"It ends where it always ends, in silence...."

When I watch Call the Midwife, I'm always struck by the kindness of women toward women.  Every episode  brings tears to see the way women take care of each other--not just in birthings but in all kinds of ways.

In 1963, abortion was still illegal in England, and women died and were maimed by back-alley terminations of unwanted pregnancies.  If they survived, they risked arrest.

But in this series,  the same good midwives who deliver babies look on these women with no judgment, only compassion.  They do what they can to keep the women alive after botched attempts in seedy places leave them sick or bleeding or worse.

"Where does it end?" one midwife asks an elder one, who replies, "It ends where it always ends, in silence."

Now that the Sixties children delivered by the midwives of that era  are past childbearing age themselves, the world has changed in many ways, some good, some less so.  But regarding women's reproductive choices, it's a world less shrouded in secrets, shame, and silence, and I'm among those who hope it always stays that way.