“We found out the fetus would not survive to full term, and that my life was at risk,” Laura Prepon wrote on Instagram following the Supreme Court’s recent decision to overturn Roe v. Wade
Laura Prepon is sharing her abortion story.
Following the U.S. Supreme Court’s recent decision to overturn Roe v. Wade — the landmark case which protected one’s choice to have an abortion in every state — the Orange Is the New Black actress, 42, reflected on her decision to abort a previous pregnancy.
“One of the worst days of my life was when I made the choice to terminate a pregnancy in the second trimester,” she wrote on Instagram Monday alongside a picture of herself in front of a rainbow.
“The devastating truth is that we found out the fetus would not survive to full term, and that my life was at risk as well,” she explained. “At the time – I had the choice.”
Prepon continued, “Everyone has their own story for seeking out this medical procedure and I empathize with anyone who’s been faced with this impossible decision.”
“I am praying for all of us, that we can get through this challenging time and regain agency over our own bodies,” she concluded.
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Roe v. Wade was overturned by the Supreme Court on Friday. The 6-to-3 ruling reverses nearly 50 years of legal precedent and will completely change the landscape of women’s reproductive rights by giving individual states the power to decide whether to allow the procedure.
Since the decision, Arkansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Missouri and South Dakota have already banned abortion after putting “trigger bans” in place that governors enacted after the Supreme Court ruling.
In 2020, the That ’70s Show actress revealed her decision to terminate her second pregnancy in her memoir You & I As Mothers.
After Prepon and her husband, Ben Foster, had their daughter Ella in 2017, she became pregnant again in 2018. Eager to share the news with loved ones, she and Foster, 41, held off until they scheduled a sonogram at 16 weeks.
When the sonographer looked at the screen, Prepon immediately knew something was wrong. After her ob-gyn was summoned, she told her it could be a condition called cystic hygroma (an abnormal development of the lymphatic vascular system during embryonic growth).
After an echocardiogram, the condition was confirmed. “Our neonatal specialist told us the brain was not growing and the bones were not growing,” Prepon told PEOPLE while discussing her book in 2020. “We were told the pregnancy would not go to full term and that my body was at risk carrying any longer.”
“Ben held me as I cried,” she shared. “We had to terminate the pregnancy.”
In 2019, the pair learned they were expecting again. However, the news brought her both happiness and fear.
“I couldn’t fathom going through it again,” said Prepon. “When the news began to sink in, we realized we’re going to go on this journey again and bring our daughter a sibling.”
“I was also ecstatic,” she continued. “I mean, it’s magical.”
“It made me so thankful for the blessing we have now,” she said of their baby boy born at the end of February 2020. “It put into perspective what a blessing it is to have a healthy child.”
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