Planned Parenthood's War Against Healthcare Workers Part 1

and healthcare, especiallyunder capitalism, requires labor. And and that labor isn't done by you know, abstract organizations. It's done by workers who are facing not only sort of the mall of the death of row, but the in transient and

often the belligerency of the room bosses. And here to talk with us about that is Crystal Grabowski and Elizabeth Vella Nuevo from the wonderfully named UEI Local six nine six, um, And I'm gonna I'm going to read a pseudo legal disclaimer here, which is that they are not representing Planned parent who they do work at Planned Parenthood. They are not representing Planned parenthood. They're they're representing themselves as individuals and our local union, yes, proud members of Local six

nine six, impeccably named union, purposefully named right. Well, they were like, you have to choose a a number that starts with six, and then we just looked at each other and we had that moment where it's like yes, and then we can add another one and it'll be a good time, fun little threesome. He'll be safe. That's good. So sorry, round one of pro union propaganda joining you did and YouTube can be in in union Local sixty nine or what if they told you the number can

start with four, like you know, yeah, boom. There's just so many options. I'm sure there's other fun numbers that besides those, but you have the entire world in front of you. Yeah, we could have done six, you could do like boom. Can you imagine if we did six six? We could not. We had that choice and we went with six nine six. Sexual Health Organization is to prove that workers will always make the right decision. This is the power of the union. We can evaluate these decisions

when when it's important and do the right there. So yeah, thank thank you, thank you, to you so much for for coming on the show. Thank you for having us. We're both super excited. Yeah, thanks for tighting us a slowly abortion workers So I'm gonna I'm gonna dispute heavily with the term slowly, like y'all are the people who make all of this possible. So yeah, yeah, And and now now having said all of this, I'm about I'm going to ask you a very depression question, which we have.

We've asked a lot of the people who've talked about abortion access, uh like who work in abortion access stuff, this question, But I think you two had a very different experience of it. Um. What was it like on the day when Roe died? Do you want to go first, Crystal? Um? Yeah. I've talked about this a lot because I'm getting asked a lot, and it's I'm happy to talk about it, um, which is I'm actually like, it's been hard to listen to other people talk about it because then I start

getting in my fields. But like when I'm talking about and I'm kind of like just processing it, it's probably healthy for me, somebody would say. But it was incredibly traumatic, and it's been incredibly traumatic. Um, since the fall of Ruby Wade and the Dobs decision. And I'm saying this, well, like, well, knowing that we all knew it was coming, it was

it was a given, and it wasn't surprising. And there's just something about knowing that it's been coming for months and years that like just it just did nothing to actually inform you, like what would it be like? Um, But it was like a It was like a tidal wave crashing and just like sweeping you away. And we're still swept away. Um. The only language that I can find that's appropriate is like natural disaster language, and I just I keep repeating it and saying, like it's like

a hurricane, It's like a tidal way. But that is the those are the words that are most fitting to me, like emotionally and just in terms of like the violence and the that is that you that people are experiencing. Um, and just the emotional and mental and bodily harm is equitable to a natural disaster. Yeah. And I think during one of our debriefs, during a particular really difficult day,

this was pretty um Row. We were talking about how sometimes it's really hard for us when we can see these things coming and yet there's nothing we can really do about it. And I know that we talked about how it felt like we were just tied to a train track, watching and waiting for that train to just come and hit us, and then when it did, it was just it just knocked I think the wind out

of all of us. Um, I think we all cried for sure, that we all cried, and um, and I'm not even like I don't know, like I feel like I am. I'm emotional and I am a crier, but a whole I didn't think that I would sob immediately the second I saw the news. And then I always knew we were going to get a lot more calls because um, Elizabeth and I also answered phones in the abortion clinic, and I was like, Okay, we're gonna get

way more calls. But like, you don't know what that feels like or looks like or sounds like, like, what is it I feel like to have a hundred people calling you pretty much at the same time? What does that look like? Now? I know, and it's traumatic and it's awful, and um, it's a natural disaster, but it's a man made disaster. Actually it's not a natural disaster. We've there are people who have inflicted this upon us. Um, and now we know what it feels like, and it's

