Sally Field is sharing her “horrific story” of the illegal abortion she underwent when she found herself pregnant on the age of 17 before the Supreme Court’s landmark decision in Roe v. Wade.
And the two-time Oscar winner indicated, in an Instagram video she posted Sunday, that that have is a reason to support the Democratic presidential ticket of Kamala Harris and Tim Walz, whom Field has endorsed, in addition to other candidates and ballot initiatives “that might protect reproductive freedom,” she writes within the caption accompanying the video.
After which, in all caps, she writes, “PLEASE. WE CAN’T GO BACK!!”
Within the video, Field recalls her feeling and circumstances when she came upon she was pregnant at such a young age.
“I had no selections in my life; I didn’t have numerous family support or funds,” she said. “I graduated highschool, but nobody ever said, ‘How about college?’ Nothing. I didn’t know what I used to be gonna be. After which I came upon I used to be pregnant.”
Field began by saying, “I still feel very shamed about it because I used to be raised within the ’50s, and it’s ingrained in me.”
And within the caption accompanying the video, she wrote that she’d “been so hesitant to do that, to inform my horrific story.”
“It was during a time even worse than now,” she added. “A time when contraception was not available and only for those who were married.”
Within the video, Field said a family friend, who was a physician, drove her and her mother to Tijuana.
“And we parked on a extremely scroungy-looking street. It was scary and he parked about three blocks away and said, ‘See that constructing down there?’ And he gave me an envelope with money and I used to be to walk into that constructing and provides them the money after which come right back to him,” she said.
She had “no anesthetic” throughout the procedure, Field recalled. But, she said, “There was a technician giving me a couple of puffs of ether, but he would then take it away, so it just made my legs and arms feel numb and bizarre, but I felt every little thing — how much pain I used to be in.”
Nevertheless, she then “realized that the technician was actually molesting me, so I needed to work out, how can I make my arms move to push him away? So it was just this absolute pit of shame.”
She continued, “After which, when it was finished, they said, ‘Go go go go go!,’ just like the constructing was on fire. They usually didn’t want me there, you recognize, it was illegal!”
The experience, Field said was “beyond hideous and life-altering” but thanked the doctor for his “generosity” and “bravery,” saying “he would’ve lost his license if anyone had came upon” what he did.
Shortly after her illegal abortion, Field said, she began auditioning and landed her iconic role of Gidget by the tip of the 12 months.
And he or she used her own experience to spotlight the present challenges women are facing since Roe v. Wade was overturned in 2022.
“I feel that so many ladies of my generation went through similar, traumatic events and I feel stronger when I feel of them,” Field wrote in her caption. “I imagine, like me, they need to wish to fight for his or her grandchildren and all of the young women of this country.”
“These are the things that ladies are going through now — after they’re attempting to get to a different state, they don’t have the cash, they don’t have the means, they don’t know where they’re going,” she said within the video. “And it’s beyond, how you possibly can return to that and do this to our little girls and our young women, and never have respect and regard for his or her health and their very own decisions about whether or not they feel they’re able to provide birth to a toddler at the moment. We are able to’t return. Now we have to all get up and fight.”
Field ended her caption by encouraging others to share their stories.