The faces – and voices – of survivors

Story and Photos By Beth Donze, Clarion Herald   

Audience members at Loyola University sat in stunned silence as they heard from two of the planet’s most knowledgeable experts on the human toll of abortion.

Josiah Presley and Claire Culwell told their listeners they literally are “walking miracles,” having both survived abortion procedures that initially were presumed to have been successful.

Despite such harrowing starts to their lives, both Presley and Culwell have gone on to forgive their birth parents and become strident advocates for life – often just by showing their faces.

“We’re being called ‘imaginary,’ and we are being discredited – people are saying that (surviving an abortion) just doesn’t happen,” said Culwell, speaking Oct. 19 at the “Rehumanize Conference on Life, Peace and Justice,” a three-day gathering hosted by Loyola’s Wolfpack for Life group that examined a variety of pro-life issues including poverty, homelessness, capital punishment, suicide prevention, immigration and the rights of the disabled.

“You showing up means that you want to hear us, and you want to see us and you care about what we’ve experienced,” Culwell said.

Adopted from South Korea

Presley told conference attendees assembled inside Loyola’s Nunemaker Auditorium that he had been adopted from South Korea as a 13-month-old and raised in Oklahoma in a happy family of 12 children.

When Presley turned 13, his adoptive parents told him the story of his beginnings and it wasn’t pretty: Presley’s birth mother had undergone a curettage abortion – a surgical procedure in which the doctor removes a baby from his mother’s womb in pieces – two months into her pregnancy with him.

Told that everything had gone according to plan, Presley’s birth mother was sent home to recuperate.

“But a few months later, she actually realized that the abortion had failed. I was still very much alive,” said Presley, who was successfully delivered on Oct. 7, 1995.

Although Presley was relieved to finally hear his adoption story, the harrowing details sent the adolescent into a three-year spiral of anger, depression and feelings of worthlessness. He had been born with a badly deformed left arm, and now he knew why.

“I hated (my birth parents),” admitted Presley. “I had anger toward any pro-choice person, toward any abortion doctor, Planned Parenthood worker and post-abortive woman I would come into contact with. I had nothing but wrong thoughts toward them.”

Healing came when Presley attended a faith-based camp at age 16. He “met Jesus,” let go of his bitterness and forgave his birth parents, wherever they might be.

“I was reminded – I had it right in my face – that the God of the universe had forgiven me of all my sins when I was against him, (so) the least I could do was to forgive my parents for the choices they made,” he said.

Presley, who got married earlier this year, went on to become a vocal advocate for the rights of the unborn and a Baptist youth minister in Mesquite, Texas.

“I’m called, as a follower of Christ, to protect life, to value life,” Presley said, urging conference attendees to take stock of their motivations for being involved in pro-life advocacy.

“We can’t say, ‘we love the unborn’ and (simultaneously) hate our neighbor who’s already born,” Presley told them. “I can’t say, ‘I love the unborn’ and then hate the post-abortive woman, hate the abortion doctor, hate the Planned Parenthood worker.”

Undetected in the womb

Culwell, 31, said she met her birth mother 10 years ago, inspired by her sister’s happy reunion with her own birth mother.

At the pair’s initial meeting, Culwell was thrilled to learn things about herself, such as her birth mother’s hometown and which relatives she resembled most.

However, things took an unexpected turn when the two women got together the second time: Culwell gave her birth mother a card with a handwritten message – “Thank you for choosing life for me” – and the floodgates opened.

“My birth mother started telling me about being pregnant (with me) at 13, and her mother telling her that there was only one choice for her, and that was to have an abortion,” Culwell said.

After undergoing a dilation and evacuation (D&E) abortion 20 weeks into the pregnancy, Culwell’s birth mother was told by clinic staff that her life would “go back to normal.”

But it didn’t.

A few weeks after the procedure, Culwell’s birth mother realized her stomach was still growing and that she was still suffering from morning sickness. A return visit to the abortion clinic revealed that Culwell’s birth mother had been pregnant with twins, and that one of those babies was still very much alive.

“I had survived my mother’s abortion!” Culwell said. “My heart broke for (my birth mother) in that moment; I knew in that moment that God had already forgiven my birth mother, and so I knew my response. The right response for me to be able to heal, for me to be able to live out God’s call, was to choose forgiveness.”

Culwell, then 21, instantly realized her life’s work would involve sharing her incredible story of survival with anyone who would listen. She said someone recently reminded her of how powerful her platform is. Because she is a twin, people who see her can literally gaze into the face of an aborted baby.

“Nobody should have to walk around as an abortion survivor,” Culwell said. “Nobody should have to walk around every day as a twin-less twin because ‘choice’ told someone that this would empower them, when in fact it left them with a lifetime of complications and (an inability) to get back something they will never get back.”

Culwell urged conference attendees to share her and Presley’s stories and to speak up every time abortion is “normalized” – such as the time a woman’s “right to choose” was marked last January by lighting up New York City’s One World Trade Center in pink.

“I don’t know what that (celebratory lighting) felt like to you, but I can tell you what that felt like to me as a woman, as an abortion survivor,” Culwell said. “I remember sitting there, thinking, ‘Do they not see me and my pain? Do they not see what Josiah (Presley) and the over 300 other abortion survivors we have connected with through the Abortion Survivors Network have experienced? Do they not see my birth mother? Do they not see that pain in her eyes?’

“It upset me and it was personal, because they were denying my right as a woman that day. They were denying my humanity that day.”

Beth Donze can be reached at bdonze@clarionherald.org.