Making Health Public

If you follow me (or probably any other Irish person) (or read Irish news) (or are passingly aware of when Ireland makes foreign headlines), you probably heard that the Republic of Ireland voted last month to repeal the 8th Amendment of the Irish Constitution (Bunreacht na hÉireann). It was a massive, multiyear campaign that took off running after the tragic—and completely preventable—death of Irish dentist Savita Halappanavar.

I know that this topic is hard for many people and that there are a lot of very strong emotions. As a devout Roman Catholic, I’m familiar with both sides of the issue. I’m not going to dig into the intricacies of the philosophy on when life begins, but I will say this: I desperately wish that I lived in a world without abortion. I wish that I lived in a world in which every pregnancy was planned and healthy and no one ever had to make the decision whether to terminate their pregnancy. I wish I lived in that world, but it doesn’t exist. It is not my place to tell someone else what they need to do with their body and in no other instance do we insist that it is.

My grandfather died yesterday. He was quite elderly and was battling an aggressive case of cancer, so his death was not unexpected, but it is painful all the same. We had known the end was near for several days and every time my father called I had expected it to be with the sad news. As a consequence, I have found myself feeling as though my grief were already all poured out and that I'm drowning under the weight of my guilt for being so stopped up. It reminds me a bit of the emotional equivalent of when I had appendicitis and, after days of agony, finally crawled to my bathroom consumed with the thought that I would feel better if I could just vomit. I don't expect that vomiting would do me much good this time, but I can't help think that I would feel so much better if I could just have a good cry.