- The mother’s fetus was diagnosed with acrania, where the skull lacks bones.
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A Tennessee woman has expressed outrage at being denied an abortion, even though her fetus suffers from a fatal condition that would cause the baby to be born dead with part of its skull missing.
Breanna Cecil, 34, ended up losing an ovary, a fallopian tube and her dreams of having a large family due to delayed treatment resulting from strict anti-abortion laws, which deny abortion if the fetus still has a heartbeat.
The mother’s fetus was diagnosed with acrania in January 2023, a fatal disease in which the developing baby lacks skull bones.
“The state of Tennessee took away my fertility,” said Mrs. Cecil, a dietitian.
Breanna Cecil, 34, ended up losing an ovary, a fallopian tube and her dreams of having a large family due to strict anti-abortion laws.
Tennessee’s near-total ban on abortion prevents anyone from getting an abortion if the fetus still has a heartbeat, which Ms. Cecil did.
State lawmakers “took away my opportunity to have a family like my own biological family because of these horrible laws they put in place,” she said. The independent.
At the time of her first ultrasound, 12 weeks into her pregnancy, doctors told her that the fetus was not viable outside the womb.
She asked the doctor what she should do and he couldn’t answer her question, she recalled.
Anencephaly is the absence of the upper portion of the fetal brain, believed to be the result of acrania.
Her options were limited since Tennessee’s near-total ban prevents anyone from having an abortion if the fetus still has a heartbeat, as Cecil did.
The law had no exceptions for fatal conditions such as acrania, and doctors who perform abortions outside the permitted exceptions can face prison sentences.
She had another ultrasound, which she said was heartbreaking because the severity of the baby’s condition was clear.
“I could see the brain wasn’t attached,” Mrs. Cecil said.
Doctors told her that if she continued with the pregnancy, the child would “probably die inside me before 20 weeks” and she would have to give birth stillborn.
Mrs. Cecil had begun to show a lump and was overwhelmed by well-meaning questions about the due date and sex of the baby. She decided to have an abortion out of state.
Getting an appointment for one had to “cry in front of receptionists” at about 20 clinics and hospitals, but she finally found it in Chicago and had an abortion on February 3.
But just six days after returning to Tennessee, he began suffering from fever and back pain.
Antibiotics didn’t help, so she had another ultrasound.
The doctor found remains of fetal tissue inside, which can have serious consequences such as bleeding and infection.
Mrs Cecil underwent another procedure to remove the remaining tissue.
But when her fever didn’t subside, she returned to the hospital, where doctors discovered she had a nine-centimeter abscess in her abdomen that encompassed some of her reproductive organs.
She had to undergo emergency surgery to remove her right ovary and fallopian tube and had to spend 10 difficult days in the hospital.
Cecil and her husband were devastated, as they had spent nearly a year trying to conceive.
They have not been able to get pregnant since their emergency surgery.
