In her words: At age 17, DakotaRei escaped Texas to get an abortion

I was 17 when I found out that I was pregnant and was already about 8 weeks along. I was so overwhelmed because I had no idea of what my options were going to be, and I was afraid.

I was well aware that I wouldn’t be able to access an abortion in Texas. The Texas Heartbeat Act had been passed about six months before, in September 2021, and it had banned abortions in the state after about 6 weeks (when fetal cardiac activity could be detected).

At the time, I also felt ashamed. We’re told as teenagers that one of your very few jobs is to not get pregnant. And so I was upset with myself.

And of course, I had no clue of where to start, how I was going to pay for an abortion, how I was going to travel out of state and who I could even tell, because we had a ‘bounty law’ in Texas.

The bounty law meant that doctors who performed an abortion or helped a woman get one could be sued for at least $10,000, and I wondered if I was willing to put people close to me in danger of financial and legal repercussions for simply aiding and abetting in my abortion.

When I got pregnant, I had been with my partner, now my fiancé, Tanner, for two years and before we were ever sexually active we had discussed using protection and getting tested for STDs (sexually transmitted diseases).

I had seen a gynecologist, and told her that I wanted to be on hormonal birth control because I believed that I was suffering from Premenstrual Dysphoric Disorder (PMDD), which is a much more serious form of PMS.

I would have extremely painful periods and just be so fatigued. There would be times that I would have to leave school early or not go in at all because of the pain. Then sometimes I would completely miss my period for a whole cycle.

But she completely brushed off my concerns. She was like, periods are painful, you’ll get over it. She basically treated me like I was a promiscuous teenager, even though I was trying to be proactive about my reproductive health. Then she scheduled me for a pap smear and left.

So Tanner and I were using condoms and also using Fertility Awareness, which helps you track your ovulation so you can prevent pregnancy on your ‘fertile days.’

But because I sometimes missed periods and I was also suffering from chronic nausea at the time, it made it really difficult for me to recognize that I was pregnant in the first place. However, when I started throwing up more frequently and noticed that I had missed my period, I was like, okay, I should definitely take a test.

Tanner and I were in our senior year of high school, and when I saw that I was pregnant I called him immediately. We both knew that being parents and having children wasn’t our priority, so we knew that I would get an abortion.

I told him that I would call my mom and tell her. Reproductive health discussions were never a taboo with my mom. Whenever I first started asking questions about sex, she gave me the rundown—the sex education that Texas couldn’t.

In Texas public schools, we really only have ‘abstinence education.’ Basically, we’re just told, ‘don’t have sex.’

When I asked my mom, ‘What do I do?’ she told me to call a local Planned Parenthood clinic and ask them. I was able to get phone numbers for a couple of out-of-state clinics, and then I just began calling. I had to ask about prices for the procedure and dates to make a booking so my mom and I could figure out the logistics.

But I still didn’t know how I would find the money to travel out of state. I decided to go on TikTok and I utilized trending hashtags and filters and I basically just told my story.

Since I was feeling lost and hopeless, I did the one thing I knew how to do as a young person, which is to utilize social media.

I talked about how painful it was being pregnant, the fact that I was extremely fatigued and how difficult and expensive it was to try to get an abortion. A lot of people really empathized with me and shared their own stories, and I ended up getting almost 40,000 views and raising $400.

It took about a week before my mom and I settled on a Planned Parenthood clinic in Albuquerque, New Mexico. It would be a 700-mile, 11-hour drive but because the clinic had such a huge influx of patients from Texas, it was going to be about a month before I could get an appointment.

In the meantime, I was vomiting after every meal and was constantly dehydrated. It got to the point where I was fainting in the shower and I ended up getting diagnosed with hyperemesis gravidarum, which is very severe morning sickness that lasts all day.

I was living with my dad and I was still too afraid to tell him that I was pregnant and so I had to keep saying that I wasn’t feeling well and that I had the flu.

When I finally told my dad, he cried. He wasn’t upset with me, but he felt so disappointed in himself for not doing everything in his power to prevent me from getting pregnant, including helping me access more reliable birth control. Then he dipped into his savings to help contribute to the cost of the abortion and the trip that I would have to take.

My parents had never married. I lived with my mom after I was born but when my mom got sick and had to go into the hospital for a while when I was 3 or 4, my dad ended up bringing me to live with him and his then-wife, and I’ve been living with him ever since.

I’ve loved living with my dad and still live with him. He’s been a very big supporter and over the years we’ve gotten much closer.

Both my parents are Mescalero Apaches, and I now realize how much my ancestry comes into play in my identity, my values, and in the culture and history of who I am. It’s something that I love to embrace.

For the trip to Albuquerque, my mom’s friend lent us her car which was a lot bigger and would be more comfortable for my mom, Tanner and I.

Even though there were a lot of barriers to getting an abortion when you live in Texas, luckily I had a community to come forward and provide me with the resources to make it possible.

Tanner had told his mom about my pregnancy. Because we had already been together for about two years, my family and his family were very well acquainted and everyone loved each other.

