Tag: repealthe8th

I was expecting to feel utterly exhilarated if the abortion referendum was carried in the Republic of Ireland. It passed by a landslide and yet I’m still waiting for it to hit me.

I think the reason I’m unable to feel anything other than a kind of numb relief is because it’s impossible to really appreciate the enormity of what has happened without taking the time to go back and dwell on the ramifications of each individual human story that contributed to my understanding of this issue and to this massive revolution in our collective thinking on this island. I am afraid to go back and sit with that pain. Anger is an incredible motivator but it is so exhausting. None of this should never have happened. No one should have had to die for want of an abortion. No one should have been sectioned, or hospitalised, or forced to give birth against their will. No one should have had to find themselves living in fear of their own body, lying to their friends, crying in airports, vomiting in ferry terminals, bleeding into hotel sheets, swallowing their grief, or walking past a thousand goddamn posters calling them a murderer.

I am, on a cognitive level, incredibly glad that the referendum is over. But I don’t think I am able to feel joy about it. Aside from the fact that the battle has yet to be won in Northern Ireland, something as basic and fundamental as the right to control one’s own body feels like something that should be taken for granted. But it isn’t, and that chills me. And yet if everything’s a fight and one is to see the myth of progress for what it is, I guess you gotta take a moment to savour the victories, however bittersweet. 

love to everyone who repealed the fucking eighth xx