On Jan. 28, 2026, four women who were denied abortion care and a physician sued the state of Arkansas to block its near-total abortion ban. On Sept. 28, a week from today, a judge is scheduled to hear arguments about whether to dismiss this lawsuit as requested by the state of Arkansas.
Now, six women are listed as plaintiffs in this case. One of them is Theresa Van. In 2023, she was already the mother to Camille, and she was excited to grow her family and give Camille a sibling. She learned she was having another daughter, Cielle.
Van says her pregnancy with Camille was uncomplicated. Her pregnancy with Cielle seemed to be going the same way until the 20-week anatomy scan. She says she felt normal and barely had morning sickness, so the results of the ultrasound visit came as a surprise.
"So the way that I process trauma is to dissociate. And so at that appointment, we just thought it was a regular appointment. We were excited to see Cielle. And so at that appointment, she was balled up pretty tight into a ball. So they couldn't see a lot of her heart and organs and things. And there was very little movement, but she had a heartbeat.
"And so at the time during the ultrasound, I really wasn't understanding or grasping what was going on until I spoke with my OB directly after the ultrasound appointment. And it wasn't until we spoke that he was letting me know what was going on, and that I needed to see a specialist. He didn't want to diagnose me right then and there, and he told me worst-case scenario of what would happen."
According to the court filing, Van's 20-week ultrasound showed low amniotic fluid. At a 22-week appointment, a specialist told her there was no fluid remaining and that Cielle's organs would not fully develop. The filing says, the doctor told Van that even if the pregnancy reached full term, Cielle would not survive delivery.
"And it was at that appointment as well that I found out the consequences of what would happen to my providers if they were to intervene or to try to help me."
Moore: What are those conversations with providers look like? What were they telling you about how you should proceed and how they were going to provide you care?
Van: Those appointments were kind of like preparation appointments, where they were just making sure that I felt supported and prepared for possibly having to carry Cielle all the way into full term because that was a possibility. But Cielle passed when I was 27 weeks. So I made it to seven months.
And a lot of those appointments were just going over our plans of what could possibly happen, playing out different scenarios of if I were to come in and I was bleeding, or even if I came in during one of my weekly appointments and Cielle was not alive. So we were basically just making sure that we were prepared and we were all on the same page about the different possibilities and outcomes.
Moore: Tell me more about this experience between 22 weeks and 27 weeks. I can't imagine what you're experiencing both physically and also emotionally. And you're still a mother.
Van: Yeah.
Moore: And that five-week span, what's going on for you?
Van: It was hard. I had a really rough upbringing, and I think that contributed to how mentally strong I was able to be during this process. I think that if I wasn't forced to endure the things I did in my early childhood that made me mentally strong, I don't think that I would have been able to handle what those five weeks were.
And when I [saw] my psychiatrist, I was put on antidepressants, anti-anxiety, sleep aids because I was struggling really hard mentally. And at the same time, I still had to be a very present mom to Camille, and I didn't want her to see me struggling. So I really had to put on a strong face for her.
And at the time, my husband at the time, I'm still having to be a wife and still do breakfast, lunch and dinner. And July is such a busy month for us. It's Camille's birthday and my ex-husband's birthday, and so I still threw a birthday party for my ex-husband. And life was still moving at the same time that I was grieving.
And it's such a weird feeling, like going through life and grieving a baby that you still feel, because she was very active. She was kicking me, constantly moving. And it was really weird to put in my head that this baby is not going to make it. I'm like, I'm not going to have a future with this baby. And so there's a word for that type of grief. I can't remember right now, but it's just a really weird space to be in.
Moore: Yeah. It's this idea of longing for something you'll never have and still being in the midst of it.
Van: Yeah. It's like grieving a future that I'll never have of being a family of four. My dream, that was my ultimate dream, was to be a family of four. I'm very big on even numbers, so having two children was really big.
And then we were really excited that it was a girl. So I love being a girl mom. I'm super girly myself, so we were really excited for Cielle. So was Camille. And it was like a dream come true, like completing the last piece of our puzzle.
Moore: Twenty-seven weeks. We're there. What does that look like? At what point do things start to change and shift for you?
Van: We were going in weekly to see if Cielle was alive on Tuesdays. July 18 was a Tuesday. We went in like it was a regular appointment. I had started to believe that I was going to carry Cielle to full term because we had made it so far. Week after week she had a really strong heartbeat. She was moving.
