‘The whole system is messed up.’ SC woman’s abortion ordeal is what awaits others

CHARLESTON, S.C. — Taylor Shelton enjoys time with friends, reading, running and cooking with her partner. The Lowcountry resident connects to spirituality through meditation in yoga. She hikes and enjoys the mountains, but considers herself more of a beach girl.

Shelton is just like any other 27-year-old woman, except in the last year, she became the face of the battle for abortion and women’s health in South Carolina. She wasn’t ready to have a child. The hurdles she had to jump through caused her physical, financial and emotional hardships.

Shelton took precautions to prevent pregnancy. She had a copper IUD for nearly seven years, which is supposed to be 99.9% effective. But it wasn’t foolproof, and the Pinehurst, North Carolina, native was in a position she had tried to avoid with a quickly approaching deadline.

A few weeks after the South Carolina Supreme Court upheld the state’s fetal heartbeat law, touted by state lawmakers to reduce the number of abortions and prevent people from using abortion as birth control, Shelton found out she was pregnant and started to scramble on what to do next.

The earliest Shelton could get an appointment in South Carolina was after the six-week mark of her pregnancy. So, frustrated and in physical pain, Shelton traveled to North Carolina three times to terminate the pregnancy she didn’t plan.

“I wouldn’t wish it on anyone,” Shelton said, when talking about the abortion. “So it is what it is. But I’m grateful that I could have it done and that it was successful. It was my decision and I knew exactly what I wanted. And I knew that I wasn’t ready.”

Shelton is trying to turn the challenges she faced into change. Shelton signed onto a lawsuit with Planned Parenthood against the six-week ban, arguing the ban should be at nine weeks and the law’s vague parameters makes it nearly impossible for anyone to get an abortion.

Eighty-two House representatives and 27 senators voted in favor of the six-week ban, even though the heart isn’t fully formed. Gov. Henry McMaster signed the bill in May 2023.

The lawmakers, however, didn’t and still don’t understand a key piece, Shelton says. A lived experience: her own.

Through the process and especially after, Shelton has found herself spending a lot of time in the ocean, where she can find serenity. It’s why she lives in Charleston, where she obtained a degree in biology at the College of Charleston.

“I love being in the water,” Shelton said “The ocean water is so much fun it feels so soothing, actually, it really helped me kind of through the process of grieving.”

An ineffective system

In early September, Shelton was in shock. Her pregnancy test was positive, despite her 99% effective copper IUD. She had been to her gynecologist two weeks earlier to have her IUD checked at a yearly appointment. She thought she needed a new one, but her doctor assured her it was good for 10 years, and it had only been seven.

South Carolina’s six-week abortion ban had recently gone into effect. Before Aug. 23, abortion had been legal up until 20 weeks of pregnancy.

So, when Shelton stared down at the double lines on the test, it was infuriating, frustrating and almost unbelievable.

“I think I was in disbelief honestly the first day after my missed period, I had gone to get the pregnancy test and waited until Thursday night to take it because I just was … I really didn’t believe that that would be the case,” Shelton said.

She tracks her periods, and considers herself lucky to have a normal cycle where she gets her period once a month around the same time. When she missed it by two days, she immediately took a test.

Between 14% to 25% of women have irregular periods, which can cause shorter or longer cycles among other effects such as pain and menstrual flow. Because of this, some women wouldn’t consider it abnormal to miss a few days. With a six-week ban, they don’t know if they’re pregnant because of irregular cycles. With a six-week ban, a few days are vital.

Under the new law, Shelton had less than two weeks before she could no longer seek abortion services in South Carolina.

Shelton knew what she had to do, and she was confident in that decision, she said. But she had to go over a host of hurdles to obtain an abortion out of state. She wouldn’t change her decision to have an abortion, but she certainly would change the accessibility of the care and length of time to be more reasonable.

“I wanted people to understand that, it’s a whole system, the whole system is messed up,” Shelton said. “It’s not working correctly, efficiently.”

South Carolina’s pregnancy-related mortality rate is 47% higher than the national average. In 2020, the state’s Pregnancy-Related Mortality Ratio was 32.3 pregnancy-related deaths per 100,000 live births, most occurring after birth.

The mortality rate for non-Hispanic Black women is nearly four times the rate for non-Hispanic White women while pregnant or postpartum.

