Justyna Wydrzyńska: “I am an abortion activist, an abortion doula”


Fredrik Laurin and Clara Zid, April 2023

Justyna Wydrzyńska

She wanted to be like any ordinary mother. Have a car, a house, a nice husband, and kids. Go on vacation overseas from time to time. But she became an activist – an abortion activist.

Justyna Wydrzyńska, a chemist with a diploma from University of Warsaw, was a production engineer in the laboratory of an electric surge-protection factory for years trying to live the dream. But she now gets threats online from her neighbors in the small Polish town where she lives, and her children go to school in another town not to get harassed. The Catholic church and the Polish state have brought their might down on her.

At 48 and a mother of two she lives in very small, strictly Catholic town a 100 km from Warsaw where her family ended up when her father, a soldier, was posted there years ago.
Until 2006 everything was normal. Or at least on the surface. Beneath there was domestic violence in the family. “My partner was using force against me. And when I found myself in unwanted pregnancy I tried to get information how to stop the pregnancy at home.”

Justyna knew there were pills to take, but information in Poland was scarce on what kind, how many, and where to get them. “At around the 10th week of my pregnancy I found an organization, Women on Web, who could give feedback on how it worked. They told me how to take the pills and how they succeeded with their abortions.”

At twelve weeks of pregnancy Justyna took the pills. “I was very afraid, really. I was so afraid. I had a lot of myths in my head that I would die, that there would be a lot of bleeding, and really bad things.”

Afterwards Justyna realized that many polish women went through the same ordeal. Fear, lack of information, but physically easy. Rumors, harassment and even disinformation filled the sites where abortion was discussed. “I saw on the internet that there were so many questions like my own. That people really need this information. I felt I had to share knowledge about how to do it in a proper way, so I started to answer in web forums.”

She opened a blog and wrote about her own abortion. That blog has evolved into Kobiety w Sieci (Women on the Web) – an informal organization, an activist site that today has tens of thousands of followers. “I am now an abortion activist. An abortion doula.”

Justyna and her friends carefully monitor the discussions on the Kobiety w Sieci forum and quickly ban anyone harassing users. “You have to register to join. If we see a person writing bad things, we ban them, the account, the IP, so that it´s not repeated. We really try to protect the space from anti-choice people.”

The first site was hosted free in exchange for advertising but as soon as the Polish domain owner realized what the subject of the site was they told Kobiety w Sieci to move or the site would be erased. The political situation in Poland in 2006 was different, the authorities were not chasing abortion activists at the time. But the social pressure was on, and Kobiety w Sieci needed to think about data protection, the owner of any hosting company could copy the database and give it to the police at any moment.

The forum grew by about 1,000 users every year not least because in public spaces anything could be posted while Kobiety w Sieci would strive to give reliable information and stop harassment. Facebook became an issue. An open space often used by women seeking information about abortion. “I joined the Polish part of Facebook and tried to tell people that if you show yourself there as a person, you show your data, you show your name. It’s a rather bad idea, because the anti-choice people see your name and they contact you directly, or they contact your family.”

“Sharing pills is criminalized in Poland and could give you three years in jail”

Searching for information and ordering pills for yourself is not illegal in Poland, but helping another person is. “Sharing pills, lending money for paying pills, ordering for someone is criminalized and could give you three years in jail.”

Kobiety w Sieci tried to delete incriminating information like “my colleague gave me pills” but in 2012 the police demanded information on two users in the forum. Instead, Kobiety w Sieci deleted the site. “We didn’t want to give the police information about the IPs and the email addresses of these users. We said we got hacked and that the database was destroyed.”

After contacting Qurium the new site is now hosted in a secure location. “That creates protection of the database and the users. Even I don’t know where this database is right now.”

The need for proper information is huge in countries like Poland where information on abortion is suppressed. In 2019, together with other five organizations from Europe, they became part of Abortion Without Borders – an international network for supporting women in need of an abortion. Sometimes they provide information, sometimes access to abortion pills, and sometimes help with money to travel to clinics in Germany, Austria, Netherlands, Belgium, or other countries in Europe.

