Unzipping Taboos: Candid Conversations about Sex - Podcasthon: I Need an A

Episode Date: March 19, 2025

Dr. Sue sits down with Becca, founder and director of I Need an A, to unpack the realities of abortion access in a post-Roe world. They tackle the confusion created by restrictive laws, the chilling effect of misinformation, and the resilience of communities working to keep abortion accessible. Becca shares how I Need an A provides clear, up-to-date information for those seeking care—without tracking data or collecting personal information.They also discuss the looming threat of outdated laws like the Comstock Act, the broader challenges in reproductive healthcare, and why community-driven action is more critical than ever. Plus, Dr. Sue and Becca reflect on the importance of rest and self-care in sustaining this work.Ways to Take Action:VisitI Need an A for accurate abortion access infoShare I Need an A with your community to combat misinformationVolunteer with I Need an A’s digital support teamDonate to I Need an A or local abortion funds or support organizations to help those in needIf you have a story, thoughts and/or a topic or question for Dr. Sue and Charlie please share your ideas here:  ⁠Show suggestions

Hey everyone, Unzipping Taboos is thrilled to take part in this year's podcast on the third annual podcast on. For one week, over a thousand podcasts are coming together to spotlight important charities. And today we at Unzipping Taboos, Dr. Sue and I are proud to highlight I Need an A. This organization is doing critical work to provide clear, accessible, and stigma-free information on abortion care. And Dr. Sue, you had a great conversation with the founder and director of I Need an A.org, Becca. Yeah, she was, that was an amazing conversation. I feel like maybe we should talk a little bit

about why we highlighted before we like jump into the conversation that we did. How we like wound up of all the charities and all the world. Yes, nice Casablanca reference there. Thank you. So we had been, so the organizers of the podcast on reached out to us

and asked if we wanted to take part. And of course we said yes, because we love highlighting the work other people are doing. And I don't think we had a very long conversation about which charity to do. No, we didn't. We got there quite quickly. We did. So for full transparency, and I do say this in the recording that you're about to hear, I am a volunteer for I Need an A and have been for a while.

I do digital volunteering, and we'll probably talk about this as we kind of close out at the end. And so for us to be able to have an opportunity to spotlight the work of I Need an A, hear a little bit more i mean i volunteer for them and i still learned a lot about kind of how they came to be and um some of the background so i think it'll be interesting for folks to listen to becca share her insights and especially because she's coming from a tech background which is neither of our backgrounds it's not not even close but as she does say uh we are children of the internet we we've been around as it was as it was born yeah so so yeah so i guess uh just kind of sit back everybody have a listen and we'll make sure we'll we'll do some more chatty chat at

the end but um if you have not already started googling madly i need an a if you're not familiar with them um strongly suggest you do that and uh just kind of kick back and listen to the conversation. Yeah. Enjoy. Hey, everyone. This is Dr. Sue, and I am absolutely privileged to have Becca here from an I Need an A. She is both the founder and director of the organization. And if you are unfamiliar with I Need an A, we will be talking about it at length today. And I will also make sure in the show description that we have links to everything, how to donate, how to get involved, and the organization itself. But Becca, if you just want to say hi, tell us what you want to tell us about you? Yeah. Hi. Thank you so much for having me today. Yeah. My name

is Becca. My pronouns are she, her. And I founded this organization called I Need an A. We're at ineedanabortion.com. And we really try to design and build tech tools that make it easier to understand how to get an abortion. Fantastic. So I feel like to be transparent, I should tell the world that I am a volunteer, which is how, actually not how I became aware of I Need an A. A student of mine came across the website and was like, do you know about this? And I said, no, but I should. And then I got on the mailing list and then poof, I became a volunteer. And we'll, again, we'll have links in the description for how to do all that. So can you just tell us a little bit about the goal, the mission, kind of how the organization popped up or came to be?

It didn't just pop up overnight, I'm sure. Yeah, I mean, it really all started when I was just a couple weeks out for my 25th birthday and I realized that I was pregnant when I didn't want to be. I called my local Planned Parenthood that I'd been going to for years, kind of as my general practitioner, really, post-college and let them know that I needed an abortion. And they told me that they'd never done that at that location. And I now know that most abortions have been happening at independent clinics for years. But at the time, it was really shocking to me because Planned Parenthood feels so synonymous with abortion.