Confident in her decision, confused on where to go

She was confident in her decision to get an abortion, because it’s what she needed to do for her health and body.

About a week after the state Supreme Court decision allowing the law to go into effect, Shelton found out she was pregnant, and almost immediately decided she wanted an abortion.

“One could say I slept on it,” Shelton said, because the next morning she woke up and immediately drove to her boyfriend’s place to talk over the abortion. He was supportive, and she started by calling Planned Parenthood.

There were no spots in South Carolina until after her six-week mark. Considering the ban had recently gone into effect when the state Supreme Court upheld the fetal heartbeat law, it led to a rush by women to the three abortion providers in South Carolina for appointments.

“Once I found out that I couldn’t get an appointment with them until after six weeks, which would have been right after six weeks, which I think is hilarious … I called my gynecologist office, the same office that put my IUD in place, who I had seen two weeks prior.”

Shelton said she wished she had asked to speak with a nurse, but instead she spoke with someone in administration. “Do you have any resources for me, do you know where I’d be able to get an abortion?” Shelton asked her.

It was a stark “No,” Shelton said the person replied.

“I felt like she was unwilling to help me and so it was just like, ‘Okay, well have a nice day’ and she was like ‘mhmm you, too.’ And that was that. So I felt like I couldn’t go to my gynecologist’s office.”

At the time of the court decision in August, doctors were hesitant to perform abortions because they didn’t have guidance on how the law would be enforced.

“Taylor fell into a really confusing time,” Planned Parenthood South Atlantic Director of Public Affairs Vicki Ringer said. “Everybody was then suddenly swamping North Carolina, because it was all the southern states.”

Shelton called Planned Parenthood again, and got an appointment in North Carolina. However, North Carolina has a 72-hour waiting period for both medication and procedural abortions as a part of the “Woman’s Right to Know Act.” During this time, the pregnant individual receives counseling information about the medical risks of an abortion and other information.

Shelton would either have to stay there or make two trips. The quickest they could get her in was the end of the following week.

She also wanted it to be over. The situation was already stressful on her health, but mentally, the anxiety and stress was something she needed to be over soon. Shelton had to look for a quicker result, so she called what she perceived as a pregnancy center in North Carolina. She asked when their next availability was, and let them know of her situation: She was four weeks pregnant, had an IUD in place and wanted an abortion.

The center said it couldn’t help her with the abortion, but could offer her an ultrasound three days before her appointment with Planned Parenthood. Shelton was already freaking out about her timeline, so she said OK, and set off on the three-hour journey to Charlotte.

She canceled her Thursday Planned Parenthood appointment, which she later would regret.

The moment she got to the center, something felt off.

“It felt very uncomfortable the moment I stepped in,” Shelton said.

The counselor, at what turned out to be a crisis pregnancy center, said she had no idea Shelton wanted an abortion or had an IUD, even though she had spoken about them when making the appointment. The counselor said her options were to have the child and keep it, or have it and give it up for adoption, Shelton said.

Shelton told the counselor she was experiencing pain and had an IUD. The counselor said that they couldn’t give ultrasounds to people with IUDs, Shelton said.

“She then told me that my baby was in danger and I needed to go to the hospital immediately,” Shelton said.

It sounded like they were more worried about the “unborn baby” than her, Shelton said. She left immediately.

“I felt that they were judgmental,” Shelton said of what she described as disrespectful, comparing it to her gynecologist’s office unwillingness to help. “It’s like their personal beliefs, opinions were being kind of used against me, in a way and, yeah. It felt dehumanizing. The whole experience felt dehumanizing.”

The center, attempts to counsel women out of abortions, gave her $100 in gas money. She drove the three hours back and called her gynecologist’s office in Charleston, got an appointment with them to get her IUD taken out.

Her Charleston OB-GYN got her into the office the next day. There was a concern she was undergoing an ectopic pregnancy, when a fertilized egg grows outside the uterus. It can cause the fallopian tube to burst, causing major internal bleeding and in some cases death.

She didn’t have an ectopic pregnancy. Her IUD had bent, which had been pushing against her cervix causing the intense pain. Her doctor said ‘I assume you want an abortion because of the IUD,’ which Shelton replied with yes. Her doctor then consoled her and said she was sorry she had to be going through the experience in such chaotic times. She then said good luck, and that she was a candidate for another IUD, and to call her if she wanted another one.