His mom was fine with Tanner taking time off school for the trip and he held my hand on the drive there. He was absolutely very supportive. For me, my abortion made us stronger. Never once did it make us question our future together or our commitment to each other. It just affirmed it.

At the clinic, in the recovery room after the abortion, there were a bunch of other girls who were all from Texas. We started talking about our experiences and about our thoughts on the abortion ban, and about how it felt to know that New Mexico was a safe haven for abortion patients.

One girl, who was also 17, had to leave as soon as the medical providers said that she was alright. She had to catch a flight right back to Texas because she couldn’t afford a hotel for the night and at that moment, I was like, wow. My story was sad that I had to deal with Texas’ ban itself and then with the cost, which ended up being about $2,000 for a two-day trip, but other people faced even bigger obstacles to getting an abortion and they are obstacles that shouldn’t be in place at all.

When I was at the Albuquerque Planned Parenthood, I finally had a health care provider sit down with me and have the conversation about birth control that I had tried to have in Texas.

We talked about Premenstrual Dysphoric Disorder, and she told me about a friend of hers who had it and was using Nexplanon—a long-term, extremely effective hormonal birth control method that had been very helpful to her.

I decided to try it and had the Nexplanon implant inserted under my skin there. It’s great because it will be effective at preventing pregnancy for at least three years, and I was able to get it completely free in Albuquerque since it was covered by family planning funding. Then I was also able to get STD testing for free.

I saw such a dichotomy between the health care landscape in Texas versus the health care landscape in New Mexico, where it was very much about preventative care. Plus never once was I treated condescendingly. The providers at the clinic were very honest, compassionate, and never judgmental.

On the drive back, I slept in Tanner’s lap. The procedure had been painless and fast, and I genuinely felt like an emotional weight had lifted off me.

For the first couple of weeks after the procedure, I actually stayed with Tanner’s family because my dad works long hours and Tanner was there at my beck and call to help me with whatever I needed. We are now engaged and he’s my biggest supporter.

I felt no regret about my decision. I knew I made the right decision. But it took a long time for my hormones to regulate and feel normal again. And I still felt like a failure because of how stigmatized teenage pregnancy is.

But over time, that depression and anxiety turned into a passion to address the issues of reproductive health. I saw that I had tried to be proactive about my reproductive health and I got shut down. Getting pregnant wasn’t my fault. I did as much as I knew how to do as a powerless teenager.

But the whole experience did instill a confidence in me that I now know that I am able to take care of myself.

Now at 19, and as an adult, I am working to ensure that other people don’t have to go through what I went through. I’m in my freshman year at San Antonio College majoring in public administration, and I’ve been doing internships in the communications and nonprofit fields.

I’m a digital intern with a Texas nonprofit started by former Texas senator and reproductive freedom advocate Wendy Davis. It’s called Deeds Not Words. (It supports young women who are working to have a public and political voice.)

We’ve been very focused on getting people in Texas registered to vote, and now that early voting has started, to get them out to the polls. It’s super exciting that a record number—18.62 million people—are registered to vote in this election. (EDITOR’S NOTE: That’s 5% higher than the 2022 election.)

Once I turned 18, I voted in every local election that came up but this will be my first general election, and I’m super excited.

I also began a fellowship with Advocates for Youth (a global organization working with youth leaders to fight for young people to have access to information about sexual health, in the interest of making informed decisions).

As part of that fellowship, I’m working with elected officials to formulate a bill that would make it mandatory for schools to provide menstrual education in Texas. That’s my goal. (Texas is one of just 5 states that requires parents to opt their children into sex education).

I’ve realized how much a lack of menstrual education impacted my own success. I didn’t realize that periods weren’t supposed to be debilitating. And period pain is one of the leading causes of young women missing school.

Now that I’ve been on Nexplanon it has really helped me with my period pain, reduced my nausea, and regulated my hormones. It has allowed me to finally feel like a normal human and lead my best life.

I’m continuing to advocate for reproductive freedom and to share my abortion story at events like the ”Ride to Decide” reproductive bus tour this past summer, which had stops in San Antonio and Austin.

(EDITOR’S NOTE: The Ride To Decide bus tour went to nine different states where abortion is restricted and put on events to publicize how abortion bans are dangerously harming women’s reproductive health care).

I really believe that abortion access is everyone’s issue, whether or not you are someone who can get pregnant.

Abortion isn’t about ‘life.’ This is part of a continuous attack on people’s rights and freedoms. Government shouldn’t be making black and white laws about what we can and can’t do with our bodies, because it ends up hurting people. We have seen that these laws aren’t about protecting women and protecting families. They’re about subjugating people.

A lot of people have asked me about moving out of Texas. But I love this state and the people in it. I just think that the people that represent it are not meeting our needs.

I want to be here and do the work to ensure that we make it better for everyone because there are so many people who can’t leave. I owe it to them and myself to stay and make it better. I have found my voice.

This story was originally published in Courier Texas.