The Supreme Court decision to overturn Roe vs. Wade poured gasoline on the embers of America’s debate about abortion rights. Protests broke out across the country as many state lawmakers seized the moment to tighten regulations or outlaw the procedure.

But regular people with real experiences with pregnancy and family planning often have more complex views than politicians and activists. Interviews with people who attended an abortion rights protest and people involved with faith-based family services showed a range of complex, nuanced opinions and experiences.

People on both sides want women to have good health care, and they want families to thrive. And they don’t think those expectations are mutually exclusive. Still, the stories from several North Texas women point to a gulf in underlying philosophies about life and human rights.

Andrea Huseman

Andrea Huseman, 37, said it was a life-or-death emergency when she had an abortion more than a decade ago. Without the procedure, she wouldn’t be around for her husband, Andrew Ballenger, or her now 4-year-old daughter, Emma Ballenger.

“My burning rage about this being overturned is hotter than the Texas sun, and I could have died if it wasn’t for the ability to have a legal and safe abortion,” Huseman said. “I don’t want that for anybody. My daughter, especially.”

Huseman’s husband, Andrew Ballenger, said if Roe vs. Wade was overturned back then, “this little girl wouldn’t be here, and [Huseman] wouldn’t be here either.”

Huseman still remembers getting the call from her doctor’s office. “Hey, you have to go to the hospital right now,” they said.

She wanted to have a child, but she had an ectopic pregnancy.

“If there wasn’t a doctor that felt comfortable to provide me with that, the prognosis is, I die,” Huseman said.

Huseman said she wants more compassion in the conversation about abortion.

“Pregnancy isn’t always a fun, glorious, shining moment,” Huseman said. “It can be hard. It can be traumatic for a lot of women.”

Aubrey Schlackman

Aubrey Schlackman, 34, felt thankful that Roe was overturned, because she said she believes the “unborn” will be saved as a result of the Supreme Court’s decision. However, the news was “sobering” and prompted many conversations with her husband and friends.

“My husband and I, we believe that all life is sacred and that babies need to be protected,” said Schlackman, who runs Blue Haven Ranch, a ministry to help single pregnant mothers “post-choice,” or once they’ve chosen to carry a child.

However, she said, “I’m not here to argue about the laws. That’s not my space. I don’t follow politics very much and honestly, that’s not any space that I have any influence in at all.”

She said the issue of abortion is divisive but certainly not black-and-white. Regardless of the law, she said there is a need to support women who are making the choice to have children.

She believes the Supreme Court’s decision will give pregnant women time to seek alternatives to abortion. But she said there’s a gap between cultural changes and society’s ability to meet that change. In that space are women making difficult, life-changing decisions about mothering a child.

“That’s where we’re at right now, and so there’s a weightiness to that,” Schlackman said.

Schlackman said rather than politics, she’s putting her energy into helping women, and it’s time for others to also respond to the situation.

“This is the time. If you were ever going to get involved with a nonprofit, this is it,” Schlackman said. “Do something, anything. Give, serve, but do something because it’s going to take a huge growth in this state, of people’s time and their resources, to meet this need.”

Bethany Miller

Bethany Miller, 22, said she was raped in 2019 and would have “automatically” chosen to have an abortion, had she been pregnant.

“It was a relief to know I had that choice in the midst of something already so traumatic,” Miller said.

Later that year, Miller was rushed to the hospital with her body entering sepsis, a serious condition that can result from infection. It was an ectopic pregnancy, meaning the fertilized egg was not in the right place in the uterus and cannot be saved, a condition that can be fatal to the mother. After taking Nexplanon, a form of birth control, for three years, she had no idea such a pregnancy was even possible.

“I had that removed,” she said. “If I hadn’t done that, I wouldn’t be here today.”

Miller underwent a D&C, or dilation and curettage, a procedure to remove tissue from inside the uterus. She said she doesn’t consider that an abortion, but rather a lifesaving procedure, “the same as any other emergency surgery.”