Shelton said it was difficult enough figuring out how to ask for what she needed, and when she did seek help, it felt like no one was willing to support her.

She called Planned Parenthood again, which got her into a Chapel Hill Planned Parenthood center in North Carolina for the following Tuesday to get the abortion. She went that following week with her parents, where she received an ultrasound Tuesday and scheduled her abortion that Thursday in Wilmington.

Shelton said the decision to have an abortion wasn’t traumatic. The procedure, however, isn’t something she wishes for anyone to experience.

“I wouldn’t wish it on anyone,” Shelton said. “Overall, it’s just like, just emotional and painful for a second and you’re in a white room… . and you know your legs are in the air and it’s um… it’s not fun.”

For an hour afterward, it was painful, but it wasn’t terrible, she said. It was quick, and she felt unbelievably relieved.

“I was crying and it was because I was just happy to be done with it and felt like I could breathe again.”

Lawmakers pushed ban forward

South Carolina bans abortions after an “embryo’s heart is beating steadily, repetitively and rhythmically,” which is usually around the six-week mark of a pregnancy, before a woman may know she’s pregnant.

The law was signed in 2023, after a 2021 version of the law was struck down by the state Supreme Court.

During the discussion of the abortion ban on the state house floor, state Rep. John McCravy, R-Greenwood, was widely viewed as one of the most outspoken anti-abortion voices, even filing bills to ban abortion at conception.

“When a mother sees and hears the heartbeat everything changes. She knows and we know she has a life that must be protected,” McCravy said during the 2023 abortion ban debate. “This bill saves thousands of lives that are currently being aborted for birth control. Let’s not pretend any more that abortion is health care. I’ve heard that said over and over again.”

He cited Democratic amendments to allow abortions if the baby has sickle cell anemia, fetal alcohol syndrome, the woman is in a bad relationship with a man, the mother had no sex education, lack of insurance or for financial reasons.

“All these examples are for convenience, for birth control,” McCravy said. “In the rare care case outlined in this bill, where the mother’s life or health is in danger, that is health care. But that’s less than 1% of all abortions. The other 99%, what are they for?”

Ringer objects to McCravy’s assertion that abortion is most used as birth control.

“One, it implies that women are irresponsible, we’re lazy and we’re promiscuous,” Ringer said. “When you consider that on the low end of the totem pole that abortions are about $600. It can run up to $20,000 depending on the circumstances and how far along you are if you have to go to a hospital and that doesn’t include any travel. Birth control itself is not cheap, particularly if you work in a low income job, which is a lot of women in South Carolina. We have a really high rate of poverty. So if you’re making minimum wage, you think $25 to $50 a month doesn’t sound like a big deal. But minimum wage, that’s a full day of work.”

Shelton said the idea that abortion is used for birth control is a “poor point to make.”

“Every woman has an individual experience,” Shelton said. “A majority of women, I don’t think are using abortion as birth control. Also by the way, birth control is not 100% effective. So when they have one that is then they can start saying things like that, but I just think that it’s unfair and it’s really untrue.”

Shelton took responsibility for her reproductive health

Responsibility for her reproductive health is something Shelton feels strongly in.

It’s why she tracked her period, why she was on birth control, and why she took the test after two days. She didn’t consider waiting.

Shelton got her IUD in college. She was on the birth control pill in high school, but she didn’t like how the hormones affected her and it didn’t suit her lifestyle. She said her IUD was wonderful for the seven years she had it, and she considered herself blessed that she didn’t have many issues with it.

Until she became the .01% of women to get pregnant with it.

“I got it because it’s the most effective form of birth control on the market. 99.9% effective, so consider me the .01%. I definitely wasn’t trying to get pregnant and that’s why I had an IUD in place, and if I wanted to have a child then I would have gotten it taken out,” Shelton said.

Being a mother at 27, when she wasn’t in a financially secure place in her life, wasn’t something she wanted. She had been dating her partner for six months, but the conversation of children hadn’t been brought up before, she said.

Having a child wasn’t something she could even consider because of her own health. Shelton is a Type 1 diabetic, which can be life-threatening for a pregnant woman if left untreated. In the last few years, it’s been difficult to take care of her blood sugars. For the nearly two weeks before her abortion, she had high insulin resistance, she said.

