This weekend, Support After Abortion CEO Lisa Rowe, LCSW, showed social workers how to navigate challenges associated with helping women who have experienced at-home abortions.
Rowe told attendees of the 2022 North American Christian Social Workers (NACSW) conference that at-home abortions are becoming more prevalent and, based upon recent research, cause significant distress to about one-third of women.
“Support After Abortion’s national study makes clear that medication abortions will increase the burdens on social workers,” said Rowe after the conference. “One in three women suffer adverse impacts from medication abortions; but fewer than one in five women even know that help for those adverse impacts exists. Identifying and addressing these traumas will, as it often does with other traumas, fall on social workers.”
Rowe’s one-hour presentation included a key process change for social workers. She noted that since most women keep medication abortions very private, asking about any child loss and then listing various losses – such as miscarriage, stillbirth, failed adoptions, and abortion – will provide the opportunity for women to open up in a psychologically secure way. She also provided Support After Abortion’s research-based language best practices to help women feel safe in sharing their abortion experiences.
The NACSW conference helps Christian social workers apply their faith to the practical realities of helping homes which are often struggling through brokenness. Rowe said that her presentation was designed to enable social workers to better serve as the front lines of helping women, men, and families find healing after traumas.
“Social workers are almost always under-resourced and overburdened with heart-breaking and difficult duties,” said Rowe. “I was honored to help them be better prepared for this important vocation by sharing how to help the real people suffering after abortion.”
About Support After AbortionSupport After Abortion is an abortion healing organization which promotes compassion, collaboration, and capacity to create gold-standard care for men and women suffering from abortion’s adverse impacts.