“I even asked my husband, I said, ‘If I was pregnant again, and it was something like that, would you understand if I had an abortion? Would you get it?’ And he said ‘Absolutely, I would choose you,’” she recalled. “Because at that point, it’s not a fetus. It doesn’t have a heartbeat. It’s trying to kill you.”

The D&C cost about $1,400. After having her son about six months ago, Miller said she recently decided to get back on birth control, which now costs $350 for a single month.

“Thankfully, I can afford it, but for someone who is low income, who doesn’t have insurance, it could be impossible,” she said. “Thank God I didn’t have a daughter. Thank God.”

Lisa Olgin-Galindo

Lisa Olgin-Galindo, 41, said her experience with pregnancy and abortion is complex. She carries guilt that came with having an abortion of her own. But when she got pregnant after she was raped, she chose to have the child.

Galindo, who lives in Irving, said she finds herself with a middle-of-the-road view that leans toward “pro-life,” but the “system is completely broken.” She said often people focus more on taking sides rather than providing resources for women who choose to go forward with their pregnancies.

“Their worth is not wrapped up in what they did or didn’t do,” Galindo said of women who dealt with unintended pregnancy. She said bans on abortion are unproductive and punitive, but she believes the procedure is a product of society, and is not the natural order of life.

“Life was not created to be ended by man alone,” Galindo said. “When they say ‘my life, my body,’ that’s true. It is your life and it is your body. But for the situations where we lay down voluntarily to engage in acts that create a baby, that … makes you a responsible adult saying that you’re willing to be responsible for someone else.”

Galindo said she chose to have one of her four children after being raped, and she has three stepchildren. She considers her children a blessing, saying pregnancy doesn’t always have to end and that there are options.

Jessica Zavas

Jessica Zavas, 34, said the counterprotesters at a rally last month upset her because she heard similar messages when she had a medically necessary abortion.

“When I was going into the clinic, I was devastated,” Zavas said. “I didn’t want to have to do it.”

Outside the clinic, Zavas said she was told she was “going to hell” by protesters who hurled insults at her over a procedure that didn’t feel like a choice to her.

“We can’t continue to let a few people tell us how we’re living our lives, tell us what to do with our bodies, tell us how to raise our children and all the women around us,” Zavas said. “It makes no sense at all.”

Tia Stelzer

Tia Stelzer, 28, was happy to learn about the overturning of Roe vs. Wade since she believes life begins at conception. However, she realized women and their families need more help.

“It was kind of a good reminder, like, ‘OK, I have a lot of work to do now. The church has a lot of work to do now,’” said Stelzer, who lives in Oak Cliff. “This isn’t just a yay, this happened and go on with their lives. The church needs to have a really big response to this and really needs to step up and support and love these men and women.”

When she became pregnant about 3 1/2 years ago, she turned to the church. Although it was a planned pregnancy, she said motherhood took her by surprise. She joined a ministry for mothers with children under 6 months old.

The ministry connected her with new mothers from the community, and she learned from the ministry leaders. The leaders would remind the new mothers that it’s normal if their marriages weren’t stable or that it was OK to be sleep-deprived sometimes.

“My motherhood journey was very difficult for me even though I had everything to set me up for success,” Stelzer said.

Her difficult but planned pregnancy opened her eyes and she later joined a church group that guides mothers during unexpected pregnancies.

“It just made me realize how much harder this must be for a woman who this pregnancy isn’t expected,” Stelzer said. “She might not have financial support or might not have transportation or a steady job or income or great support system in her life.”

If someone is “pro-life,” she said, that person has an obligation to put those words into action. Stelzer hopes people in the church step up because she said it’s “desperately needed.”

“As a church, if we’re saying that we believe that life begins at conception, we kind of need to put our money where our mouth is,” she said. “We need to support these women who just need our help more than ever. … We need to just come around them and support them because that’s what we’re called to do.”

Elizabeth Souder contributed to this story.