“I was feeling sick a lot of the time because it was hard for me to figure out how much insulin to give myself, if I gave myself too much then my blood sugar would drop too low, and I’d feel off, or I didn’t give myself enough it would be high and I’d be irritable.”

Women’s health vs. protecting life

If you haven’t experienced an abortion, or haven’t had a loved one experience it, most people really don’t understand what an abortion really is, Shelton said.

“I really don’t think that you’d have any idea, especially men. They don’t know what it’s like to get periods and to have that stress of being the ones to add the birth control or take the birth control or the shame that has been in our history of women having sex in general,” Shelton said.

Shelton emphasized how grateful she was to been able to have had the procedure done. Between driving more than 20 hours, missing multiple days of work and the financial strain it put on her, she couldn’t imagine how women who didn’t have the resources she did ever would be able to get an abortion.

“I was exhausted. Like I said my blood sugars were not happy with me because of the pregnancy itself. So that was also taxing but I just finished a summer job. So I was in a bit of a transition, therefore I did have the time. I think most women do not because they are working or because they are taking care of other children or have other things that they’re doing where they don’t have the time to get to these appointments,” Shelton said.

If she hadn’t been able to get the abortion in North Carolina, she would have gone to New York, where she had some friends who she could go to.

“My mom did ask me a few times, ‘Are you sure you don’t want to keep it?’ But I didn’t and she was unbelievably supportive. My dad was supportive,” Shelton said. My mom, my aunt, my partner, my friends. I mean, I really had all the support I could ask for. And I don’t think many women do have that support.”

Shelton said she feels unbelievably grateful and privileged to have the resources she had. But, she did everything in her power to do the procedure as quickly as possible and do it the way the government wanted her to and still couldn’t get the care she needed in South Carolina.

“I would have done what I needed to do because I really didn’t want to be pregnant. I don’t think I should be forced to have a child if I’m not ready to have one, which is why this whole thing is ludicrous, and which is why I’m here, speaking about it.”

After the abortion and the experience she went through, Shelton said she is not going back on birth control, mostly because she doesn’t trust it. Getting an IUD inserted was painful enough, and when it failed her, she said using condoms and tracking her period has been what is working best for her and her partner.

Anger into action

For someone who hated public speaking, the interviews, court appearances and advocacy that became her reality felt unimaginably daunting; but Shelton said there was no other choice. She had to step up.

Shelton felt she wasn’t a priority through the process, she said. And she had to jump through a number of hoops that were completely unnecessary, she said.

She was angry. So, she sought out Planned Parenthood again, but this time to fight along side them.

“That wasn’t the intention to begin with, it was more like I was just frustrated and wanted to know if there was a way I could tell my story or be a part of something.”

In the state Supreme Court decision to uphold the six-week ban, Planned Parenthood argued there was an unsettled question remaining: When is a fetal heartbeat detected? Planned Parenthood filed a subsequent lawsuit to say it really is around the nine-week mark when a baby’s heart is fully formed. When Planned Parenthood filed the lawsuit, the organization added Shelton as a plaintiff.

Her parents and Planned Parenthood were more concerned for her safety than she was, she admitted. Mainly because Shelton decided to use her name, and not be anonymous. It meant appearing publicly in court, standing in front of news cameras and now publicly advocating for greater abortion access.

“I felt drawn to using my name because I feel like it makes a difference,” Shelton said. “It’s more impactful when you see the person and you and the name, that this is a real person experiencing the situation, and I’m one of thousands of women who are experiencing this. I thought the best way to do it would be to go all out and use my name and be myself.”

To Shelton, a six-week ban is a total ban. Even if it is “enough time” she is living proof that its not, she said. She thinks the lawmakers did it on purpose, so abortions couldn’t happen anyway.

A judge denied a temporary injunction saying that the legislative intent of the law is six weeks, leaving Planned Parenthood a decision on whether to file an appeal.

Shelton said she feels she was meant to be a mother, just not at 27. Sometimes she wonders about the state of the world, which is in a dark place, she said, and isn’t sure she wants to bring a child into it. But when she’s financially stable enough to have a child, she would consider it again.

A good law or policy allows for access to the care someone needs, she said. Other people’s personal beliefs should not run the show. It’s her decision to not have a child, and no one else’s belief should dictate that, she said.

“If you don’t believe in what I believe in and you don’t agree with it, that’s not my problem. This is my life, and having a child drastically changes your life, and I was not ready for that,” Shelton said.