This story was originally published by the WND News Center.
A new study shows that a majority of men who have lost a child to abortion have suffered "adverse changes" to their mental health.
The study, "Abortion's Long-Term Negative Impact On Men," was commissioned by the nonprofit Support After Abortion and was conducted by Shepard Research, an Oklahoma-based market research firm.
A new study shows that a majority of men who have lost a child to abortion have suffered "adverse changes" to their mental health.
The study, "Abortion's Long-Term Negative Impact On Men," was commissioned by the nonprofit Support After Abortion and was conducted by Shepard Research, an Oklahoma-based market research firm.
It surveyed 1,000 men across America and found 100 had a personal experience with abortion.
Seventy-one of them experienced "adverse effects" and most of those "either sought after abortion help or said they could have benefited from talking to someone."
There remains no question about abortion's impact on the unborn. With only extremely rare exceptions, every baby targeted by an abortionist dies. The impact on women is major, too, with lifelong mental and physical health issues resulting.
Now the study considers the men in the equation.
"While abortion harms women physically and emotionally, and ends the life of defenseless children, it also harms men in incalculable ways," explained Mat Staver, chief of Liberty Counsel, which reported on the study.
"At the core of a man’s heart is the call to protect one’s family and to fight to preserve life when necessary. But abortion has morally, socially, and spiritually eroded our culture putting masculinity under attack. These findings reveal how abortion breaks the hearts of men and confirms how our society largely ignores their circumstances. Any society that favors abortion undermines its own men. Thankfully, there is healing and restoration available so men harmed by abortion can stand and be the protectors our children and families need."
The study found "one out of every seven American men suffering abortion loss experience depression, anxiety, regret, grief, anger, and more."
Moreover, society holds that they "do not have the right to grieve," the study said.
"While slightly more than half of those surveyed indicated they were 'pro-choice,' 31 percent of 'pro-choice' men were negatively affected by an abortion. Regardless of whether one was 'pro-choice' or 'pro-life,' 57 percent (almost three out of five men) said the abortion 'wasn’t their decision,' but rather it was the woman or someone else’s. In fact, 45 percent of the men said 'they did not have a voice or choice' in the matter," Liberty Counsel explained.
The author, Greg Mayo, experienced loss through abortion twice.
"I had no say in either decision. At that time few people were talking about abortion healing…especially for men. The decades that followed, until I found healing in 2009, were mired and muddled by the fallout of lost fatherhood."
He said there was no area of his life untouched by abortion.
"Work, education, relationships, including eventually my marriage and the children I raised," he said.
Bradley Mattes, a pro-life educator and president of Life Issues Institute, explained in the Liberty Counsel report that at the core of masculinity "lies a man’s desire to 'procreate, provide and protect,' and abortion has a direct, traumatizing effect on a man’s core."
Courts in America have ruled that the father has no say in an abortion decision.
And Mayo "wrote that 82 percent of men surveyed in the study did not know where to go for help after the abortion, and 32 percent didn’t seek help at all."
"[There’s] a really, really big need in this country to get men out of the darkness…to get them talking about their abortion experience and then to help them find healing," he explained.
