On June 10th, sextuplets were born to Ryan and Brianna Morrison. Since we last discussed this, half of the Morrison Sextuplets have died. I asked for my readers' comments, and boy did I get them. Here are some of the things people have said. These are reprinted verbatim; spelling and grammar errors included.
Maureen said:
I have 5 children, all the result of fertility treatments. Two sets of twins and a singleton. However, I had been married for three years and was in my mid 30's when I turned to fertility treatments. The doctors are responsible for this debacle. First, NO 24 year olds with only a year of trying to conceive should be given potent fertility drugs.
Second, this young woman should not have been allowed to ovulate if she had this many follicles. The doctors count them. I had 12 once and given my infertility issues would probably not have even gotten pregnant but my doctor was not taking any chances. Fertility doctors need to give more counseling, need to be more judicious in their administration of fertility treatments. Oh yes, my first set of twins came early, 25 weeks weighing 1.6 and 1.7 pounds. One does very well. The other is severely mentally impaired, profoundly autistic, legally blind and has mild CP. Bottom line, doctors have the ability to keep parents from being in this situation in the first place. If the doctors had done their job right, the couple would not have been pregnant with 6 and would have never needed to consider selective reduction.
Stacy said:
Only people who have not been in this situation can speak so cavalierly about what "should" be done. I had sextuplets last year, two of them died, it is a grief I will always have to live with, but I have four healthy happy children whom I adore.
These poor kids (Ryan and Brianna) are going to need so much support for the grief and shock that has not yet set in. I ask everyone to give them a break, they will question themselves forever, and they don't need judgment from everyone else.
John Hardy guavamatic@yahoo.com said:
did you hear about the other couple having sextuplets at the same time?
The woman had a severe heart attack.
So you are so righteous you would risk the life of your wife and all of the children to be high and mighty.
what a pias honerable christian you are!
It's not YOUR butt on the line.
If you had forced your values on my sister, she would never have had two beautiful children raised in a loving family.
When she was a teenager, she had the choice of dropping out of school and raising a child that she did not want to have, or waiting until she was ready to have a family.
She would have been an abusive, resentful mother. She was very immature with a terrible temper.
Instead, she had an abortion, went to college met a wonderful man and their 2 children are college grads.
Think of all of the young girls who died from coathanger abortions.
And think of all the young girls who were saved because they had a safe option to end a pregnancy they did not want.
It's so easy to be holy when you will never face a pregnancy you are not ready for.
Colleen said:
I am outraged at the decision of the Morrisons. The reason for the rapid decline of religion in our country can be in part attributed to the irrational decisions of religious zealots. The doctors advised the Morrisons to terminate four of the pregnancies for good reason - they were concerned about their chances for survival. Instead, they selfishly cite religion as the reason for their decision to keep all six fetuses - the "fetuses" were not viable at the time that they made their decision so baby is not an appropriate term.
Here is something for these religious zealots to think about. I know that very few women have naturally conceived six babies during one pregnancy. Coincidence? No - a human being has little chance of carrying six healthy babies to term. So all this talk about "God's will" is flawed. Natural conception is God's will. Human intervention by way of infertility treatments is an artifical method. God will's is to ensure that healthy babies can live by reducing the number of babies created in an artifical atmosphere.
I do feel a great deal of sympathy for the Morrisons. I fully support infertility treatments for those who are struggling to conceive. But medicine trumphs faith when it comes to medical decisions. The Morrisons can in part be blamed for the death of their children. Likely, all six will die before the first year and if any survive, they will likely have lasting physical and mental developmental problems. So, instead of allowing two healthy babies to live - they allow none.
I write this article in a negative tone for one reason. The religious community needs to stop relying on faith for medical decisions. Six dead or critically ill babies are the result of selfish decision making as artifical conception is not God's will. Hopefully, these medical disasters will be a powerful lesson that medical decisions and intervention are made for one important reason - to save lives. The Morrisons are the saddest example of medical disregard.