sucking awful. I should have asked if I was allowed to swear. Oh yeah, I swear all the time, okay, because like I've been on podcast before where they were like, oh, we gotta edit that out, which, well, it's a fucking nightmare. Yeah, we work in healthcare. I think we swear more than the average lay man because they keep saying something out. Yeah, there's so much more to say, like yeah, please, I

don't even know where to go from there. It's just yeah, it's like a never ending nightmare because like the calls started and then it's just like just just person after person after person. They driving driving two hours, three hours, four hours, five hours, coming from states that are like three states away, coming from like states in the South, people taking planes and um, people staying in hotels and we've had people pay like hundreds of dollars for an

uber MHM and UM. And then just like bringing in the labor angle to as like unionized abortion workers, who you know, we have been vocal and we've been rallying and making our demands like publicly known, but we are doing this while under staffed, like skeletal crew staffing. We didn't have enough staff before row Fell and the Doobs decision, and now we just it's bare bones and it's like we are so we're taking on this title wave, this like man made title wave while just giving every last

ounce of our energy. Yeah um, and doing multiple roles at once. Yeah. I don't know if you are able to tell from the fact that Crystal and I both work directly in the clinic, but we also answer calls. Um. When we signed up for our job, Um, we knew that we would be doing multiple things around the clinic, and it's just it's funny, um to not really know

what that means until you start doing it. So one day you'll be holding a patient's hand while they're having this procedure done, like giving them a little baggy in case they feel sick. Um, you'll be talking to them

on the phone. So some there are days where I will meet people who I've spoken to on the phone when they called to book their appointment, and it just hits me like a tidal wave because I'm like, that's the person, Like, that's this person specifically, I remember because I remember hearing the sound of their voice, and every single time they call in they are sobbing. This is a horrifying moment for them. This is a moment where they feel like trapped, They feel like they can't share

with their family, with their friends. Um. Depending on what state they're from and the legalities of that state, they are even afraid to make these phone calls. Like some of the first things that patients say to us when they call it is in my is this okay? Like? Am I allowed to call you? Um? Emanuela to talk to you? Of my allowed to book an appointment? Um? What's going to happen next for me? Yeah? Because we're not lawyers, because we everything is so fluid right now,

we don't have answers to give them. Um we can just say, well, you're coming to Pennsylvania and it's stillegal in Pennsylvania. So um. And then just to like paint the picture a little more too about like both the skeletal staffing and the emotional turnoil and the emotional weight of it. Um. So, the jobs decision happened on June, which was a Friday, and we're in Pennsylvania, and that evening of the evening of June a trigger man went

into effect in in Ohio. It was a it's a fetal heartbeat bill, which is a deceptive language because it's not actually a heartbeat but um, but it's a it's technically a fetal heartbeat bill. And so people after six weeks um could no longer access abortion services or once any sort of like electrical impulse was detected, and everyone

had their appointments canceled. So we were actually at a protest, like the staff was like at a protest that evening, um with our with our doctors, our abortion providing doctors, and the news came out like yeah, shout out to them, we love them, um, And we got the news that Ohio had just did this, and we were just like, oh my god, tomorrow because we knew the second our call center and our phone lines opened, everyone whose appointment

was canceled gonna be calling us. And then we pull up the staff schedule and we're like standing in the middle of the street at a protest. We pull up the staff schedule and we're like, oh my god, there is one person schedule to answer phones right now, and it is an older woman who's been doing this since like the seventies or eighties and it's like we cannot like and we were like all as a union, like, um, we turn to each other and we're like, oh my god,

this is the situation. We cannot leave her alone. Um, we've already worked our five days, we already worked our already five hours, but we are going to call ourselves into work. And like we just we were like we've notified our managers, like we're gonna come into work and we're gonna help too, answer the phones for these canceled Ohio patients. Like that was a decision that we made to work those extra that that extra time on our

weekend off because it was a Saturday. But this ties into what Elizabeth was saying, where, Um, when you hear the person on the phone and then they come to you, and like it's very emotional because like you're doing your best as a health care worker to get them the health service that you have been trained to provide and that you know is very important. So knowing that we were understaffed, um, knowing that we're not making that much money, and then just being like I have to go in

