Thea Thompson was about 18 weeks pregnant when an ultrasound technician told her in September that she was having a baby girl. She and her husband were delighted to welcome a second child into their family.

But the good news stopped there.

Thompson, 37, was having a detailed ultrasound after earlier genetic tests showed her fetus had a low risk of developing abnormalities. She could tell her medical team didn’t like what they saw.

“My husband and I just freaked out. He’s shaking my hand, we’re so panicked, so stressed,” Thompson said.

Finally, her doctor tells them: The fetus had fluid around the brain and holes in the heart. His umbilical cord had only two blood vessels instead of three and his face was not developing properly.

“He’s basically saying, with all of these things — with one of them, you know it might not have been that bad, but with all of these things, from what he could see on the ultrasound, the baby wasn’t going to live. Thompson said.

Thompson’s blood tests and ultrasounds indicated that her fetus had a genetic disorder and was likely to be fatal.

“We were just devastated,” she said.

Thompson, like many other women since the US Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wadeshe would still find herself struggling with the consequences of the state ban on abortion, even though she wanted to get pregnant. Now, she’s advocating for a ballot measure that would enshrine abortion rights in Florida’s constitution, known as Amendment 4.

Qualifying for an exception can come with risks

Florida’s six-week ban includes an exception for fatal fetal abnormalities in the first two trimesters. The law requires two doctors to certify in writing that “in reasonable medical judgment” the fetus will die at birth or “imminent thereafter”.

Thompson and her doctor discussed the option, she said, but he told her, due to legal concerns, that he could not sign off on an abortion until she received a more invasive genetic test to confirm the diagnosis.

They scheduled the procedure, known as amniocentesis, for the next day. This involves inserting a needle into the uterus to draw fluid from the uterus. Thompson’s doctor warned that the results could take a week or two to arrive and that it could be harder to find a place to have an abortion the later in the pregnancy she was, she said.

The next morning, Thompson woke up bleeding and cramping and went to the hospital thinking she might be having a miscarriage.

“I have this moment of relief, thinking, ‘God, I hope I miscarry,’ so I don’t have to go through these procedures and I don’t have to make this decision,” Thompson said.

The medical staff at the hospital told her that she had not miscarried and that she probably had side effects from the ultrasound. They told her they couldn’t provide abortion care and suggested Thompson go to her amniocentesis appointment.

When she arrived at the clinic, a maternal-fetal medicine specialist told her she had a higher risk of the procedure causing her water to break early, a condition known as preterm premature rupture of the membranes, or PPROM. That could lead to a serious infection, something Thompson said she’s seen firsthand in her nursing career.

She chose not to take the test.

“I just didn’t want to go through this, my own health through this, my husband through this, you know our child, it’s dangerous,” Thompson said.

Doctors say confusion and fear are impacting patient care

Instead, a few days later, Thompson and a family member traveled out of state to get an abortion at a hospital in the Northeast. Her husband stayed in St. Petersburg with their 2-year-old while she had the procedure.

“We couldn’t even grieve together, we had to be apart and it was horrible,” Thompson said.

Advocates for Amendment 4 we say Florida’s six-week abortion ban is hurting women. They want to allow abortions in Florida until the fetus is viable, usually around 24 weeks of pregnancy, or after that if the patient’s healthcare provider deems it necessary.

Right now, patients with pregnancy complications have trouble getting care because doctors are concerned about breaking the law, said Dr. Chelsea Daniels, a family planning specialist who works with Planned Parenthood in Miami.

At a recent media call with other doctors who support the amendment, Daniels shared her own encounter with a patient who was rejected by doctors despite ultrasounds showing she had a non-viable pregnancy.

“The exceptions are so narrow that they can’t address each case individually, so if a doctor is audited and the state challenges their judgment, they could be fined, lose their license and go to jail,” Daniels said.

A September report from a group called Physicians for Human Rights featured doctors’ accounts of the challenges of determining whether a serious abnormality would be considered “imminently fatal.”

Exemptions work for some people, according to state data. 386 abortions were performed in Florida so far this year due to “fatal” or “serious” fetal abnormalities, with more than half done after the first trimester. But that’s still a lot less than the 757 made in 2021the last full year that abortion was legal in the state until viability.

Infants have died from birth defects in Florida at higher rates since the abortion ban was first implemented in July 2022, the South Florida Sun Sentinel reported. reported this week.

Governor Ron DeSantis

/

Facebook

Opponents of the amendment say the Florida law protects women

Gov. Ron DeSantis defends the exceptions and warns that doctors who fail to treat a woman at risk could face malpractice penalties.

His administration used taxpayer resources to produce advertisements and launch a website that say things like “Current Florida Law Protects Women, Amendment 4 Threatens Women’s Safety.”

DeSantis spent the last few weeks hosting press events arguing against the 4th amendment.

During one in Clearwater on Monday, he said supporters of the amendment point to extreme cases of women being denied care — including some that have occurred in other states. DeSantis claims he’s trying to distract voters from what he calls a “vague” amendment.

“Florida has exceptions, of course, for maternal health, maternal life, incest, human (trafficking) victims — all that stuff — and yet that’s what they focus on, so I’m lying to you. DeSantis said.

DeSantis urged voters to vote “no” on the constitutional amendments as a “default,” arguing that they are much harder to change in the future than actions taken by the Legislature.

He was joined on stage by members of a group called Florida Physicians Against Amendment 4, including Dr. Ana Verdeja-Perez. The Plant City OB-GYN told the public not to “fall into scare tactics.”

“Our abortion laws protect the lives of vulnerable women,” she said.

“Now, I’m angry.”

But women like Thea Thompson say they shouldn’t have to put their health at risk to qualify for the care they need.

“I should have been able to make the decision I wanted to make at that time,” she said of her September ultrasound. “I shouldn’t have even thought about doing further tests and waiting. We were already devastated, we were already just miserable. I didn’t want to push him out any more.”

Thompson says tests after her abortion confirmed the fetus had a fatal condition known as triploidy, in which a cell has three copies of each chromosome instead of two. She asked WUSF not to publicize where she traveled to get the procedure because, while the state says the abortion law’s penalties don’t apply to pregnant women, she still has concerns.

While the treatment she received out of state was “the best care she could have asked for,” Thompson said the trip for a second-trimester abortion cost her family thousands of dollars and it was emotionally traumatic.

“I look back on it now, I’m angry,” Thompson said. “I’m very upset that I’ve been put in this position because of laws, because of politicians making decisions about my own health.”

Thompson’s family is still working to process their loss.

“It’s so fresh and so raw, and it’s hard to talk about and it’s scary to speak publicly, but I don’t want anyone else to go through what I had to go through and what all these women who are coming out and sharing their stories had to come through,” Thompson said.

To pass, Amendment 4 needs at least 60 percent of the vote, a higher threshold than in other states that have passed ballot measures supporting abortion rights.

Early voting ends this weekend before Election Day on Tuesday.

Copyright 2024 WUSF 89.7