And that was just kind of always my plan. I was like, I go here because if I got pregnant, I know I'd get one. And so after that phone call, I Googled it, like many people do. and I found the search results to be really chaotic they were filled with a lot of even from well-meaning websites they were often really fragmented there was kind of no one place to find every abortion clinic near me they were out of date a lot of the time so you know I always like to say abortion clinics have way more important things to do than update their websites but it was really really hard to piece together accurate information and of course it was

surrounded by misinformation from anti-abortion organizations in particular these anti-abortion organizations called crisis pregnancy centers that really try to look like real abortion clinics both online and in person they try to look like a real clinic to try to lure you there to talk you out of getting an abortion. Um, so it really took me days to figure out where all the clinics in Austin, Texas, where I was at the time, um, uh, where they were. Um, I spent days researching and I ended up having to wait a few weeks for my appointment, um, because of how trap laws in Texas were at the time um and I really just couldn't understand why it took me so long to piece together all this information um for context I'm a product designer and engineer by trade I

like am a child of the internet right like it's not like finding information is hard for me um And so I really was just shocked that it's something so common. We know that more than a million people have abortions every year. I couldn't understand why the user experience was so bad. So I went and got my abortion, went back to falling in love, went back to starting my career, but I couldn't really shake the feeling that that experience could be better. um and so in 2016 uh uh inspired by an election and another round of really intense targeted regulations against abortion providers apologies i used an acronym earlier but that's what trap

stands for another round of them have like made their way through state legislations um and so i went to a hackathon with a friend and um built the first proof of concept uh and from there I just kept on working on it on nights and weekends after my day job uh working in tech um and uh it was just kind of a slow and steady like pro bono not funded burn um until uh 2022 Really, when we saw the Supreme Court leak come out and the Dobbs decision happened, we had a lot of support come our way. And we realized that this this part time, you know, volunteer website had really kind of become critical infrastructure that people were really relying on, both as individuals to find care and as people in the movement trying to help people get care. We became this source of truth for clinics and other funds and laws. And so that's that's really when the the org like capital O started. And it wasn't just me and my now spouse and some friends working on it. And so since then, we've been really scaling up to meet the moment and iterate on the website and grow it to what abortion seekers today need.

And if you haven't checked out the website, you really need to. I remember the first time I saw it and just how much it's changed. And I'm going to ask you a lot about how it's changed. So I am old enough that I have been working in reproductive health care since before the Internet. I'll give people time to Google how old that makes me. And it's fascinating because I never I mean, the clinic I worked at didn't do abortions, though we still got picketed and death threats and all the fun stuff that comes with that. But it was always like the people around us knew we existed and knew we were a source of information. And I'm sitting here thinking about it now that you're saying like Google has been around for so long and people know how to look up information.

Like, how did we find, like, how did people find an abortion if they needed one before the Internet? And silly me is thinking, oh, the Internet made everything easy. But then I don't know if you remember a few years ago, this was a while ago, where you would ask Siri about where the nearest abortion was and it wouldn't give you a direct answer. And they got called out on that. So I'm so glad you brought that up because I'm just sitting here thinking, oh, it must be super easy, especially for those younger than me who are native to digital and technology to be able to just find it. So how has I know you've said you've been working on it for a while, a while, a while, actually. How has it changed? And then I don't know if you want to speak to how it's changed just even in the last four or five months. um but just how has it changed really since you since you launched i don't want to say for real

because you were working on it for for a decade for almost a decade um yeah but how is it what are like the big changes that that you've really felt the need to put in place yeah i mean i the biggest change is really the since 2016 in particular the accessibility of abortion pills by mail is just completely night and day different like I really I remember when I needed my abortion like finding women on web uh who's this international pill provider and being so pissed off that they would not ship them to me and in Texas they wouldn't ship them anywhere in the United States and that's no longer the case we now have um in states like California where I'm sitting today, literally dozens of teleproviders. And then in states like Texas,

where I got my abortion, we have people who are living in states like New York and California that are providing pills via shield laws. And so those shield laws are set up to protect the provider of the pills, the person prescribing them from Texas's laws and just keep them in their own home state um uh and so helping people understand what is a shield law how much they need to or don't want to or need to understand about the ins and outs of that is something um that we've spent a lot of time on um and then helping people really understand if they do want to travel of traveling um to another state if they're in texas like i was is the best abortion for them Helping them understand where are the places that they can go.