I was really thinking that I was going to carry her all the way, because if they had told me the week before on a Tuesday she was having less movement or whatever, then I kind of would have started to prepare myself. But because I just thought this was going to be another appointment where her heartbeat was strong and she was moving, it was very shocking going in for that.
And even though we're doing all these things to prepare me for her loss, nothing can really ever prepare you. And so when I went in, and at that appointment, and they said she wasn't alive, it was very shocking for me. And like I said, my way of processing trauma is to dissociate. So as things are moving around and people are talking, I'm checked out. So it was really hard.
Moore: What I hear from your story is you're good at taking care of people. You've probably spent a lot of your life taking care of people. Who was taking care of you in those moments?
Van: I felt very alone. I felt very alone because I didn't know anyone else that was going through what I was going through, and it was really hard for... Sorry. Really hard for other people to relate. I personally didn't know anyone myself that was going through what I was going through. And it was even hard for my ex-husband to even understand.
And I think that I was just in survival mode, just on my own. I'm not mad at anyone. I just don't think anyone knew really how to care for me. People really didn't know what to say to me either, especially close friends and family. And so I spent a lot of time processing what I was going through alone.
I would wait until Camille went down for her naps and would use that time to kind of process a little bit. And I only had about an hour because I never wanted Camille to see me like that. So I would say no one. Just me.
Moore: Why was it important for you to be a part of this lawsuit? Why was it important for you to tell other people about your experience? You can take a second if you need to.
Van: Yeah. Sorry. Sometimes I don't think about how lonely that experience is, so... So sorry.
Moore: That's OK. It's a hard story to tell.
Van: Even though I grew up one of six sisters, I grew up alone because my first four sisters, there's a huge age gap between me and the last four, and there's a huge age gap between me and my youngest sister. So there's a lot of trauma surrounding being alone. And so I think when I went through this process alone, it was hard, and I just had to handle it on my own.
So I think that, like I said, because of what I went through in my childhood, it kind of prepared me a little bit for this entire experience. But I chose to be a part of this lawsuit because truly, I do not want anyone else to have to go through what I did. I don't want to see another family go through what I did. I don't want to see another woman... It has deeply traumatized my life.
The contrast of 2023 and 2026, my life has changed so much, and it has really affected my family. And I don't want to see anyone else have to suffer and go through that. And as long as these laws are in place, there will be.
And it's really important for me to share my story because I felt so alone in that process. I didn't feel like no one else understood what I was going through. And so for me to be a part of this and to be able to share my story is really important because I don't want anyone else to feel the way that I did.
Moore: Van says she never considered herself very religious, but she says that while she was pregnant with Cielle, friends, relatives and strangers offered religious assurances about what would happen.
Van: They would say things like, "A miracle is going to happen." Like, "Cielle is going to make it." And I'm very much a realist. And so it put such a bad taste in my mouth because no one understood what I was going through. And no one is more of an expert than my doctor, who has seen these scans and is applying real-life, evidence-based, science-based things. And so no one can tell me better than what my provider can tell me what is going on.
And so after my experience with losing Cielle, I completely lost all faith. I would say that I'm not religious at all at this point. And I'm not judging anyone for their religious beliefs. I've never have because I grew up in a multireligious home. But it really put a really bad taste in my mouth as far as religion goes.
Moore: Anything I missed, anything you want to make sure we touch on here?
Van: I think that it's really important for people to understand that I'm very much a normal woman that lived here in Arkansas that planned her pregnancy, wanted her pregnancy and was forced to go through this, and that it can literally happen to anyone else.
When I shared my story, so many people were like, "I didn't even know this could happen." I didn't even know myself that this could happen. And that's speaking from someone who protested in 2022 in downtown Fort Smith, not knowing that a year later I would be impacted directly by these bans.
Theresa Van is one of the plaintiffs suing the state of Arkansas for its near-total abortion ban. You can hear our previous reporting on the lawsuit, Waldorf v. Arkansas, and our conversation with Emily Waldorf.
Ozarks at Large transcripts are created on a rush deadline and edited for length and clarity. Copy editors utilize AI tools to review work. KUAF does not publish content created by AI. Please reach out to kuafinfo@uark.edu to report an issue. The audio version is the authoritative record of KUAF programming.
