The ex-fetal harvester featured in several recent Planned Parenthood sting videos elaborated on her story this week, saying she’s been diagnosed with PTSD since quitting her job in the clinics.
“This is not political to me,” Holly O’Donnell said Wednesday in an interview on the podcast Splintered Caucus. “This is just me telling you the truth, giving you my testimony.” (RELATED: Fetal Harvester Describes Cutting Through Baby’s Face To Harvest Brain)
O’Donnell’s job was to procure fetal tissue from Planned Parenthood clinics for StemExpress, a middleman between the aborted fetuses and researchers. She would “consent” women — ask them to donate their fetus — and then pick through the remains for the wanted tissue.
She was traumatized when she cut through the face of a late-term baby to procure its brain, and decided to quit her job. She later agreed to be featured in the series of videos released by The Center for Medical Progress, which alleges Planned Parenthood is profiting from the sale of aborted fetuses.
1. For a good cause
O’Donnell applied for the job on Craigslist after graduating from trade school, and gladly accepted the position about six months later — under the impression she would be doing blood work as a licensed phlebotomist.
“I did not know what I had got myself into,” she said on Splintered Caucus. “I passed out at the site [my first day] and woke up in the recovery room.” At that point she said she asked her coworker: “Why didn’t you let me know that the job was going to be dissecting dead fetuses?”
Her coworker replied: “Oh, well it’s for a good cause. … It’s kind of recycling. We’re taking something good from a bad situation.” (RELATED: Fetal Harvester Says She Passed Out In Shock On First Day In Planned Parenthood Clinics)
2. Women who didn’t consent
O’Donnell said some of the women reacted with disgust when asked whether they wanted to donate “a part of the remains of the abortion” for cancer or diabetes research.
“So what part of the fetus are you taking?” one woman asked O’Donnell when asked to consent. O’Donnell said she wasn’t sure.
“So you could literally just go in and take an arm?” the woman pressed.
“Yes, that could be it,” O’Donnell said. “It’s highly doubtful, but it’s possible.” At that point O’Donnell said the woman “just looked at me and stormed out of the room.”
3. Post-traumatic stress disorder
After she left her job at StemExpress, O’Donnell said she had “night terrors” and would wake up crying. She started seeing a therapist, who diagnosed her with PTSD and generalized anxiety disorder as a direct result of her work in the clinics.
“You have it just like any soldier who would come back from the war,” O’Donnell’s therapist told her. “That’s the extent you have it.”
“[The therapist] believes that the mind and the soul are connected as one, so when I had to go into those clinics, she believes it was kind of a soul damaging thing,” O’Donnell said. “And to me, I feel the same way. I was very messed up for awhile.”
4. A woman’s choice
“It’s every woman’s choice — your opinion,” O’Donnell said. “But mine, I’m pro-life. I think if you were to show these women the aftermath of an abortion, I don’t think they’d be getting them.”
“A lot of them come in and they are completely happy: ‘Oh, I’m really happy I can get this done, I’m not ready for a child. I’m a hundred percent into this,'” she continued. “And then you see them walk out of the room however long later, and you can just see this look in their eye.”
“A part of them was just ripped from them, and they didn’t know how important it was, and now it’s gone.”
5. Asked to leave
After she left StemExpress, O’Donnell recounted being asked to leave the room during an abortion debate in one of her college classes.
“There was a debate on abortion, and I went up to my teacher and said I don’t really feel comfortable in this debate,” O’Donnell said. “And she’s like: ‘No. You have to.'”
“Well I used to work in an abortion clinic,” O’Donnell explained, but her professor again told her she had to stay for the debate.
“And when the debate started, I raised my hand,” O’Donnell recounted. “And I’m like, ‘I have worked in abortion clinics. I have dissected dead fetuses. I’ve interviewed hundreds of women to why they’re having an abortion, and I don’t agree with it.'”
“And no one had anything to say, and my teacher is like ‘you should leave.'”
6. Outing Planned Parenthood
“It’s something that not a lot of people can relate to,” O’Donnell said, referring to her experience in the clinics. “So until this whole thing happened with the videos being released, I felt very alone.”
“I felt like this was something I would never be able to get rid of, because people didn’t know what was going on. Some people didn’t believe me.”
On her way to interview with CMP Project Lead David Daleiden, O’Donnell said she passed out on the plane. “The night before was nerve racking for me,” she said. “In the video, I think I look tired. I look like — look like hell. It’s cause I felt like hell.”
Asked what outcome she’s hoping for, O’Donnell said she wants people to know the truth, but doesn’t have a political agenda and is not on a mission to shut down Planned Parenthood.
“I don’t think I have any authority to outright say, ‘oh yeah, shut down Planned Parenthood,” she said. “Because they do good for women as well. But at the same time, how many other clinics, how many low-cost clinics in the USA do good for women as well?”
While her family and some friends remain supportive, O’Donnell said she’s lost others but expected that to happen. “I’m not just going to sit in a corner and not open my mouth,” she said. “I’ve always been one to stand up and — even if waves have to be made — you have to make waves if there’s going to be any kind of change.”
Content created by The Daily Caller News Foundation is available without charge to any eligible news publisher that can provide a large audience. For licensing opportunities of our original content, please contact licensing@dailycallernewsfoundation.org.
All content created by the Daily Caller News Foundation, an independent and nonpartisan newswire service, is available without charge to any legitimate news publisher that can provide a large audience. All republished articles must include our logo, our reporter’s byline and their DCNF affiliation. For any questions about our guidelines or partnering with us, please contact licensing@dailycallernewsfoundation.org.