I think a lot of the times driving to the closest place isn't necessarily the most practical option. A lot of the times they'll have a long appointment wait time. And sometimes flying, especially depending on what's going on economically, sometimes flying can be a lot cheaper. And it's usually faster than driving. So we try to help people really understand those logistical options and understand where they can go for questions that they might have about medical things or legal risk and all of that. So there are a lot more moving parts than there were when I got my abortion. And the question was, like, do I go 15 minutes north or do I go 20 minutes south? Right. People in Austin, Texas are deciding between New Mexico or Kansas or Chicago or Pills by Mail and all of these options. And we really try to put them next to each other side by side so that people can compare and contrast. And so that has created a much more complex user experience and search experience and kind of algorithm with how we return information to people. Always trying to keep it as understandable and personalized as possible, but making sure that they understand the breadth of what's available.

I think one of the most amazing – I mean, I'm totally fangirling, and I know I said that to you before we started because the website is amazing. And if you haven't checked it out out there, please do. One of the things I think is fascinating is what you were just talking about, that you put in where you are, how far along you might be, because that's going to change access. And then there's like a little calculator. And what I think is great is it'll help you figure out like not just how far you have to travel, but tolls and gas and food, because eating is important. And if you have to stay overnight, because I know some clinics make you go and then wait a day and then go again. And you have a great link on the site to abortion funds. So can you talk a little bit about abortion funds, like what they are and how like what you what you've seen them and how they've been used? Yeah. So abortion funds, and I'll even expand it a little bit to be abortion funds and practical support organizations, are really more often than not, wherever you are, you have one in your community or you have one in your state. And these are organizations that really work to make abortion accessible by, you know, potentially covering your entire cost of procedure.

They may help you book a hotel room. They might help you organize child care where you're traveling. I know that's something that the Bridge Alliance, who focuses on later care in particular, does a lot of child care coordination for people who are having to travel, you know, thousands of miles. So these are orgs that really are experts in what their community of abortion seekers need, and they work diligently to remove any and all barriers. And, yeah, there are about, I think, like 98 members of the National Network of Abortion Fund. On I Need an A, we track even more than that. I think we've got about 180 organizations that we refer people to. And we really try to make sure that people connect with their organization locally where they live and if they're traveling with organizations where they're going to. And so that's all baked into our user experience. And we actually just last month released a new page at Ineedme.com slash support dash organizations.

and so it's this new easy to filter by your state easy to see at a glance all of these orgs particularly for people who want to get involved we have links for every like open or every organization that has an open volunteer application all of that's like listed there and so yeah these are incredible organizations I literally say doing the lord's work Um, and, and they're a really amazing place, especially in this moment in 2025, if you're looking for a place to get involved and do something meaningful, my first recommendation is to always reach out to your local abortion fund. Um, even if they don't have a volunteer program, helping them fundraise, um, there are lots

of fun things that you can do with your fund. Um, yeah, thank you for bringing that up. I talk to people and they're like, I want to do, but I don't want to be like an escort to a clinic. And having done that work, it can be scary and it can be threatening. And for some folks, they can't manage to get to a clinic to do it or they have their own childcare they have to worry about and they're always looking for digital ways. That's the big thing.

How do I digitally volunteer? You can do that in I Need an A. They do have volunteer efforts. that you can get involved with digitally once a month. I will make sure that we link to that, though, because I feel like that's been coming up in conversation a lot in the circles I run in. It's the, I want to do something, what can I do? So getting that word out.

So we'll just highlight the whole website in the description. Amazing. I love that. I want to go back if we can. I feel like I want to go five different places, but I want to go back for a second because I get this question a lot. So one of the things that I do on top of this is people submit anonymous questions to me to my website and I answer one every Sunday post all over social media and right after Dobbs it was I live in a state where it's illegal basically am I

screwed do I have to carry a child to term so I got a slew of those right after the Dobbs decision but I'm still getting them probably about once every seven weeks and so I guess the question and and I know neither of us are legal I don't think you're a legal scholar I mean you already do all these other yeah um maybe maybe that's the next guest it's a legal scholar um what happens if i get on your website let's use texas because it's come up and it's illegal in texas so can i still get information if i'm looking for it if i'm living in a state where it's illegal am i going to get reported are you tracking my data like i want people to who live in who are in that situation to know how to how they can kind of proceed from here yes um so i am not a lawyer i cannot offer

