The committee which decided to bestow the Order of Canada on Dr. Henry Morgentaler clearly didn't consult Joanne Boone or Vicky Green.

If Morgentaler is considered brave for conducting abortions on them, they are equally as brave for standing up and saying they wish now he hadn't. And although both described the famous abortion doctor as professional and clinical, neither would have recommended him for the award. He's not a hero or pioneer for everybody.

"I heard a sucking sound."

And just like that an 18-year-old girl known then as Joanne LaMere was no longer pregnant and $600 poorer after a cash payment. "If you can imagine a soul being pulled out one's body! That is how it felt," said Boone, now 56, a grateful mother of three in Caledon. "It felt so unnatural. We are supposed to give life, not end it."

She feels she had no choice and no say. "I was nine weeks pregnant and I didn't have many options," she said of her family making the call to take this route.

Even though 38 years has passed, she remembers "the nurse saying to put your legs up in the stirrups. It was then like I was hooked up to a vacuum."

Yet another successful abortion at the Morgentaler Clinic -- circa 1970 when such a procedure was still a legal question mark and certainly not mainstream and available like today. She had to sneak down to Montreal from Toronto to "this house" where "there were 10 other women lined up behind curtains waiting for abortions, too."

Some 13 years later, a 21-year-old Vicky Green also found herself at the controversial East End Clinic. "It was Jan. 2, 1983," said the now 47-year-old Ottawa-based social worker who now has two children of her own. "If Dr. Morgentaler doesn't believe me, he can check his own records."

She was 12 weeks pregnant and was having second thoughts. "Dr. Morgentaler sat in front of me and I was crying. I told him I don't want to do this to my baby. He said it is not a baby and that you will have other pregnancies."

When the procedure started, she said, she remembers saying "it hurts" to which he said "just relax." Soon it was over and she recalls Morgentaler taking the fetus over to a table in a canister.

"I just knew what they were doing," Green said, fighting tears.

There are so many greys on this issue but with Morgentaler getting the kind of distinction a lot of people have not been able to obtain for a charitable fundraiser of millions of dollars and national icon in Don Cherry, it needs to be stated that performing abortions is just not the same as being a great singer, entertainer or community activist.

This award, if it wasn't already, has clearly become a political vehicle but, no matter which side you're on, tiny fetuses were taken from the wombs of real Canadian women like Green and Boone. Perhaps Morgentaler getting this award is okay, but then that same pin should also go to Joanne Dieleman, a woman who for decades provided an inn and counselling for women suffering depression after their abortions.

One was a pro-choice pioneer and one was a pro-life pioneer -- although all efforts so far to gain the order for the latter have failed, much like the ones have for Don Cherry.

Now Morgentaler, who did speak with media yesterday, did not return a call but has equal opportunity to talk to me. I can also put him in touch with both women. They have plenty to say to him. Neither seems to hate him, but want to point out there is more to an abortion than the 15-minute procedure.

They also want to make sure these doctors consider there are confused girls who could spend decades regreting such a decision. Making that point is just as heroic as anything Morgentaler has done. "When I was crying, I just wish Dr. Morgentaler would have stopped and said 'let's talk about this Vicky,' " said Green. "I wish there had been some counselling."

"What I didn't have was anybody to talk to about it," said Boone, who remembers him telling her "It's all over."

The procedure may have been over for Dr. Morgentaler. For her, it was just the beginning of "30 years of darkness and pain." Vicky Green understands this all too well but said she finally came to the place where "I have forgiven him and I have forgiven myself."

It's true Dr. Henry Morgentaler is now a member of the Order of Canada. It is also true not every woman he performed an abortion on to get in that select club is pleased about it.