The network also collects data, and their best estimate is that among Poland’s 50 million inhabitants there are 120,000 abortions per year. “It’s really hard to estimate because we don’t have access to numbers. But comparing the situation in different countries, seeing that in 2022 around 44,000 people received help from Abortion Without Borders and you have at least 1,000 Polish abortions because of fetal malformation it means there are a lot of unwanted pregnancies.”

“And unwanted pregnancies can also result in a child because you are feeling that even though you want an abortion, you can’t. “

Cover of “Wysokieobcasy”

In 2016 together with other polish activists she stated the Abortion Dream Team and took a bold move to shine the spotlight on the issue. In 2018 they went on the cover of a large Polish newspaper for women. “This was the moment when I really saw how my town is treating people who think different. I was called to a meeting with a human resources person and my boss, a very catholic person. I said I’m not a judge of what I do for the company, but what I’m doing after my office hours is my private business.”

But anonymous letters started to arrive saying she used company time for activism and the manager started to treat Justyna different from her colleagues. It took four years but in 2020 she left her job because of the tension her activism created. “I just couldn’t face it anymore.”

The situation of Polish women has caught international attention and Abortion Dream Team is now funded by Open Society Foundations, Global Fund for Women and Mama Cash.
“Now I can do this full time, and I’m really not afraid to walk around this town. I just live and work here. I see that people are bold on the Internet, writing nasty comments anonymously. But when you meet the same people in town they are not so brave.“

Justyna used to be an active citizen years ago and attended church. ”I don’t go anymore. A priest visited me when I wanted to divorce my partner and told that maybe if I would go to church more often we wouldn’t have problem with violence. I said that if your position is that my partner is using force against me is my fault, then church is not a place I should go to. It’s not good for me. So, I quit the church.”

The Catholic church and the Polish government’s objection to abortion is in its foundation a remnant of the patriarchy, Justyna says. “Poland is very good at keeping what they call traditional values. The main purpose of a woman is to have a kid and be a wife and a mother. The government, which is now very Catholic, don’t want to have a feminist revolution among women.”

“They even invented a contract for towns to sign where they would not pursue gender equality politics. And only the traditional roles between women and men. Which for example means that sexual education in schools with gender equality are not allowed.”

After the supreme court revision of the Roe v Wade act the US is currently living through a heated debate over abortion and the pill. “Abortion pills are a tool of freedom. If a country wants to control abortion it should controls clinics, laws and regulate legalization of specific medicines like Mifepristone (also known as RU-486)” Justyna says.

“The only way to help women who wants to abort, in case of restrictions, is to organize networks which deliver information and pills.”

Finally, the Polish government came for Justyna. In 2023 she was sentenced to 30 hours community service a month for a year for aiding a woman to do an abortion. “I decided to risk my freedom because Ania, the person who I sent pills, was living in violent relationship and it was in the beginning of the Pandemic.”

“You have to help other people, because there is no other choice than just getting help”

European Union, United Nations, Amnesty have all issued protest and demands that Poland reverse the ruling. But the damage is still done, Justyna says. “I have been living in a bubble since the case started. I thought it wouldn’t have any significance. But last week I saw an interview with a woman who is doing a similar job to what we do, but in a smaller way. She was helping friends with access to pills and sharing a room to do the medical abortion. Now she said that after my verdict she’s so afraid that she will stop. And this is what we wanted to avoid, that people would be afraid to help other people.”

But the chilling effect will not persist, reality will, Justyna says “I hope it will change, because every time the chilling effect is keeps people from helping others reality tells you that you have to do something. You have to help other people, because there is no other choice than just getting help.”

The case is appealed. It might take as much as several years before its heard in the appellation court and if it holds up, Justyna will have to do her community service. “The sentence is only 30 hours per month, but I probably do this work 30 hours per week already, so I have delivered the community service in advance.” she says with a smile.

If push comes to shove she will not be alone. The moment the verdict became known Justyna Wydrzyńskas mailbox filled up. “People were saying they would come and help me do whatever they told me to do. So, if the appellation court lands in the same verdict, I will probably do it with many, many people around me.”


Kobiety w Sieci is hosted by Virtualroad since 2018.