legal advice and i am just like everyone else capable of reading these laws right and so i think one thing it's really important to clarify is that with the exception of one law in utah that's specifically for like over 22 or 24 weeks getting an abortion is not illegal anywhere performing abortions are what have been restricted specifically. And most of these laws specifically exempt the pregnant person slash the person who's getting an abortion from prosecution or civil suit, right? Even in Texas, SB8, the first like bounty hunter law that went on the books, it exempts the pregnant person. And so I think that that's something that when people are scared it's really important to ground in what do these things actually say

um and there's so many points where even the biggest legal scholar can go goes this thing doesn't say anything specific right like we see a lot of stuff happening in the courts where doctors are like please just give us some specific guidelines and the courts are like no um so it's not to say that this stuff isn't incredibly complex it is um but there are some truths that we know um and some truths to hang on to and and I think the um again I'm not a lawyer nothing's legal advice but I do track points of abortion access and I think um you know some sometimes it can be a little like obnoxious um when i'm like well actually like access has been pretty bad for a really long time pre-dob's decision right like um we had abortion deserts

across this country like whether or not you can afford an abortion was often like a determining factor right like and and i say that not to say like not not to just be a debbie downer about it But actually, that gives me a lot of hope because like we had built with the network of abortion funds, with grassroots communities, with now community networks that are sharing pills in their community. We have the resources to ensure that no matter what, people will still have options. And that that's something that it's frustrating. It's not fair. We shouldn't have to be this creative and this resilient. However, in this moment where we need to be, we are and we can. So for people in the most restricted states, they can order pills, they can travel. I think we've seen some, not I think, we've seen some really insidious laws, particularly targeting minors in states like Idaho and Tennessee. um and so we're even seeing uh clinics in other states won't necessarily see a minor from

Tennessee because they're worried about those laws which don't apply to them in any kind of way um so we things are bad and we see many chilling factors and there are people ready to help there are people that can get you the safe abortion that you deserve no matter what and And I think that's the thing that I try to really focus on because we can and we will always have abortions. That's amazing to say. Thank you. And thank you for correcting the whole – the legality piece that it's not the person who's having it. Because I think that's one of the really big problems with abortion is that we hear things and we don't always know what's true and what's not.

And then you see this case where Texas is now trying to go after the doctor in New York and New York's like, you can't touch her. And they're like, we're coming for it. And like, no, you're not. You can't touch her. I mean, I'm sure she's getting threats. I know when I started in this field, I was always amazed by the things I would hear from people who were talking about abortions. Oh, people have abortions. They hate children. I'm like, actually, they don't hate children. And most of them actually already have a child. you know if they didn't want to there were ways to stop it well contraception is flawed and like you mentioned abortion deserts there's also contraceptive deserts so those those myths can be so incredibly powerful you know i've been asked i don't even know how many times like oh i know someone who had like 18 abortions like no you didn't like no you don't but these stories and these urban legends and these myths so what are what are some of the most common myths you hear about abortion i mean you know i unfortunately i have to spend a lot of time on crisis pregnancy

center websites so i see a lot of really really bad inaccurate takes right um and i i think so many of them just aren't even like i don't know i i go back and forth with uh like screaming about the bad like you're still like giving power to the words and then inevitably someone will hear it and they're like no it doesn't increase like the risk of breast cancer it's like no I that's not like we said no um so I try not to focus on those I think right now the most like concerning like piece of information I'm hearing uh is the there are people who are really confused about what has been banned and where and where it has not and i i think that's like in the same way that you know you you get emails from people in restricted states i i've had people sitting in

california new york illinois say to me i mean i know abortion is illegal here now and it's like no no it's not and and i i think that's the um you know the like back to the question of laws like they're designed to be confusing they're designed to be chilling both for providers and individuals and like the confusion and chaos is the point and so I think that's where those are the things like the the anti-abortion like talking points are nauseating and they also don't really keep me up at night anymore the person who thinks that they cannot go to uh an er in texas if they think they're miscarrying right like the the person he thinks that they have no options we know from the society of family plannings we count data

