Maya Hawke Says Mom Uma Thurman's Abortion Is The Reason She Exists
Maya Hawke is sharing how access to abortion care has impacted her entire family, including parents Uma Thurman and Ethan Hawke.
During an appearance on "The Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon," the "Stranger Things" actor discussed the Supreme Court's decisions to overturn Roe v Wade, eliminating the Constitutional right to an abortion and allowing state legislatures to individually regulate access to care.
"I called my mom to ask for advice today about coming in to talk to you," Hawke told Fallon. "And we just got into talking about the Supreme Court ruling and this essay that my mom wrote a couple months ago when they were putting these further restrictions on abortion access, sort of preceding this whole thing."
Last year, after Texas passed a 6-week abortion ban, Thurman, wrote an essay for The Washington Post, sharing her personal abortion story.
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"In my late teens, I was accidentally impregnated by a much older man," Thurman wrote. "I was living out of a suitcase in Europe, far from my family, and about to start a job. I struggled to figure out what to do. I wanted to keep the baby, but how?"
Thurman went on to detail her experience, sharing that "we decided as a family" that she "couldn't go through with the pregnancy" after discussing her options with her parents.
"The abortion I had as a teenager was the hardest decision of my life, one that caused me anguish then and that saddens me even now, but it was the path to the life full of joy and love that I have experienced," Thurman explained. "Choosing not to keep that early pregnancy allowed me to grow up and become the mother I wanted and needed to be."
Related: Is abortion a parenting issue? Yes — here’s why
Hawke told Fallon that her mom's abortion decision is the reason she was eventually born.
"If she hadn't of had it, she wouldn't have become the person that she had become and I wouldn't exist," Hawke told Fallon. "Both of my parents' lives would have been derailed if she hadn't of had access to safe and legal health care — fundamental health care."
"So many people, because of this ruling...will not only not be able to pursue their dreams, but actually lose their lives and be unsafe," Hawke added.
"I just wanted to say, 'F--- the Supreme Court," Hawke told Fallon. "But we're going to keep fighting it and we're going to win, like our grandmothers did."
"You can absolutely say that," Fallon responded. "Thank you for saying that. Thank you for saying that message."
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