Unplanned: The Dramatic True Story of a Former Planned Parenthood Leader's Eye-Opening Journey Across the Life Line by Abby Johnson, Cindy Lambert Page A
Authors: Abby Johnson, Cindy Lambert
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darkness and further and further from the light for several years by then. I’ve since owned up to the fact that if I had truly been seeking God’s will, I would have been reading the Bible and spending time in concentrated prayer, listening for His wisdom. I would have been seeking the counsel of spiritually mature believers rather than hiding my livelihood from them.
Instead, I made a childish bargain. In so doing, I thought I won. I accepted the job and cheerfully celebrated that God had blessed my career move. In reality, I lost. Because now, as my mother had pointed out, I had taken upon my shoulders the mantle of responsibility for everything that happened in that clinic.
Chapter Eight
My Enemy, My Friend
I was surprised how ready I felt for my first week as director of the Bryan clinic. There were so many changes I was eager to make, and I didn’t want to waste a day getting started. I was ready to roll. The first major change was one I would not announce. I would model it instead. I was determined to build a positive, cooperative relationship with the Coalition for Life.
“I’ve made a vow about something at the clinic,” I told Doug as I dressed for my first day as director.
“A vow? About what?”
“I vow never to call the police on the Coalition—unless, of course, someone is violent or lighting a fire or actually damaging property. But if anything like that happened, it wouldn’t be the Coalition anyway. That would be some troublemaker they have no control over.”
Doug smiled. “That will be a change. Seems to me the clinic has always called the police for every little thing. I’ll bet the police hate it when your clinic calls.”
“I think you’re probably right. But I’ll call them in for real crimes only. If a problem comes up with the Coalition, I’ll just call Shawn and discuss it with him.” I told Doug I wanted to build a strong relationship between the community and the clinic and get rid of the adversarial distrust. It’s not like either of us had a secret agenda. They believed in wiping out abortion; we believed in reducing unwanted pregnancies and protecting a woman’s reproductive rights. But I’d watched them at the fence for a long time. I was convinced they cared about these women, just like we did.
“Sometimes I think we have more in common than we do differences,” I told him. “It’s just that our differences are so . . . well . . . drastically different!” I was on my soapbox.
“Okay, Abby. You go single-handedly change the nature of the pro-life/prochoice battleground. I’ve got students to teach.” He kissed me good-bye and left. I finished going over some details with Grace’s new nanny and cuddled my daughter for a few more minutes before heading in to work.
I didn’t have to wait long before testing my new approach. One of the staff came to me that week and said, “Abby, I have another client complaining about the camera out front.”
“Ours or the Coalition’s?”
“Theirs. She’s asking me if they plan to show the pictures someplace, revealing that she came here.”
“Okay. I’ll talk to the Coalition about it.”
We had our cameras mounted along our fence. The Coalition for Life’s practice for some time had been to set up a manned camera and tripod each day. As I understand it, there had been a lawsuit long before between a clinic worker and a pro-lifer, and ever since, the cameras were there. There had been times when a pro-lifer was overly aggressive with the camera, following us closely or sticking it in our faces as we walked. I’d seen Coalition volunteers, including Shawn, put a stop to such tactics, as this was not their style, but a few zealots occasionally misbehaved. Today this was not the case. The pro-lifers’ camera was properly resting on its tripod next to our driveway.
I was actually glad to have an opportunity to test out my new face-to-face approach, with no police involved. Here was my chance.
I looked out the
Instead, I made a childish bargain. In so doing, I thought I won. I accepted the job and cheerfully celebrated that God had blessed my career move. In reality, I lost. Because now, as my mother had pointed out, I had taken upon my shoulders the mantle of responsibility for everything that happened in that clinic.
Chapter Eight
My Enemy, My Friend
I was surprised how ready I felt for my first week as director of the Bryan clinic. There were so many changes I was eager to make, and I didn’t want to waste a day getting started. I was ready to roll. The first major change was one I would not announce. I would model it instead. I was determined to build a positive, cooperative relationship with the Coalition for Life.
“I’ve made a vow about something at the clinic,” I told Doug as I dressed for my first day as director.
“A vow? About what?”
“I vow never to call the police on the Coalition—unless, of course, someone is violent or lighting a fire or actually damaging property. But if anything like that happened, it wouldn’t be the Coalition anyway. That would be some troublemaker they have no control over.”
Doug smiled. “That will be a change. Seems to me the clinic has always called the police for every little thing. I’ll bet the police hate it when your clinic calls.”
“I think you’re probably right. But I’ll call them in for real crimes only. If a problem comes up with the Coalition, I’ll just call Shawn and discuss it with him.” I told Doug I wanted to build a strong relationship between the community and the clinic and get rid of the adversarial distrust. It’s not like either of us had a secret agenda. They believed in wiping out abortion; we believed in reducing unwanted pregnancies and protecting a woman’s reproductive rights. But I’d watched them at the fence for a long time. I was convinced they cared about these women, just like we did.
“Sometimes I think we have more in common than we do differences,” I told him. “It’s just that our differences are so . . . well . . . drastically different!” I was on my soapbox.
“Okay, Abby. You go single-handedly change the nature of the pro-life/prochoice battleground. I’ve got students to teach.” He kissed me good-bye and left. I finished going over some details with Grace’s new nanny and cuddled my daughter for a few more minutes before heading in to work.
I didn’t have to wait long before testing my new approach. One of the staff came to me that week and said, “Abby, I have another client complaining about the camera out front.”
“Ours or the Coalition’s?”
“Theirs. She’s asking me if they plan to show the pictures someplace, revealing that she came here.”
“Okay. I’ll talk to the Coalition about it.”
We had our cameras mounted along our fence. The Coalition for Life’s practice for some time had been to set up a manned camera and tripod each day. As I understand it, there had been a lawsuit long before between a clinic worker and a pro-lifer, and ever since, the cameras were there. There had been times when a pro-lifer was overly aggressive with the camera, following us closely or sticking it in our faces as we walked. I’d seen Coalition volunteers, including Shawn, put a stop to such tactics, as this was not their style, but a few zealots occasionally misbehaved. Today this was not the case. The pro-lifers’ camera was properly resting on its tripod next to our driveway.
I was actually glad to have an opportunity to test out my new face-to-face approach, with no police involved. Here was my chance.
I looked out the
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