that um in mississippi there were actually more abortions that happened from january 2024 to june 2024 than did in 2021 in that state right um so i i think those are the i i try to really focus on those facts because i think people are so so so confused and so scared um yeah just about the reality of access and what is and isn't true and i think that's that's really telling for me like i understand that the folks who are in states where they feel like they're being attacked and their rights are being stripped away like i understand that fear but i've always kind of looked at folks who aren't in those states like oh like take a breath and literally i i think it was like three weeks after the dobbs decision i sat in a conference room

with funders in downtown san francisco and other people like in the tech space and someone sat there and was like well now that abortion is gone i was like there's literally an abortion happening three blocks from where we're sitting right now what are you talking about like what are we like things are bad and like they're not that that level right right um so but i think that's that was part of the decision and how it was played out in the media and i don't want to get into that that tangent because I could go after the media for a while but a lot of people were seeing the headlines of Roe overturned and either didn't read or it wasn't clear in those like what does that actually mean one of the things that I found really helpful and kind of

how I frame it because working in academia and working in many different states and areas and I've had people try to tell me that this is a political issue and I'm like it's not a political issue so when that when that phrase abortion is health care started becoming used much more often it was i mean i hate to say it for me it was almost like a shield that i could be like nope abortion is health care and i'm going to approach it from there do you how do you feel about that phrase because i i've actually met some people who work in this space who are like i hate that phrase it doesn't it it for them it sets it up to be something it's not so if if you're comfortable sharing your thoughts yeah i mean i yeah i've heard i've heard some people in in the movement

in the space like be frustrated with that phrase and for me i think it is i think that's truth and that's fact um and you can get an abortion totally outside of the health care system too right um and i i think that that's important to to highlight in that i think where i struggle with the phrase abortion is health care is really on i feel like we as a country do not value or respect health care especially like especially for women and trans folks and non-binary folks anyone who's not male essentially that's i'm like i'm pretty sure health care sucks pretty bad and so if this is this is the i don't know it feels it feels like being the band on the titanic a little bit like let's hitch our wagon to this completely failing thing um so it's not quite the

rallying cry that i dream of but i'm not a like political messaging comms person um so i i don't have anything better other than you'll always have options so no i think that's a great point Especially especially for when we look at how folks are treated, if you don't if you're not usually cis and white or straight or if you're living in an area where you can't get access to care, like saying abortion is health care is like, great. One more thing I can't get to. Yeah. So I think I appreciate the take on that. But it's but I do think it's a helpful phrase, though, because I think the the phrase that I respond to and people tell me every day that abortion is political and that that's the. It is not everyone of every walk of life, of every political belief, of every religious belief gets abortions every day.

We all need abortions in order to have functioning societies and healthy families and all of that. And so I do think as an anecdote to the anti-movement, it is really quite helpful. And I think a shield is actually a really nice way to think about it. Yeah, I think it gives people that place to stand on. And I've used it. Like I said, I've used it when students accused me of being political. what I think was is really fascinating for me watching some of the changes so it's like you know that phrase comes out everyone kind of guess that phrase and you know things ebb and flow with

time one of the things that I've noticed is that it's almost the issue with reproductive care in general like is becoming is I think we're finally realizing how many barriers people have to reproductive health care in general and not just for women so I know for me and I was getting a lot of questions from students and from the internet about this I had men who were like I want to I don't want to be a dad I know I don't want to be a dad I know that sterilization for men is way easier process than sterilization for women but I'm in my 20s and my doctor won't have that conversation and part of me was like welcome to being in a space where you're you know where your doctor has decided they know better than you but I'm finding more and more folks are

are struggling with access to so many things so reproductive health care in general especially for for now men who were trying to be like i don't want to be a dad this isn't what i want i'm also hearing about issues with access to medication for women who are not pregnant but their medication could potentially if they ever got pregnant maybe affect the fetus so we're seeing access issues in in different ways it's not just access to abortion it's access to lots of things, which is rolling me into the question of what do you I mean, you've you've seen this from you've seen this change for years now. Like, what do you think are going to be some of the biggest abortion access issues for for folks in the next few months? I mean, I know right now

the country's a little bit of a dumpster fire, so it's hard to know what's going to happen anywhere. But yeah, I mean, I think that right now the biggest looming challenge is this zombie law called Comstock. And that that's the thing that like, yeah, I worry about. And so for people not familiar, Comstock, I'm going to give, like, such a janky, like, AI, like, summation of this, but whatever. Go for it. Comstock was this weirdo dude in the 1800s who couldn't stop masturbating. And so he decided to just, like, make all these anti-obscenity laws and punish everyone for how he felt crappy about himself. else um and so there there are these laws that are still on the books that uh make it a crime