and be there. I can't leave my coworker alone because I love my coworker and we can't, and like, somebody has to be there for these these patients when they're calling. And if it's not going to be the employer and the bosses, then it's going to be you. And and then we we all just we did that, and then um there was another clinic day. We a lot of us arranged to come in for an extra work day because we were like, we have we have to be there for these patients. Um, so we're really giving all

of our energy, and it's exhausting and traumatizing. I can't I feel like I can't say that enough. But and we need more staff, we need better wages, we need better working conditions because it's so it's like at the end of some of these days, it's like, how am I going to keep doing this? My body hurts, my brain hurts. I started having like issues with my memory where like I couldn't remember anything because my brain just

gave up on retaining information. And I'm like, I think this is like a trauma response, like yeah, I'm overwhelmed system shock. I think this is one of the things you get with working for NGOs, which is that like we're doing something like this is like there is work that needs to be done, but you know, the employers not giving you the resources that is necessary to do it right. You have one person on a call line like the day after a fetal heartbeat bill goes goes

into effect and and it's I don't know. It seems like one of the one of the things that's that that these NGOs do is they were you know, they make they make a mistake or they do something deliberately because they don't want to pay people and then they don't want to pay another more people, and they make you go deal with it because you know it has to get done because these people need you and that has to do it. Yeah, and that's so cross, it's disgusting.

So for me, I like to equate it as kind of like being emotionally gasolt because the whole point of healthcare, and I've said this to other people in different healthcare roles that I've worked before, because as we know, health care is chronically understaffed, like there are so many like nursing shortages and things. UM is that healthcare is designed to draw people who want to help. You have these like very strong moral and emotional beliefs, UM, and we are paid to care like it is our job to

care UM. And that is how they can get all of these things out of us, is because it's very easy to feel emotionally manipulated when somebody's like, well somebody has to be there for this patient, this person, UM, this like thing that can't wait UM and so a lot of us UM. Even like I said before, I worked here. At like different positions that I've held, I've been like, I will take an extra shift because somebody has to do it. And I love my job so much.

I love working in healthcare. It's something I've been very passionate about since I was a small child. UM. So I for years would burn myself out and be like, I'll take the extra shift at a different position. UM. When I used to work at a care UM. I worked at an intermediate care facility for adults with intellectual physical disabilities UM for a couple of years, and I remember routinely working sixteen hour shifts like day in and

day out. I think there was like six seven days a week of just doubles where I would work sixteen hour shifts. I don't think I like slept or aid or did anything UM. And then at one point, I was so burnt out that I just couldn't do it anymore. And I started to get frustrated with the people that I worked with and like the patients that I cared about.

And this one particular day, I like, I noticed myself getting incredibly annoyed with everything that was like happening, like sounds, patients like just being themselves, Like I didn't, you know, take it out on anything or anyone. I just noticed myself getting like slightly more irritated, and then I was like, this is not sustainable. I can't keep doing this UM. And I compared this recent change posted the Doobs Decision to what it was like when I also used to

work for distributing medical equipment to hospices. UM. It felt like every single moment was an emergency that I just did not have the resources to be able to UM help with. Because on one end of the line, you have somebody that is having this emergency, and then on the other end of the line, there's another person pulling you because they're also having an emergency, and so you have to kind of weigh which one of these patients like needs you the most right now, and which one

of those can you reasonably help. It's like that psychology psychology puzzle where they're like, um, if you move the thing on the try, Yeah, the trolley problem where like one of these people will die or seven people will die, and you have to decide which one of those you're gonna pull. Yeah, there's only so much that we can give as healthcare workers, as abortion workers, as reproductive health workers. UM,

there's only so many hours in a day. And as much as we want to keep giving, for us to keep pouring out of an empty cup, it's just not sustainable for ourselves. Like I know, many of us have lost sleep, many of us have stopped like being able to focus on anything outside of work because as soon as like you turn on the news or you open the phone or you like open up Twitter, there's more and more and more information because everything is consistently changing

all of the time. And like, um, Western Virginia is currently having like there, um yeah, so that's new. And we had a couple of calls come in from UM and we had Kentucky. Yeah, so that was new. UM. And we're just starting to like really have a good pattern of resources for patients coming in from like Ohio, UM and now we're like, okay, well what about Kentucky.

