Pregnancy Choices: Celebrating Life Through Compassionate Support
Edmonton Prolife stands for the inherent value of every human life, from conception to natural birth. We’re dedicated to providing resources, alternatives, and unwavering support to those facing pregnancy choices. We aim to celebrate life, empower women, and promote a culture that values the sanctity of each unique life’s journey from the very beginning.
Embracing Life: Empowering Pregnancy Choices with Compassion and Support
The pro-life movement’s principles extend to the realm of pregnancy choices, rooted in the belief that every human life is precious and deserving of protection. We advocate for alternatives to abortion that empower women, support families, and nurture a culture that values life. Our goal is to provide life-affirming options for those facing challenging decisions during and after pregnancy.
If you or someone you know is considering abortion, we encourage you to explore the resources below and reflect upon the alternatives available. Together, we can work towards a society where every child is welcomed, and women are supported on their journey through pregnancy and motherhood.
Crisis Pregnancy Help
Are you pregnant and needing support? There are pregnancy car centres located near you, two of which located here in Edmonton. Click on the links below to the visit their websites and gain more info or support:
Edmonton
Lethbridge
Medicine Hat
Olds
Red Deer
Rocky Mountain House
Spruce Grove
Stettler
Whitecourt
Brooks
Barrhead
Calgary & Area
Camrose
Cochrane
Edson
Grande Prairie
Hinton
Pregnancy Crisis Centers
There are two main Walk-In or Appointment pregnancy crisis centres in Edmonton – the Gianna Centre and the Pregnancy Care Centre.
They offer many of the same services, and will refer you to other services/organizations as your situation calls for.
The local pregnancy crisis centres are not medical clinics, though they can do simple pregnancy tests.
Follow the links below for details about the services they offer.
Gianna Centre
The Gianna Centre is a ministry of Catholic Social Services, but serves people of all faiths. Their policy is only to present religious information if you ask for it.
- 9040 – 95 Ave., Edmonton, AB T6C 1Z3.
- Phone: 780-482-5111
- Email: giannacentre@cssalberta.ca
- Website: https://www.cssalberta.ca/Gianna-Centre
Edmonton Pregnancy Care Centre
The Pregnancy Care Centre is an initiative of Protestant Christian volunteers. Volunteers may share information about their Christian faith, but their services are open to people of all faiths regardless.
- 10434 – 122 Street NW Edmonton, AB T5N 1M3
- Phone: (780) 424-2624
- Toll Free: 1-877-424-2685 (outside the Edmonton area)
- Text: 587-402-5860
- Email: info@pregnancycarecentre.ca
- Website: https://www.pregnancycarecentre.ca/
Pregnancy Help
When you’re faced with an unexpected or difficult pregnancy, it’s easy to feel isolated. Sometimes abortion feels like the only choice possible. Thankfully, there’s a local support network of people who are ready to extend concrete, practical help to women in difficult pregnancy situations. There is also online information about pregnancy, a baby’s development within the womb, and options for dealing with difficult or crisis pregnancies.
24 Hour Crisis Pregnancy Line
Need to talk to someone right now?
Even if it’s the middle of the night, there’s a volunteer standing by at the toll-free number below:
- Phone: 1-800-712-4357
The Back Porch
The Back Porch is a pregnancy resource centre that offers information to women and men considering all of their pregnancy options.
- Website: https://www.thebackporch.info/
Stand Up Girl is a website and forum where women can share their experiences and stories, as well as seek resources or help that they need with their pregnancy.
- Website: www.standupgirl.com/
Parenting Options
Marital Parenthood: Some couples who are unexpectedly pregnant choose to marry to provide a supportive environment for each other and their child. Those who are already married may seek support from family or community resources.
Partnered Parenthood: Some couples decide not to marry, and they work together to support each other and raise their child.
Single Parenthood: Many women choose single motherhood. Fathers—and even grandparents—may also choose to raise children when a woman feels she cannot accept the responsibility of motherhood.