to ship uh abortifacients and any materials and supplies and um uh via the mail or a common carrier so that like includes FedEx and UPS um there's a world where so that's technically like still on the books there's a lot of like uh memos and other precedent that have like overwritten it but that's something that when we we look at all these like wackadoo executive orders happening um that's something that like could potentially and it's outlined in project 2025 like i'm not like saying any analysis here it's like outlined as like we could do an eo to like bring back comstock um and so that that's something that i think um is potentially a really big challenge because i think again it's it will it's one of those things that it'll if it happens it'll get

hung up in courts it'll go back and forth and the damage of this thing could be on the books like It will chill providers, particularly telehealth providers, which have been the saving grace of the last few years, right? It's why the numbers of abortions have not gone down post-ops. They've gone up thanks to abortion pills by mail. So that, I think, is a really, really big challenge potentially on the horizon. And I think, again, like back to that, like how does the media report on these things? How do people know what's true and not? um we know that these scary headlines like get clicks and it's part of the monetization right

like so i i think we'll if this happens we'll see more of not just a chilling wave for providers but even more confusion amongst people who are just trying to get reproductive health care and being confused and scared um and uh so yeah that that is very um potentially challenging and one of those things that we're keeping an eye on and so the ambiguity of of this moment and this like shock and awe eo system that we're in is so unsettling so we're trying to keep an eye on it prepare as much as possible but know that we cannot prepare for everything um but but i think that's uh i mean it was really built to be able to rapidly change to changes in services and laws we've been doing it um just through like four different crises now it feels like

um so the system is built for it our system is but it still is yeah very unsettling yeah and and like you said you're not the only ones out there there's the funding agencies and the support agencies and and so it is really scary especially when you read the news one day and then you read something the next day and you're like which is true they seem to count you know counteract each other so that there are folks who are doing the work um they're and and i i don't want to go i was going to go down another road but i don't want to go down there um so so as we're getting ready to wrap up and i'll make sure you have time to give us any other words of wisdom how can people people who are listening to this are like yes i'm i'm looking at the website as i'm taught as i'm

listening to this i'm fired up i want to do something how can they support the work of i need an a yeah i mean the first thing you can do is make sure your community knows about i need share it on your social uh order some stickers and put them up in your community i that's the the anecdote to misinformation and confusion is accurate information in people knowing that they know where to go so tell your friends tell your family tell your dentist i don't care about i mean a um uh that's the first thing to do um like you mentioned we have these monthly volunteer days where people can come in their pajamas in the comfort of their own living room we meet on zoom and we work to really maintain the data that we have sometimes we're reviewing

clinic data sometimes like last week we were doing some analysis of regional airports and finding which regional airport airports have direct flights to major abortion destination hubs um and trying to map that out together so you can apply to join us we review everyone um for privacy and security sake to make sure that it's like a good group of folks um but joining us there is huge and then of course um you can always make a tax deductible donation and to I mean a we're really um still pretty like grassroots um org and so every donation um really helps particularly uh the monthly kind of recurring donations though i will always say if you only have one donation to give send it to your local abortion fund i mean we can be fine

and tech like can work really efficiently um uh paying for people's abortions those costs like are what they are. And and I think that paying for someone else's abortion by donating to an abortion fund is frankly one of the most radical and beautiful pieces of love you can do. So share us, join us for a volunteer day and donate to either us or your abortion fund if you're not set up there yet. Fantastic. Any final thoughts before I take us out? um i feel like we hit most of it um i'll also say though one one thing um in this moment in time uh i think that our stories our abortion stories are like sharing first-person accounts are you know in addition to accurate information which your personal story

will always be accurate information right um that is the anecdote to this moment in time i think and i think you know abortion was so othered in health care for some some so long and so stigmatized um that sharing our stories uh sharing when it was uh the hardest decision sharing when it was no big deal sharing when it was medically necessary sharing when it was your fourth Right. Like I think all of those things are are true. And so that's the finding the moments where you feel safe and secure to do that is something that I'm encouraging folks to think about. Wonderful. Thank you so much for coming on and talking about the organization and all the other organizations that need the help and the support. For those of you who have made it through the, and a lot of times I hear that people are like, I can't make it through the whole episode because it's overwhelming. Like they have to pause it or they're driving and they're like, I have to get out of my car and go to work. now that you've made it to the end and you can hopefully safely look at your phone please check out the description for links in in the um sorry check out the description for links to the

