My patient attempted suicide

My first month into my clinical rotations, I took care of a patient in OBGYN who attempted suicide after she found at that she was pregnant with twins. She already had a few children and explained that she had difficulty caring for her present children let alone two more and she saw no other alternative than taking her own life out of desperation. Pregnancy is not without risk to the mother in the form of many pathologies, physical and mental. To force women into carrying pregnancies regardless of these risks is to ignore the value of maternal lives in exchange for sustaining a pregnancy. To what end? Without providing ample resources to support pregnant people and families, without providing proper education on sexual and reproductive health to our adolescents in Georgia and improving access to forms of contraception, you cannot in good conscience force individuals into a lifelong commitment without having wholly pursued alternatives.