Tia said:
This is a difficult subject that can be debated forever it seems. Yes it is tragic that a situation that the Morrisons had to face ever comes up, but it does, there is no hiding from that fact. Though I have never had to face a decision of selectively reducing, I do know how I would choose. I personally suffered a miscarriage my first pregnancy, and was told I would probably never be able to successfully get pregnant and carry a child (And for the person who posted at 24 you have 15+years of fertility left, while this is true in most cases, individual medical circumstances may vary, I was 22, and it is common medical knowledge that after age of 35 the increase in birth defects and other complications increase.) In my case my doctors well-informed medical opinion was wrong. I was able not only to get pregnant but to carry a beautiful boy to 34 weeks. He was 6 weeks premature, and yes I spent 14 weeks of my pregnancy on bed rest so I could carry him, but it was all worth it, and at 14 weeks when I was given the information on amniocentesis, it was an easy decision, though the chances of miscarriage are low (1 in 400) with an amino, I could not have it done, I knew that in the off chance a miscarriage would occur, I would not be able to live with myself knowing I cost my child his/her life. When a woman miscarry s no matter how irrational and unscientific, she goes through all the what ifs all the maybes, what I could have done different to save my child. Although in my case there was nothing medically that could have been done to save my first baby, and although it will never be considered a person in the eyes of the law, it was my baby, part of me and my husband I will miss until I die. When I saw my second baby's heartbeat on the monitor at 6 weeks gestation, it was sealed, I would do anything to give him 'life'. I now can happily say I have had another successful pregnancy and another son (born at 38 weeks) both of my boys are healthy, active, intelligent people, and when I look back the sacrifices we made financially and physically they are moot in comparison to the joy I have watching my children play together. Therefore I support the Morrisons wholeheartedly and my thoughts go out to them for it is a truly sad world we live in when people can look upon and judge a family obviously going through suffering that is unimaginable, and say they deserve it without even having the guts enough to stand behind their opinion with their own name. If you have a strong opinion, and a hateful one at that, you should at least have the strength to sign your name to your beliefs, while the Morrisons have to stand before a judging world with grace and courage demanded upon them even as they face continuing heart-wrenching decisions, how tragic that a coward can anonymously judge them and be given a platform where they can spew forth whatever feelings they have and hide behind anonymity, protected from the glare they themselves throw on others. That in my opinion is the true tragedy when we have lost our humanity to the point we condone such cruel weakness.
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4 comments:
I've finally come up with an opinion on this issue. I believe that medicine trumps religion. In my opinion, if a doctor suggests you selectively reduce the amount of fetuses, then you should. If you're taking fertility treatments, you're already tinkering with god's plan for you, why not go ahead and terminate some fetuses so the ones you keep have a fighting chance.
Brandon
Editor-In-Chief
Political Musings
Julia,
I deleted your previous comment, you can repost it to correct it as you wish.
Regards,
Brandon.
political.musings@insightbb.com
It appears that many of the Morrison supporters are women who have struggled with infertility. Infertility treatment is an unbiased science that does not impose God's will on anyone. Women who chose to undergo fertility treatments need to approach infertility treatments with the same perspective. So many of these women are so desperate to have children - they will do just about anything including risking the life of an unborn baby in a high risk pregnancy. They tell us over and over that if we had been put in that position, we would be so overcome with grief at the thought of terminating a fetus that we would certainly make the decision of the Morrisons. I can say with certainty that I would absolutely chose to have fewer children if it meant I would be increasing my chances of giving birth to a healthy baby. I would never want to knowingly increase the risk of having a child with severe developmental problems. If I suffered any grief at the thought of terminating a fetus, I would selflessly accept that position in the hope that a child could lead a healthy life.
These women need to stop with their biased opinions on infertility treatments - it's a science - any scientific experiment can result in negative consequences and must be approached with great care. The desperation of a woman who wants a child doesn't justify the risk of having an unhealthy or dying baby. I implore these women to stop undermining science and encourage women to chose medical expertise over selfish ignorant decisions. It's unfortunate that they can't have children but perhaps that is God's will - they are thousands of orphans out there in need of a family and a home.
I feel that perhaps I wasn't clear in my first post, so I just wanted to add these thoughts. I in no way am saying it is God's will or vise versa. However a pregnancy occurs whether it is with or without the help of science it is still a pregnancy it is still human. Although I was told I would not have children, I did not seek fertility treatment. I was fortunate to conceive naturally after being told it was impossible, and it came as quite a surprise to me, at the time my husband and I were looking into the adoption option as we too feel that there are thousands upon thousands of children that need safe loving homes. My point is just this, a child is a child, you can call it a fetus, you can call it a choice (though I do believe in certain cases abortion should be an option, lets be realistic, which is better a condom or a medical procedure - abortion should never be considered a normal form of birth control). As a mother, as a human, as a nurse, as a sister of a baby born with severe medical problems (who was not a multiple was not born early, no tests before his birth showed any abnormality), please don't act as if it is an act of selflessness and kindness to terminate a child over the risk of having a child with a birth defect. I wonder about the fact that we consider doing away with the death penalty over the idea just one innocent person may lose their life over a mistake made in the pursuit of justice, and yet we will terminate a life on the chance (even a high chance but still a chance) that the baby may not be genetically perfect. Beyond a reasonable doubt, if you sit on a jury you are to be 100% positive before you end a life, I know there are very few if any tests that can be performed during a pregnancy that say with certainty a baby will have this problem to this degree. I think it is something to be feared when society as a whole begins to believe it is acceptable to select who deserves a chance at life. In my recollection there was a 'government' in history that started first by getting rid of 'undesirables' who suffered from developmental problems it was called a holocaust. Although the issue here is the risk increase due to multiple births I notice increasingly in the news people having children later and later in life, and I see many people personally who choose to wait until they are older to have a child, and I have to ask, would the same person who selective reduces a pregnancy to decrease the risk of birth defects be the same person who waited until they were older and those risks were increased in the first place to have a child. All in all I agree that fertility treatments is a science a new and growing one that will have its share of setbacks, however as evidenced by the response to these posts, it is practically impossible to ask that as human beings we don't allow emotion to become mixed in with science.
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