What happens to women when becoming a parent isn't a choice?

After the U.S. Supreme Court voted to overturn Roe v. Wade last month, people in states with codified abortion rights — including Massachusetts — started considering what the ruling could mean for them. In the immediate future, that could mean more people who live in states where abortion is banned and can afford to travel for care coming to Massachusetts. It also has people considering what motherhood and parenthood mean to them. Alexandra Valdez, executive director of the Boston Mayor's Office of Women's Advancement, joined Morning Edition hosts Paris Alston and Jeremy Siegel to talk about how her office is responding. This interview has been lightly edited.

Paris Alston: How does this decision from the Supreme Court add new challenges to women and people who can get pregnant? In that answer, give us a little bit of your take of what the status of that is already.

Alexandra Valdez: Abortion continues to be legal in Massachusetts. And that's something that we need to continue elevating and we need to continue educating our communities about, to make sure that message gets across the board. As we know, thanks to a lot of advocacy from many from Boston across the Commonwealth, the legislature has passed laws in recent years, including the ROE Act, that provide additional safeguards for this right. The Dobbs decision is, again, a huge, huge step back for women's rights to bodily anatomy and determination. And we can't really erase the fact that this is going to specifically hit and focus on a lot of women of color, not just in the city, but everyone in the country. Abortion is health care. Forced pregnancy would have so many health consequences disproportionally felt in traditionally marginalized and underserved communities. Specifically, Black women experience three times more maternal mortality risk than white women. So there's no denying that further restricting abortion care will increase the already vast health equity gap for Black and brown communities all around the country.

Jeremy Siegel: Let's talk a little bit about parenthood and families. We've seen conservative leaders, anti-abortion activists, rally around the idea of being pro-family after this decision. What, from your perspective, does this ruling mean for families, for kids, for parents and one's decision to become a parent?

Valdez: As a recent mom myself, of an 8-month-old, parenthood should be a joyful event in a person's life, and in a family's life. And that individual should be willingly able to choose. The choice will now be forced upon many people across the country. And there's emotional damage in this experience, not to mention the economic implications. And we can't ignore the changes. It will reduce women's ability to achieve economic stability by imposing a multitude of costs. As we can think of raising a family, having children or choosing the right to do that is, when it comes to talking about economic changes, it will be something that is a huge change. It's a big part of someone choosing to have a family. Starting a family should be something joyful. It should be something wanted. And when being able to choose is not an option, or is not even something to consider, then we would definitely be talking about an issue here.

Alston: Give us an idea of what happens when that's not a choice, when frankly, it's not wanted. You know, when people end up with a family that they did not plan for or, again, did not want.

Valdez: For those who would not have the choice, economic stability is going to be definitely a big deal. And we can't have this conversation without talking about mental health. We are going to be looking at rising numbers of [people] needing more space and needing that specific ability to to talk about mental health and preparedness when this decision is not able to be chosen.

Siegel: Your office, the Office of Women's Advancement, is dedicated to removing systemic barriers surrounding gender equity. Abortion rights, advocates would say, is a huge gender equity issue. In a state like Massachusetts that does have strong abortion protections, what can people who are frustrated by this decision do? Obviously this isn't everybody in the state, of course. In the nation, there are a lot of people celebrating it. But as someone whose office is dedicated to issues like this in a state where abortion is protected, how are you making sense of what you should be doing as a city office in a changing national landscape?

Valdez: Even though abortion and reproductive health continue to remain legal and protected in Massachusetts and in Boston, we still have a lot of work to do and a lot to improve. When we talk about what our office does and our focus, one of the biggest things that we're focusing on is the education piece, specifically around immigrant populations, specifically around those [for] whom English is not their first language. We want to make sure that the correct information is getting to them, and we don't want misrepresentation or misinformation to be spread. Social media can play a huge role, specifically when it comes to sharing information. I will encourage people to continue advocating, continue attending that community meeting, speak up, continue writing letters, continue making those phone calls, and continue to be heard. Making sure that our voices are elevated in our platforms is essential, and making sure that everyone's voices are at the table is a must.

This is not just what the Mayor's Office of Women's Advancement is doing, but this is just what the city of Boston as a whole is doing. Making sure that we are coming together as one and being unified is very, very important to making sure that we are sending across one simple message.