So we just like we feel like there's just one like hole in the dam that we put our finger on and then another one shows up that at some point we just have to know that we've done our best, um, and then it's okay to take a second to rest um and do you know, go home and maybe like watch TV or listen to a podcast. Yeah, not about abortion. Yeah, forget about abortion for two seconds, and because we will

inevitably have to do it again tomorrow. This reminds me a lot of Um, I did an interview like I don't actually it'll be a couple of weeks, I guess by when this comes out. With some organizers who were like trying to do like relief and aid for the migrants. You're getting bus to d C from Texas, I think you talk to and it was like they were talking about exactly the same thing where it's like we have to do this, we have to do this because otherwise

no one's gonna help these people. But like at a certain point it's like everyone has COVID, like we just can't and it I don't know, it's I think it's especially frustrating that this is happening because like those people were just like they have no resources, right, it's just a bunch of people who could drink vitual aly thing, but like this is planned parenthood. Like they have resources and they're not they're not doing this, and they're they're

doing this. I talked to a nurse who's a friend of mine a long time ago on this show, and

he talked, you know, he was in nurseting COVID. He's gotten COVID twice I think, and like, you know, he was talking about how like, yeah, he he said to be like thing I've always remember, it was like I've seen people die because I've seen people die because of staffing decisions, and it's like it's this it's this moral blackmail thing where it's like, in order to expect this thing needs to be done, we're not going to actually supervisee you with enough resources to do it, and we're

going to make you responsible for the consequences of our actions. And yeah, it's grotesque. Yeah something that um really it's just kind of like part of the trauma for the workers.

And I'm honestly for the patients and for everyone in our communities because this impact literally everyone is um just like turning, Like we do turn people away because pregnancy is a time sensitive issue and you know, you have to get in in a certain number of weeks in order to get you know, the type of procedure that you want, in order to get a procedure at all.

And these are people that are often parents, the majority of people who have abortions or parents, um, and they have children, and they have jobs or they don't have like PTO, and they live four hours away. So it's like,

how am I going to get to this appointment? So there's so many people that we have to refer, so it's it's so much on your soul to be on the phones and you speak to mother after mother, like a single mother or somebody who lost a partner or they are you know, um, they got evicted, and you're referring them to Detroit, which isn't also four or five hours away, and just to refer people to say I can't help you, try calling this place. And to do that like multiple times in a row every day, and

then you're like you're working seven hour days. It is really soul crushing because it feels like and like you tell yourself like it's my you know, we don't have the resources, we don't have the staff, we weren't prepared for this crisis. It's not on me. But it's very hard not to feel awful when you are turning people away because you don't I don't know any I've probably turned like probably over a hundred people away on the phones and told them who to call. I don't know

if they reach those places. I don't know if they called those places. For all I know, they continue to hire risk pregnancy, and they might suffer health consequences or things that debilitate them for the rest of their life, things that make the children's lives worse. And I have no have knowing. So it's just very traumatic to constantly be hanging up on the phone with people and just like sending them into like just a desert. I think the hardest part two is that these phone calls aren't

like two seconds long. They're not two minutes when we tell when we answer the phones. Abortion appointments take about fifteen to twenty minutes to schedule, So this is a half an hour that you are getting to know an individual. A person. They tell you everything about their lives. They tell you exactly what they're feeling, what they're afraid of, what they're going through with their families, like um, what

their financial situation is like. And then at the end when you tell them or at the beginning, which I do often just to let them know what they're getting themselves into. When you tell them that you're booking like three weeks out, four weeks out, you can just hear it in their voice that they are so scared and so desperate and there's nothing you can do about it because there's just not enough of us. There's not enough planet days, there's not enough hours in the day to

see all of these patients. There is so much red tape that these patients have to go through to even get to this appointment. There's a twenty four our phone consent in the state of Pennsylvania. UM. If they miss that, they can't be seen. And these are often like um.

Depending on the time of the phone call. Some people work multiple jobs, they're like sleep, they can't make the phone call, they're sick, they don't have working cell phones, or they're in a yeah, there in a situation where they're like have intimate partner violence, so they can't be on the phone for that long without risking their personal safety.

