Abortion Leaves Olympic Champion ‘Traumautized,’ ‘Shaken’ by Katie Yoder for Town Hall
Many in the media regularly promote and applaud positive abortion stories. But one Olympian’s story is forcing them to hint at the tragedy of abortion – and the truth that many women choose it because they feel like they have no other choice.
On July 1, the New York Times reported that U.S. hurdler Brianna McNeal said she “didn’t open her door to antidoping officials” last year because she was “traumatized after having an abortion.” Now, she faces a five-year ban on competing, among other penalties. Sports reporter Juliet Macur detailed the plight of the 29-year-old athlete who won a gold medal at the 2016 Olympics – and who originally qualified for the 2021 Olympics.
Throughout July, in media interviews and on social media, McNeal admitted that her abortion left her “traumatized,” “shaken,” and “disoriented.”
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She missed a doping test last year, she claimed, because “she was in bed recovering from the procedure,” Macur reported. But McNeal was banned because of “flaws in the documentation she submitted to prove that she had an abortion,” Macur added. Among other things, she changed the date of her abortion by one day: from January 10, 2020 to January 11.
“McNeal had been so shaken and disoriented by the abortion, she said, that it didn’t occur to her that changing the date would be a bad thing,” Macur emphasized.
Breaking from the narrative of positive abortion stories, Macur spared no words to recall how abortion crushed McNeal.
During a video call, Macur wrote, McNeal remembered the “very emotional time” enveloping the “very big decision” that “really affected my life.” It was a decision that “left her medicated and in bed,” Macur reported McNeal as saying. It also left her “suffering from depression.”
“McNeal said that as a Christian, she felt guilt about the abortion, which she underwent so she could compete in the 2020 Games,” Macur reported. “She said she was even more crushed when the Games were postponed until 2021, because the delay meant she could have had the baby after all.”
