My Honeyville, Utah-born grandfather was a died-in-the-wool Democrat. He was a Jack Mormon. He abandoned the church and became a party loyalist. He was a diplomat from the 1940s to the 1970s for U.S. Presidents. Because of Lee Madsen Hunsaker, I AM blue.
Fast forward to the 1980s in Oregon – where my South American-born and raised mother raised me and my 3 older sisters – alone. My native Peruvian father was nowhere and no-how in the picture. I would not meet him until the ripe age of 40 years old.
Fast forward – again – to 2012 when Obama and Romney were running a neck-and-neck race, and I was called to persuade swing voters to vote blue in THE historical Broward County, Florida. This was an incredible job – we elected two Ds to Congress, one of which was a woman, Lois Frankel – and Obama beat Romney in a highly contested race on the corridor where Fort Myers is.
Alas – I got pregnant that night. In Florida. The night of the election. It was unplanned, and it was scary. I went to a Planned Parenthood in Florida and found the morning-after pill within 72 hours of having unprotected sex. That is how to be successful in avoiding an unplanned pregnancy. Unfortunately, the pill didn’t take, and I found myself pregnant – alone – in my new home of Atlanta, Georgia. This, I thought to myself, is a motherf***ing mess. I hate to say it, but this is the second time I was faced with this terrifying situation. I had had an abortion 5 years earlier after I had been brutally drugged and gang-raped by my employers. It wasn’t the rape that resulted in the pregnancy, but the two events were congruent. It was hell on earth.
So, here I was, at the age of 30. Pregnant and alone. At the time, I had a good job. I was a secretary in finance. I called friends to talk about what to do. WHAT DO I DO?!?!?! How did this happen AGAIN?!?! I was smart, educated, knowledgeable – how did this happen AGAIN?!?! I started looking for apartments. I texted the father – his first words were, “I will pay for the abortion.” WTF?!?! In his eyes, our baby was solvable by me “simply” having an abortion. Sadly, that was pretty much the reaction I got from the first unplanned pregnancy I had. You see, these were “nice guys.” And THAT was their response.
My baby had no chance to have the home that I wanted it to have. I was raised by a single mother, and although that could very well end up my fate at some point in my life – at the age of 30, that was not what I wanted for myself or my unborn child.
After a LOT of soul-searching, crying, and feeling like a complete idiot, one of my best friends, while I was visiting her in Brooklyn, helped me find the Atlanta Feminist Center in Metro Atlanta.
In January 2015, I took myself, alone, to the center and had an abortion without anesthesia because no one was there to pick me up. I cried. I laid in the center and cried. I overheard the nurses say, “we have a crier.” The nerve. After I was “done” recovering and crying (mind you, this is less than an hour of my day), I walked to a local fast-food spot, bought lunch, and took the bus to the train to get home.
Why am I telling you this? Because THIS IS WHY I AM BLUE IN 2024. As you can see, I have always been blue and will always be blue. However, I ask that YOU vote blue because abortion and women’s reproductive rights are on the ballot. If that second unplanned pregnancy happened today in Georgia, I wouldn’t have been able to get the abortion I wanted and needed. Today’s 30-year-old Georgian women DO NOT HAVE THE SAME CHOICE that I had in 2015. We have turned the clock BACKWARDS.
Vote for Democrats, please. We lead with compassion, love, and hope. Lastly, I hope what I went through doesn’t happen to you, or your daughters, nieces, granddaughters, goddaughters, sisters, or mothers.
Adalina-Alejandrina Capuli-Chaskanahui Merello Salas
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