This blog is part of a series that catalogues the learnings and the reflections from the recently conducted 10th Anniversary Conference titled the ‘Power of Partnerships’.  

– Smriti Thapa, Youth Champion, Nepal

I hear and I forget, I see and I remember, I do and I understand: Chinese proverb

The first time I saw Dr. Ea Mulligan doing a Papaya workshop was in in ASAP’s Gender and Medical curriculum meeting in Vietnam. I was so thrilled and fascinated by the idea of trying MVA in a fruit, which further inspired me to bring this amazing learning experience back home among my students. As a result of which, I conducted similar workshops among my students. Before each workshop, I went through a lot of presentation video clips on it (as well as the TEACH abortion training workbook developed by Dr. Sarah Mc Neil (at TEACH in California)

To be able to join Dr. Ea for a similar demonstration during the two days of ASAP’s Anniversary Conference was another learning curve for me. This time, we tried the procedure with a dragon fruit and it was much better in terms of the process of evacuation since it was more reflective of the actual evacuation of the contents of the uterus during the termination of pregnancy in comparison to a papaya.

The demonstration was set up for both days of the conference and I had this opportunity to help Dr. Ea as one of the facilitators of the demonstration. Along with the Manual Vacuum Aspiration, she also demonstrated the use of IUCD in a dragon fruit and we were able to demonstrate that to other participants. Not only did the participants see our demonstration, but they also had a chance to do some hands-on skills practice.

Some of the participants with backgrounds in medical science really found this procedure simple and non-threatening, and felt that this will help them tackle the anti-choice rhetoric which often shows old and outdated sharp instruments to describe surgical abortion, when in reality MVA has really shifted the paradigm of abortion services.  On the other hand, a few others, especially with non-medical backgrounds, weren’t quite sure of how much this learning was useful to them. Nevertheless, they enjoyed the hands-on practice and were excited to share their experience with other people. The majority of them were really curious and excited to see the contents coming out of dragon fruit after being sucked by manual vacuum aspirator and were struck by how simple the overall procedure was.

The entire setup wouldn’t have been possible without the amazing Dr. Ea Mulligan and Dr. Dalvie whose relentless support and guidance for the demonstrations really helped the stalls team of me, Riti and Thuy to develop the necessary background for the successful outcome of the demonstration.
Personally, it was a great learning curve for me and I really hope it has inspired abortion advocates, both with medical and non-medical background to really think of abortion as a simple and quick procedure, and further debunk the myths associated with it.