Adoption
- Birth mothers today can choose the families in which they place their children and the extent to which they have contact. Birth mothers can arrange a closed, semi-open or open adoption, depending on their level of comfort. Adoption allows women who choose not to parent a chance to pursue their unrealized dreams as well as the dreams they have for their children.
Are you pregnant and wanting to ask some questions about making an adoption plan? The following Adoption services below are available to help:
Small Miracles Adoption
- Phone: 780.421.1177
- Text: 587.596.5380
- Email: info@smallmiraclesadoption.com
- Website: www.smallmiraclesadoption.com/
Amaris Adoption and Family Support Services
- Phone: 403-256-3224
- Toll Free: 1-877-256-3224
- Email: info@amarisadoption.com/
- Website: www.amarisadoption.com/
Abortion
An abortion (intending to end the life of the child) never has to happen. It is never the only option. So why do people have abortions?
There are many reasons why women or couples decide to have an abortion. An internet search will yield various results, statistics, and percentages, citing socio-economic reasons, not wanting children or any more children, fear of health risks, and many others. Abortion takes an innocent human life, and the gravity of that fact cannot be mitigated, it is important to remember that many factors can go into an abortion decision, such as fear, desperation, and ignorance (the person(s) have perhaps become convinced by others whom they trust that the preborn child is not a living human being).
For those people who wish to see Abortion, we provide the following information. These videos may not be pleasant, but it must be seen. Hundreds of innocent unborn children are torn to pieces every day in Canada because most people simply don’t know what abortion actually does. A doctor describes four abortion procedures, covering the 1st, 2nd, and 3rd trimesters of pregnancy.
Abortion Procedures: 1st, 2nd, and 3rd Trimesters (video) – YouTube
Although there are many methods of abortion, one should reconsider utilizing any of them.
Below is a downloadable PDF that goes over both Surgical & Medical abortions methods commonly used, providing more information and insight regarding abortion.
Want to learn more about Abortion and why you should reconsider it? Click the button below!
Post Abortion Help
About one third of pregnancies in Canada end in abortion. We don’t really have good enough statistics to know how many women that represents, but obviously post-abortive women are a significant proportion of the population.
If you are a post-abortive woman, you are not alone. And if you have never been personally involved in an abortion, it’s probable that you know and love people who have been.
Unfortunately, many people suffering regret or grief over an abortion feel isolated and unable to communicate that grief even to their loved ones. The resources on this page provide spiritual, emotional, and psychological help for those suffering from the pain of an abortion.
Online Support:
Voices Who Mourn – Feminists for Life’s publication for women who want to openly mourn their abortions.
Rachel’s Vineyard – A safe place to renew, rebuild and redeem hearts broken by abortion. Weekend retreats offer you a supportive, confidential and non-judgmental environment where women and men can express, release and reconcile painful post-abortive emotions to begin the process of restoration, renewal and healing.
The Abortion Recovery Centre offers counselling for post-abortive women. The centre is an arm of the Pregnancy Care Centre which is a non profit, faith based organization.
Canada Silent No More – A national campaign of Post-Abortive women reaching out to other women who regret their abortions and have been hurt physically, emotionally or spiritually because of it.
Local Support:
Project Rachel
Project Rachel is an international healing ministry to those who have been involved in an abortion. The program is sponsored by the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Edmonton, but has counsellors from many faith backgrounds to assist you in your healing process.
- Project Rachel Edmonton – (780) 424-4538
- Project Rachel Lloydminster (780) 871-3584
- Website (Project Rachel Locations): www.campaignlifecoalition.com/healing-centers/
(Disclosure: Edmonton Prolife is not affiliated with Project Rachel. The information here is reproduced from their distributed pamphlets, as they do not have a local website.)
What can you expect?
Project Rachel is a sensitive, private, and confidential experience. It begins with a call to the Project Rachel confidential phone line. A staff member will then refer you to a certified counsellor and/or a member of the clergy in you area. For Catholics, the Sacrament of Reconciliation can be a powerful part of this healing journey.
Project Rachel provides an opportunity for you to receive the healing grace of God and to move forward in a caring and hope-filled atmosphere toward reconciliation – with yourself, your unborn child, your church, and your God.