And it's just really traumatizing. And I know that it really common on the left and with like pro abortion people to say like you can't stop abortion, you can only staff save abortion. And I I totally support the sentiment behind that, because people are going to get abortions no matter what. But people also need to think about the people who give up, because I have when I have been on the phone with someone and heard them

give up. Yeah, and it's it's it's it's traumatizing because like you know that you gave them the information that broke them where they were just like when I'm like, okay, you have to wait four weeks, you have to drive four hours, you have to do this, you have to pay this, you have to do that, and then just for them to say, I'm sorry, I don't want to waste your time anymore. I just can't do this much

right now. It's just too much. And just to hear they're just resignation because you know, I think I feel like, you know, working in jobs, you might have heard people just like reach that moment where they hit their point, um whatever they're breaking point might be whatever the con text is, whatever the topic is. But like when it's your life and it's your health and it's your family and they're just like, this is my breaking point and

witnessing and that that does happen. And it's a tragedy every time that somebody abandons what they really want and their health and their well being and um, and it does happen. And that's why this is a tragedy that needs to stop. And I don't know when it's going to stop, because it just kind of seems like it's going to keep happening and keep going and going and going, in which case the trauma is going to like move.

Right now, we're like bearing the brunt of it, but it's gonna like radiate from us in our patients and we're going to see the ripple effects across the whole country, generational trauma that's going to continue for multiple decades. Yeah. Yeah. And it's i mean, just on a basic level, it's not fair that even you have to deal with this like this. This shouldn't be happening at all like that.

And it's it's that it's that like all of the evil of the American settler state falling on like a bunch of people who have nothing and then a bunch of workers who are expected to show up and have to deal with all of their all of their trauma to every day and it's just like a trauma to loser. Yeah,

and it's like flags and um. And then we had a union rally recently and uh, we were very open and talking about how a lot of us work two jobs and and we have staff members who donate plasma, so it's like we're doing this on top of a second job and donating are like bodily fluids. I spoke at this rally and I was like, we're literally giving our flash blood and tears to this whole thing. Um, because it's just we love it. We love all of

our patients, We care about the work. We really want to make sure that our patients are going to be okay. And I think that's why we do it, and also how we can justify feeling this way day day in and day out. I wanna, I think move from this to talking about the contract negotiation process, because like, okay, it is not okay for anyone to have like a

fourteen month long contract negotiation process. It is especially not okay for you to have to do this, so yeah, can we can we talk about what plant like what planned parish has been doing and would be better at answering this because she's on our bargaining committee. I'm on the bargaining team, yam. I've been doing this for fourteen months and like just oh god, I'm so sick of these meetings. I'm so sick of them, sick of their talking to their lawyer. Um, it's been long been just

um really just dragging themselves. It's like carrying a dead body. It's like like it's like come on, come on, are you are you okay? We're gonna We're gonna get there, you know, Like I'm We're just like dragging them and they are afraid of everything. Everything is we gotta see, we gotta check, we gotta we gotta look into it. And then you never hear back, or maybe you hear

back like three months four months later. Um, they constantly want to bring in a mediator constantly, and it's like there's nothing to mediate, Like what are we going to immediate? You telling us that you gotta back to us, like what's their tom mediate there? Um? And they're like it will move it along. And it's like yes, because they're doing the job for you. We want you to do it. We want you to have answers, you to figure it out. You're the bosses, you make the money, you're the one

running the organization. Um. Sorry, I start getting salty the bark team as has um. Being on the bargaining team has really nurtured my rage. Um. It's been very exhausting. And I know we're going to win a good contract because we are badasses and I think we're really strong union and really strong team. Um, and we need we need a livable wage because we're we're getting pommelled. So UM, it's been really frustrating. I guess it's like in short,

it's really drawn out, frustrating, disrespectful. I feel like my time has been disrespected. You know, I turn up every day, um for for my employer in the clinic. I'm an excellent worker and uh and they just waste like two three hours of my evening constantly. I could have been on my porch drinking tea or something, I don't know,

something relaxing. Yeah. And I guess, like any other person, like like every every day that they don't like sign a contract is another day they get to get away with not paying you, not bringing more staff, and it's and they're constantly trying to get delay contract negotiations to where they're like, oh, if you do this, we can We'll give you a couple of pennies and then we won't make any you won't be able to make any

