By Max Scheinblum
THE CONCORD MONITOR
Kelly Omu was 16 weeks pregnant when she heard the devastating news – her unborn daughter had a life-threatening tumor called a fetal cystic hygroma on the back of her neck.
Doctors told Omu she would have to undergo further testing to determine the exact severity of the growth, but it was undoubtedly fatal.
“We had asked them if it was going to make a difference if we waited the next two weeks, if we found out what the cause was or if it was fatal,” she said. “And they said with the amount of swelling she had even at 16 weeks, she wouldn’t make it to birth.”
It took two more weeks for Omu and her husband, David, to find an abortion provider that accepted patients after 15 weeks of pregnancy, even though New Hampshire law allows the procedure up to 24 weeks. The couple settled on a clinic in Boston and traveled to Massachusetts on a frigid winter day, walking in amid shouts from pro-life activists yelling “you could have been parents.”
Days before, the Jaffrey resident took to Facebook to voice frustrations with the entire process, particularly the difficulty finding an accessible abortion in the Granite State and the cost. Through her posts, she was connected with Josie Pinto, the founder and executive director of the Reproductive Freedom Fund of New Hampshire.
The fund helped pay for the $3,000 two-day abortion, a more costly and lengthy procedure because of its timing. Testing later revealed their daughter had Turner Syndrome, a condition when a female has only one X chromosome. Kelly and David Omu posthumously named her Mariposa, the Spanish word for butterfly – the symbol of strength and perseverance for families dealing with Turner Syndrome.
The fund provides financial aid for New Hampshire residents seeking abortions in any state, like Omu.
Once the leak of a draft U.S. Supreme Court opinion in May revealed justices were poised to strike down a woman’s right to an abortion throughout the country, the fund received a wave of financial support.
“It was hard to raise money at first, but then when the Supreme Court leak happened, we raised the same amount of money that took us two years to raise in a matter of 14 minutes,” Pinto said.
When the official Supreme Court decision in the Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization was released at the end of June, and rallies were held around the state, even more support rained down.
“It’s really picked up,” Pinto said. “And that’s really great.”
Much of the money raised will be used for a new anticipated need – patients coming to New Hampshire seeking medical care from states where abortion is illegal or where clinics are overbooked.
Pinto expects the two main influxes to be from New York and Pennsylvania, which neighbor states where abortion is restricted or are in the process of restricting it. When clinics there get overbooked, people will likely flock to New England states to book an appointment, she said.
Women who have previous connections to the Granite State, like school or family, are also likely to come here if they need an abortion.
“I think what else is next for us is trying to accommodate all the new requests we’re going to get from these out-of-state travelers, which could look like picking more people up from airports or getting bus tickets. Kind of coordinating on a much more regional level than we really have before this,” she said. “We were pretty focused on New Hampshire and occasionally would help someone get to Massachusetts or even as far as DC, but I think that those things are going to become a lot more requested of us.”
Financial assistance
Pinto established the non-profit in 2019 soon after she discovered New Hampshire did not have any program to help cover abortion expenses.
“I moved to New Hampshire in 2017 for a job with Planned Parenthood Action Fund from Massachusetts, which has three abortion funds. Pretty soon into living in New Hampshire, I became aware that we didn’t even have a single abortion fund,” Pinto said.
She landed a job at the Equality Health Center in Concord, one of the three main abortion providers in New Hampshire.
“It was actually my job to answer the phones for the patients and schedule appointments, so every single day I was directly talking to patients scheduling abortion appointments who couldn’t afford to pay for them,” Pinto said.
In January 2019, she started laying the groundwork for the Reproductive Freedom Fund of New Hampshire.
“I said, ‘you know what, I don’t really know anything about starting a nonprofit. But I know a lot of people and I think that I can do it with the right team’” she said. “Then I officially built a board and we got to work, but we didn’t launch until February of 2021 because we wanted to raise enough money so that we wouldn’t just be out of money immediately. We spent about two years building the organization and raising the initial $30,000 before launching.”
Her passion for activism began at UMass Amherst after she was sexually assaulted. Rallying against sexual and domestic violence began to wear on her as the years went on.
“Over time, telling my story about being a survivor and doing that work felt really intense and I just got to a point where I didn’t feel like it was helping me heal anymore,” Pinto said. “The passion for that never died down, but I sort of pivoted more broadly because I started learning more about reproductive justice and all the different ways in which it can be applied to so many different issues.”
The Reproductive Freedom Fund mainly provides direct payments for abortions after a health center discovers a financial need. The organization also offers transportation and is looking to expand to offer hotel rooms as more out-of-state patients come to New Hampshire.
“We’ve never turned anyone away, and we’ve helped over 250 patients and given out over $100,000 in direct support for abortion,” Pinto said.
Outreach
Another key component of the fund is lobbying and outward activism.
Just a day before her abortion, Omu testified before New Hampshire lawmakers in favor of adding an exception to the state’s 24-week abortion ban in the case of fatal fetal anomalies like Mariposa’s.
Pinto helped Omu prepare to speak about her experience following her Facebook post.
“It felt like it was my one duty as a mother to speak up for my daughter and myself, and I hoped that it would inspire even one person who was in that room or watching that day, and it did so much more than that,” Omu said. “I believe my story has touched thousands, whether they see a butterfly and are reminded of my story, or it’s used in a deep discussion at a family party. It was worth every second of sitting there listening to the baseless hurtful comments said by the opposition that day, and I hope one day our children and mothers won’t have to tell such private information in public to be heard.”
Pinto sees continued lobbying as a fundamental part of the fund’s future, especially after the dismantling of protections put in place following the 1973 ruling in Roe v. Wade.
“It’s safe to say that more abortion restriction bills will be coming, but I don’t know that they will pass. They certainly didn’t go too far last session, but it is still concerning when they even get filed in the first place because even if they aren’t taken super seriously, they still take up our capacity and time organizing against them,” Pinto said. “I do think that this is a time for people to be bold, and I do think that there are Republicans on our side. I do really hope that people put values before party, and maybe we can pick up some more votes and get that fundamental right protected.”
Pinto sees personal stories as the way of the future in getting progressive reproduction legislation passed and restrictive laws overturned, like with Omu’s testimony.
“People learning more about the concept of reproductive justice and really just taking this moment to talk to people in their lives about abortion, like sharing their own abortion stories with people they know, can be super impactful, especially legislators,” Pinto said. “Obviously, the legislative session doesn’t start up again until January, so we are going to be working with abortion storytellers through then. I would welcome anyone who has an abortion story to share to reach out to us, and we can help them work on it so when the legislative session starts up we have a whole bunch of abortion storytellers ready to share their story.”
While the fund is still young, Pinto’s past activism has prepared her to see its mission fulfilled.
“I organized from a personal place of experience and not wanting more people to go through the trauma that is having your personal body violated. I really feel like your bodily autonomy is the most important thing,” Pinto said. “If you don’t feel safe in your own body, how can you feel safe or do any other social justice work beyond that? It’s a deeply personal issue for me.”
These articles are being shared by partners in The Granite State News Collaborative. For more information visit collaborativenh.org.
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