Informed but Not Always Prepared: Patient Experiences of Clinic-Based Medication Abortion in Mississippi

Drawing on semi-structured interviews with 46 individuals who obtained clinic-based medication abortion in Mississippi between June 2021 and April 2022, this study contrasts patients’ informational preparation for abortion with their experience of its embodied dimensions. Although respondents generally described clinic information and counseling as thorough, many experienced pain, bleeding, and viewing pregnancy tissue as more physically or emotionally difficult than anticipated. These accounts reveal a gap between informational preparedness—knowing what may happen medically—and experiential preparedness—being prepared to navigate bodily realities of abortion. Accurate clinical information is necessary but may not prepare patients for abortion as bodily experience.