economic changes until the next fiscal year. And it's like, do you think I want to wait till next July? I have a life plans. Yeah, I mean I think we've talked about on the show before that like one of the one of the most common ways that one of the most common ways that unions fall apart, and one of the things that corporations do and n g o s due to crush them is by trying to make sure that the first contract fails. And yeah, it's

a union busting thing. And it's grotesque, especially that it's like okay, like with capitalist firms, like yeah, you expect them to be union busting, right, like that that's their job. Their job is to ruthlessly specially, but it's like this is an NGO, Like their job is to provide health care for people. They're supposed to be oppressive organization. They're still doing this and it's I don't know, it seems

just really grim. Um it is grim and it doesn't give a lot of hope too, I think just everyone living in this in this country because it's like, okay, so there's been a a uh, I was gonna say attack, but like attack doesn't feel appropriate. Like they have gutted abortion access, hurting everybody, UM, causing like violence to people.

And who do you look to? So you would think that you would look to these progressive abortion related organizations like Planned Parenthood, National Abortion Federation, UM, narrow, but all of them have nothing to give and nothing there. They're you You only hear bad news. You hear them shutting down, you hear them union busting, you hear them UM requiring ridiculous regulations that aren't even necessary, and it's it's just

there's no they don't do anything to inspire hope. So it's like, well you need you know, like um prison culture and uh Mary Mikaba says, like, you know, hope

as a discipline. So I feel like a lot of us are always looking to like a place to exercise or hope and you're you're not going to get that here with with some of these organizations, I think you are going to get it in I think the rebro unions because I think there's a lot of us, and I think there were I think that we are working our little hearts out, and I think you're also going to get it with some of these other organizations, like um,

the abortion like abortion funds and some of the practical support organizations that are really like getting on the level of patients who are patients for former patients and are like, we're going to get people abortions. I think that's where Hope is right now. Um, but not with our employer. Yeah, I wanted to I guess there's some of your things I wanted to ask about was sort of on a

macro level. I mean, everyone we've talked to has talked about how like the ability to get an abortion is based on like a pretty small number of people who are like some you know, people who are abortion who are escorts, who are who are like a lot of time volunteers, or it's people who are like you two, who are being like horrifically underpaid to do the actual

work of this. And I was wondering what you two think that like the like the way this like I don't know, I guess, like the way everyone has sort of run ragged even keeping the system. How it was, like what role that played on a sort of macro level in terms of why ROW was like destroyed in the first place, and what that's done to the sort of the broader movement. I mean, no, they didn't do anything to Bennett, Like like, it's just what have we seen?

What show of force or strength or commitment to abortion access have we seen in ever? Honestly, like I can't even think other than like some loss or some legal wins we've celebrated, Like I do remember whole woman's health be Hellerstead, Um, what was that was like a win and we were excited and we were like, this is good news, and that's honestly the last and that again, that was just a court decision, so it was like

not in our hands really anyways. So I just either's so little, there's so little to work with, and so a little look at outside of I think just some really excellent organizing from workers and practical support groups. And I really think that our community has been fabulous this last whole like month. All of the support that we've gotten um for our like personal morale has been through like friends or local businesses or like people who know people who um like are there to offer us like

an ear, a hand, um, a cup of coffee. Um. Some of our doctors bring in bagels. Uh, this is like from their own pockets. Um, we'll bring in bagels. We've had like people donate and organized to bring in like coffee and stuff. UM. I know that Crystal was receiving a lot of donations herself, UM that we all use to buy ourselves, like food, drinks, stuff for people are just like sending me money for them. Yeah, and I thought that was really great. But I also noticed

that it came from outside sources and not from internal sources. Um. These are all other people outside in our community who understand and value the work with that we're doing, and like actively listen for what we need and what we're asking for. Um. And I think that there's a lot to be said about that. Yeah. Honestly, the most hope and the most support has come from just like regular people. You don't really see it from anyone with anything any

actual money or power. And on that note, this has been na could happen here You can find us on Twitter and Instagram That Happen Here pod, and you can find Crystal and Elizabeth Union at PPWP Union on Twitter for part two of this interview and until then goodbye. It Could Happen Here is a production of cool Zone Media. Or more podcasts from cool Zone Media, visit our website cool zone media dot com, or check us out on the I Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you

listen to podcasts. You can find sources for It Could Happen Here, updated monthly at cool zone media dot com slash sources. Thanks for listening.