole dance but I was too weak/my brain couldn't wrap my head around it. I'd love to do it again eventually but first I must get stronger💪 I lost all my muscles.

5. Do you use sarcasm? It's my 4th language.

6. What’s the first thing you notice about people? Whatever sticks out about them. Their aura? If they're attractive? Interesting fashion? It really depends.

7. What’s your eye colour? black/very dark brown.

8. Scary movies or happy endings? out of the two happy endings, I'm a wimp for scary movies.

9. Any talents? I am not really sure if I've got any innate talents? I've got stuff I'm good at but that all took work. From the work I put in to expand my palate/mind's eye to be a decent cook, to all the therapy I've done to become very aware of my emotions/self.

10. Where were you born? on this little blue ball we call Earth<3

11. What are your hobbies? I'm ADHD af so I pick up and drop hobbies once they stop giving me enough dopamine. Most consistent throughout life that I've always come back to were cooking, trying out new food, gaming, and knitting. I'm also quite the sex/relationships nerd, not only in the horny way but also in the intellectual/philosophical way. It's why Gale's scenes tickled me so much on an intellectual level. It's weird sex and I love it!

12. Do you have any pets? Not yet! I really want a cat but I want to make sure I'm healthy enough to take care of it before adopting.🐈🐈🐈

13. How tall are you? 5’2

14. Favourite subject in school? any of the humanities/arts I really enjoyed. Cinema studies, communications, psych, history, linguistics, ethnic studies, etc. Inject that shit straight into my veins. It made choosing a life path a nightmare. I was always jealous of those who always knew what job they wanted.

15. Dream job? I'm working towards becoming either a therapist or a radiology tech. I'll decide if either psych is truly my passion or not by the end of this year. If I can tough out this much school to a master degree/finish clinical hours end career goal it's doing mental health outreach for AAPI, and little bit of private practice. Otherwise rad tech is a short program, in demand, well-paid and you can end up with a 9-5 with enough luck.

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wcrlights · 3 months

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INTRODUCING ... HAZEL FARROW

FULL NAME: hazel mauve farrow

FACECLAIM: maia mitchell

NICKNAMES: haze

BIRTHDAY: october 31, 1995

BIRTHPLACE: starlight oaks, washington

EDUCATION: duke university — bachelor’s degree in education & history

SEXUALITY: bisexual / biromantic

OCCUPATION: history teacher at the local high school

TIME IN STARLIGHT OAKS: local, returned in the past 7 months

RESIDES: starlight cove

WRITING CAREER CLAIM: erik larson

HEIGHT: 5’6”

HAIR COLOR: dirty blonde

EYE COLOR: chocolate brown

SPOKEN LANGUAGES: english, spanish, & italian

BIOGRAPHY

born in starlight oaks to bonnie and dane farrow as the second of their three kids, it was surprise to both sides of their family that the spontaneous love affair resulted in both a shotgun wedding and hazel’s older brother popping out not long after.

bonnie was an australian studying abroad at the university of seattle when she met dane — a starlight oaks local who often traveled into seattle for work and met hazel’s mother when his company dinner outing turned to late night bar hopping, and she was the bartender.

it was love at first sight and a year later once bonnie walked across the stage with her master’s degree in radiology, she and dane tied the knot in an intimate ceremony located in starlight oaks where bonnie’s family flew in from perth, australia.

to hazel, her parents are two of the smartest people she knows — her mom a radiology manager at the local hospital and her father who still travels into seattle at the architectural firm he works at as partner. she and her siblings were raised in celestial drive with an emphasis on their education and that knowledge was what would further push them ahead in life.

on her father’s side, the farrow’s have lived in starlight oaks for as long as they could remember, while her mother was the clever and beautiful australian bombshell that he wrangled into small town life. hazel admires her mother’s unparalleled intellect and ability to carve out her own path in life, even if it meant traveling away from all of what she’s known.

she and her siblings grew up in a white picket fence kind of life with a golden retriever named sammy, while she bobbed in between keeping up her grades and taking part in the local girls soccer league. hazel would excel in both her academics and her athletic career throughout high school, though her falling the wrong way during an away game caused a dislocated knee and put an end to any further competitive soccer.

it was through this that when hazel had extra time to devote to whatever else now that soccer practice and games were out of the picture, she began to pick up more books that she could read for leisure.

it was an accident, really, when she picked up her dad’s historical non-fiction book about the titanic that sparked hazel’s interest in learning more about different historical events that interested her.

while she always knew that she wanted to pursue an education degree from her knack of tutoring her fellow classmates, this cemented her desire to teach history specifically. following the tenacity of her mother, hazel applied to duke university all the way over on the east coast, to which she gained acceptance and would continue on to double major in education and history.

it’s in her junior year of college at age 20 that she manages to get the historical non-fiction book spent her college years writing ( the devil in the white city by erik larson ) published where it would go on to sell very well and gain her a 4 book deal with penguin random house.

after graduation, hazel stays in north carolina to begin her teaching career while also beginning to write her second novel ( thunderstruck by erik larson ). she stays in north carolina until she’s 24 and hears news that her mother had gotten into an accident and with months of recovery, hazel moves back to starlight oaks to help her father take care of her mother. she’s in town for nearly a year when her she takes an open teaching position in seattle once her mother is fully healed.

during that year she accidentally fell into a super serious relationship that reminded her a lot of the stories her parent’s told of their first few months together and tbh, it was mainly a fear that she was moving too fast and getting too serious into this relationship that she took the job in seattle and moved. so rip to that ex bc now i imagine things are awkward with her now back in town.

despite the income of being a teacher and the earnings from her two successful books, hazel wanted to slow down from city life after two and a half years of being in seattle and was able to buy herself a cozy bungalow house in starlight cove.

she now teaches history at the local high school, trying her best to impress her students with her enthusiasm for all aspects of history ( she teaches both american and world history ) and getting them to appreciate it. all the while she juggles writing her third book ( in the garden of beasts by erik larson ).

PERSONALITY

overall, hazel is someone who’s very charismatic and extroverted, thrives best when she’s around other people and socializing. she views knowledge as something ever growing and attainable, often encouraging not only her students but her friends to pick up a book or watch a documentary on something they’ve never knew about before. hazel can oftentimes come across as overbearing with her enthusiasm, but she means well in trying to help other people out. she values the relationships of those close to her, though true vulnerability and being seen fully as who she is is something that terrifies her. as a result, she dodges around fully talking about her feelings or how she’s doing since talking about herself for long makes her uncomfortable. it’s something she’s working on with a therapist but it’s still a work in progress. it’s also part of the reason her and her most serious ex broke up … that and hazel ran off to seattle with her tail between her legs. hazel loves baking, going for morning runs or daily yoga classes, and stopping by the local coffee shop to either read or work on the latest draft of her new book she’s writing. traveling is a top priority for her, though any travel whether it be work related for book tours or conferences is usually confined to the summer time, as not to take off too much time during the school year. being a teacher, hazel can be anyone’s biggest cheerleader in getting them to believe fully in their own potential and achieving their goals.

#starlight.intro #she be a bit rambly but she was written w luv <3

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