What are Pregnancy Options?
What are the options?
If you get a pregnancy test that comes back positive, the options are generally Abortion, Adoption, or Parenting. Your ability to explore or access these options may depend on things like where you live, your age, and possibly your housing/financial situation. For more on this topic, check out our article: I’m Pregnant. What are my choices?
Ending a Pregnancy
Choosing to end a pregnancy is called having an abortion. We have a number of articles that can provide some more information:
- Choosing to have an Abortion covers the basics on what is involved in having either a medical or surgical abortion.
- Can I Get the Abortion Pill in Canada? provides more details on the abortion pill, which is still relatively new in Canada.
- Caring for Yourself After an Abortion covers some of the side-effects and aftercare that can be expected following an abortion.
Continuing a Pregnancy
Choosing to continue a pregnancy usually involves pursuing either adoption or parenting. Having a Healthy Pregnancy covers some of the frequently asked questions about the first steps to having a healthy pregnancy.
It is generally recommended that you check in with a medical professional once you become aware of your pregnancy. These include:
- A family doctor (or general practitioner), who can care for you when you are pregnant and help you give birth to your child.
- An obstetrician, who only cares for a person who is pregnant and helps them give birth to their child. If you choose to see an obstetrician, you will need to see a family doctor first who will refer you to an obstetrician. You cannot book an appointment with an obstetrician directly.
- A midwife, who is not a doctor, but is a licensed medical professional who has a lot of knowledge and experience in caring for people when they are pregnant, during childbirth and for 6 weeks after birth. If there are concerns or complications with your pregnancy, a midwife will work along with a doctor. Midwifery services are free for people with an Ontario health card (OHIP).
- A doula, who is someone that provides non-medical support and care to people when they are pregnant and when their child is born. Doula services are not covered by OHIP but some doulas offer sliding scale fees.
Check out the article Choosing Adoption for more information on the process of pursuing open or closed adoptions.
Check out the article Choosing to Become a Parent for more information on prenatal care, and the article Financial Supports for Parents to learn more about ways to make having a baby more affordable in Ontario.
While many supports use very heteronormative langauge when talking about parenting and parenting supports (where it’s assumed there’s a mother and father, they are married, etc.), there are many different ways that people are able to parent and many different ways that families can look. Parents can be of the same gender or different genders; they can be together romantically, not together but co-parenting, or someone can be solo-parenting; parenting duties can be shared amongst friends, close or extended family, or paid childcare.
Choice
When choosing what to do about a pregnancy, it’s important to remember there is no single experience you’re supposed to have. Some people know right away what they want to do, and some people don’t. It’s also worth noting that whatever you choose to do might be different than what you thought you would do in this situation before you were pregnant. It’s normal for the reality of a situation to be or feel different than what you expected it would be like, and that’s totally okay.
When it comes to making a decision, you can try stuff like journaling, talking to friends or family, talking to your partner, or even checking in with a counsellor or peer support service, or sexual health and abortion clinics. You may consider things like long-term goals, health, finances, parenting supports, or just your general desire to be pregnant. Ultimately, deciding what to do about a pregnancy should be up to the pregnancy person.
For more info on how you can go about making decisions about your pregnancy, check out the articles:
You are also able to make (or put off) long-term decisions about pregnancy through things like freezing eggs or sperm to be used at a later date. If this is something that you’re interested in, check in with a clinician.
Access
The decisions you are able to make may also depend on your ability to access services related to any of the three options. This includes stuff like being able to travel to your nearest abortion provider, having accomodations (from work or school) to see through a pregnancy, or even parenting supports.
For information on Toronto-based organizations that work with young parents, check out: Supports for Young Parents
For information on where you can go in the GTA for abortion services, check out: Abortion Providers in the GTA
For information on who to contact to understand the next steps regarding adoption, check out: Choosing Adoption