organization thank you becca again so much for coming in we appreciate it thank you for having me we're all in this together and there you have it dr sue's conversation with becca so dr sue i wanted to just chat a little bit about you know maybe what were some of your thoughts after your your convo with her you know it was fascinating and I I said this to her after we got done recording that I've never seen or had an experience where we were we were highlighting somebody you know because I've been part of organizations where we've highlighted other organizations or we'll have them come guest speak to help fundraise where we highlight an organization and the organization was like don't give us money and give money to other places which I just was

fascinating for me um it was a really eye-opening experience because it really does draw in how this is an everybody kind of thing um especially because she's coming from a tech background and how tech has access to things that you know we not that they have access to things but but just they're doing things differently with a different thought process with different access to funds than those of us who are out there in the community doing the work so it was just it was really eye-opening um yeah what do you do you have any thoughts on what you heard yeah i have a couple um to to carry on i think that thought about uh the tech background and being in the technology space how adaptive i need an a has like the framework has been built to be highly

responsive to how quickly things change with abortion care and abortion access um that that really stood out to me. I really liked that kind of little takeaway. Um, some of the other things that I, I mean, I enjoyed hearing her story and, um, and how she, she came to want to build this resource. And, um, towards the end there, you hear her talk about, um, sharing those first-person stories as an antidote to some of this misinformation. I think some of our regular listeners might remember when we did our abortion as healthcare episode, I received messaging that all women who have an abortion have post-traumatic PTSD, and that's not always true it's not always a it's not a dramatic event yeah it's not for the

majority of people so yeah yeah and so I think sharing those stories another thing that popped in my mind when she was talking about that was uh Cecily Strong's um weekend update but she did it back I think in 2021 on an episode of SNL she was dressed as a clown and talking about, you know, the other thing that's interesting is that when I get together with my other fellow clowns, um, how, how all of us at that table have a story about an abortion. And so, um, so that's what stood out to me with that sharing our first person experiences, um, as an antidote to some of this misinformation, because you guys, you two did spend a bit of time on the media misinformation because they have to monetize their content and get interaction

and so they become shocking headlines to get people to engage with it and then just her other calls to action sharing on on your socials I need in that I need in a is a resource um and you know you could do that you share on socials and then they also have you know she says um buy some stickers and and share them put them on your card put them you know post them um and they have so many other things you can buy like they have stickers they have hoodies they have shirts they have water bottles they have so many things if you want to if for some reason you're uncomfortable donating and we get that that might be a thing but you're okay buying merch. Like they've so many options. Yeah. And the other thing that I learned was

about the local abortion funds. So those of you that made it to this part of the show heard a bit about that. And that was, I know something that you found interesting too, was that she said, you know, tax deductible donation tonight. I need an A, but, you know, we are adaptive and we have access to some resources so if you want your dollars to go further in this space um donate directly to your national abortion or not national i'm sorry your local abortion fund right or local support organizations that help folks who need to travel yeah that was the big thing about keeping it local you know that whole idea of if you can't if you can't give global at least do something local that was that was a great point yeah

any any other thoughts no i just a huge thank you to becca for coming on and doing the show we are honored to be able to take the chance that we have to highlight an organization to highlight i need an a in the work that they're doing um donate to them volunteer we we do volunteer monthly calls they do change the day the day of the month every they do change the day of the week every month so if like you're interested in doing it and you're on their site and you're like, oh, I can't do their most recent, I think was on a Wednesday. Don't worry, they do change that on a regular basis. So it's not like if you can't make one month that you're out forever. But if you can't volunteer and you can't donate, at least mention the organization

to someone because someone out there that you know probably is in a position where they either need an abortion now or they will in the future. Or they know somebody that might. Or they know someone who does. Yeah. So it's that ripple effect of information. So again, we are so grateful to Becca for coming on our show to talk about I Need an A and highlighting the work that they do to ensure that people have access to clear, reliable information about abortion care. If you want to support their mission, check out the links in our show notes to donate, volunteer, or share their resources. And always keep the conversation going, keep unzipping those taboos talk about this challenge this stigma and advocate for reproductive

freedom and everyone thanks for listening we'll catch you next time on unzipping taboos