A woman faces a choice that she prayed she never would have to make. The baby she has been carrying for eight months has died. She needs to have an abortion or else her own health will suffer. Not only is she upset about the loss of her child, but she is also afraid to walk through the crowd of protestors outside of Planned Parenthood, shouting at her for killing her baby.

Another woman has just lost her job. Soon after, she finds out that she is pregnant. She has lost her health insurance along with her job. Her boyfriend has been looking for a job for a couple months, but has been unsuccessful so far. He called a company to see if they received his résumé, but he isn’t expecting a call back from them. The woman is only a month pregnant, but the couple has been figuring out the costs of their possible medical bills. They’ll have to pay nearly $8000 if they don’t find insurance soon. They discuss their options.

As of 2016, the poverty line is $11,880 for a single person household. The minimum wage in America is $7.25 an hour. A full-time job is working 2,080 hours in a year. A person working 40 hours a week for 52 weeks would receive $15,080 before taxes.

The average cost of daycare is $11,666 per year, or $972 per month. A person working 40 hours per week on $7.25 would make $1,160 per month. There’s not too much a person can pay for with $188 left over.

A woman knew she should have left her friend’s earlier than she did, but she lost track of time. The keys she gripped between her fingers wasn’t enough to stop him when he attacked. Maybe she would have been able to fight back if she had grabbed the purse with her pepper spray. A few days later, she discovers she is pregnant. She hopes that by some miracle her body can shut down the pregnancy, just like that one representative said it could. But she knows better. She thinks about what she can do, afraid to tell her parents in case they ask her what she was wearing that night.

As of the end of 2015, almost 108,000 children were waiting to be adopted. Around 50,000 children were adopted in 2014. 50,000 is 46% of 108,000.

Two teenagers, fifteen and sixteen years old, have been dating for almost two years now. They’ve been wanting to share their first time together for a while, but they’re afraid. She’s too nervous to ask her parents about going on birth control because they always talk about how sinful it is to use. So, they decide that a condom will be enough. The condom breaks and she gets pregnant. So many problems flood their minds. Will they both drop out of school? Will her parents disown her? Will he stay with her? Can they put the baby up for adoption? How can they hope to afford a baby?

Teenage pregnancy rates are declining. Despite this, sex education still isn’t the greatest in America. Students who have received comprehensive sex education (versus abstinence only education and no education) are less likely to report teenage pregnancies. States that do not require comprehensive sex education often report the highest teenage pregnancy rates.

Abortions are certainly a hot topic in American society, especially with the upcoming elections. Pro-life and pro-choice are constantly feuding, one side shouting that all life is precious while the other shouts that women have a right to their bodies. It’s a classic black-and-white narrative, but it’s anything but that. There is so much gray area when it comes to birth and abortion that neither side can be the definitive authority on the subject.

People come from all different situations. It is up to us to be open-minded to struggles that people have. Believing that people should not have sex will not stop people from having sex. Believing that women should cover up will not stop rape. Outlawing abortions will not stop them, but will make it more difficult for women to get them done safely. There is no definite right and wrong in situations like the stories above. There are only people who are willing to listen and understand.

Do you care about that baby after birth? What if the parents have to go on welfare and receive food stamps? What if that baby grows up in a criminally active area? What if that baby’s parents need to work two jobs each to keep up with bills and to put food on the table? What if that baby’s parents can’t pay the medical bills because insurance won’t cover them? We must all work to fix the problems that our nation faces. Pointing our fingers and yelling at scared, pregnant women will do absolutely nothing. Be pro-life, not pro-birth.