To initiate your participation in Project Rachel, or get further information, call the number listed above
Have You or a Loved One Been Hurt by an Abortion Experience?
Without a doubt, abortion is one of the most traumatic experiences a person can have.As such, it’s common for individuals who have gone through with an abortion to experience Post-Abortion Syndrome, in which symptoms include:
- Depression
- Eating and sleeping disorders
- Flashbacks
- Loss of self-esteem
- Nightmares
- Spiritual divorce from God
- Self-blame
- Anger
- Denial
- Guilt
- Prolonged grief
Both before and after abortion, feelings of fear, anxiety, guilt, panic, and pressure are common – not only for the woman who undergoes the abortion but also for the father of the unborn child, the grandparents, close friends, and even medical personnel.
For some, the pain can be intensified by a sense of alienation from God and church.
If you are in this position you want you to know that the Christian community understands and cares. As ministers of the loving and forgiving Christ, we reach out to you in compassion and concern.
Above all, we want to help you through the healing process. Catholic Social Services, the Redemptorist Centre for Growth, and the Family Enrichment Centre invite you to participate in Project Rachel – a post-abortion program offered by certified counsellors and trained priests and ministers who are ready to help all who have been involved in an abortion.
FertilityCare Program
NaProTECHNOLOGY® (NPT) is a major breakthrough in monitoring, treating and maintaining a woman’s reproductive and gynecological health. NaProTECHNOLOGY® offers new hope for couples with infertility; it is nearly three times more successful than IVF, it is inexpensive and uses a step ladder approach to dealing with infertility. This new health science approaches women as whole persons and maintains the dignity of the couple. NPT works cooperatively with the body’s natural reproductive cycle. It doesn’t suppress the body’s reproductive system but instead enhances its function by thoroughly evaluating and treating the underlying problems.
The Marguerite Bourgeoys Centre uses the work of Dr. Hilgers and his team from Creighton University who have developed a highly accurate, medically safe and natural way to understand and regulate fertility and to properly diagnose and treat fertility problems. This method does not use drugs that supress or harm the natural fertility cycle.
Hilgers describes NaProTECHNOLOGY® – Natural Procreative Technology – as “a union of education and technology in a way which allows us to evaluate and treat a whole host of women’s health problems, which does not use contraception, sterilization, abortion or other artificial reproductive technologies, and is thus completely consistent with Catholic teaching.”
What makes NaProTECHNOLOGY® medically different from modern, contemporary reproductive medicine is the fact that it doesn’t just treat women’s health problems, such as premenstrual syndrome and infertility, but it gets to the underlying causes of those problems. That happens by targeting a woman’s menstrual cycle.
FertilityCare™ System
Natural fertility treatment should be considered as an option not just by Catholics and Christians but also by society as a whole. The FertilityCare™ method is ethical, inexpensive and healthy. As couples are encouraged to work together in tracking and recording the woman’s fertility cycle, the experience can enrich a relationship. The divorce rate amongst users is approximately 1% compared to 50% of those who use the contraceptive pill.
To find out more visit http://www.fertilitycare.ca/
More information is available on-line through the American Academy of Fertility Care Professionals at https://aafcp.net/
Fetal Development Information
3D/4D Ultrasound Pictures – Avoid 3D and 4D imaging, as amazing ultrasound pictures and videos of the unborn child are, viewing them with these methods can cause harm.
In The Womb – National Geographic’s groundbreaking documentary about life before birth. With clips from the documentary, pictures of life in the womb, and articles about the advances in understanding pre-natal life. (The full DVD can be borrowed from Edmonton Prolife.)
The Back Porch – The Back Porch is a pregnancy resource centre that offers information to women and men considering all of their pregnancy options.
BeNotAfraid.Net – For Parents Facing a Difficult Diagnosis
MOTHERISK – Treating the Mother, Protecting the Unborn
Recommended Books
Below is a pdf file containing some recommended books related to pregnancy choices and links to purchasing them:
