How can we help now?

It's horrible, terrible, not to be able to help those women. I ask myself why we have this Hotline open if we can not tell them where to go, what to do. If the boat would be in Figueira da Foz we could bring them on board and help them for free.

The last call was especially emotional for me, because the woman told me that the contraception failed. One of the most important things for people is to have control of the situation and to have control you need to take precautions. If she tried everything thinking I'm protecting myself, I won't be pregnant, and a stupid thing happens like a broken condom, she didn't have control, which must be very distressing and there is no other option like abortion, it's terrible.

Most women who call have already two or three children, they have no money, are afraid to tell their husbands. There was a call from a woman who couldn't be away for more that one day, because otherwise her husband would know and would get mad with her. Most hate calls we get are from men, calling us whores, things like that. Very aggressive. I think the men do that because they don't know what is to be pregnant, what is to have a child in your belly and not want it.

I don't know what will happen to these women we can't help, we just hope that they can find help somewhere else, we hope they can afford to have a safe abortion. Some of them will probably have their third or fourth child. It's very hard for me, I get angry with the situation.

It's fine that we also get a lot of calls supporting us, many many calls. Yesterday we got a call from Portuguese workers on a platform at sea near Greece supporting us, saying that they knew about Women on Waves and were ashamed of this government that most of the time don't take position on anything, and now make a mess out of it.