Woman Refuses to Abort Twins With Two Heads, One Body Monday, January 12, 2009

I love the fact that humans are imperfect.

Genetic Mutation may cause disease but it also allows us to adapt to disease.

How boring would life be?

reply to post by crmanager


"If you don't want to turn this into an abortation debate then why say "She doesn't know what she is getting in to."

If it offends you then why should it offend others?"

Why should saying "She doesn't know what she is getting into" turn this into an abortion debate?

I have no idea what you mean by the 2nd line.

At the moment she does not want an abortion, though it would be okay if she changed her mind. And maybe the woman doesn't know what she's getting into yet, but likely the hospital will give her some counseling to help her deal with whatever comes down the pike. The kid could die shortly after birth, the kid could be very sickly and cooped up in an ICU for a long time, she could take the kid home and have to deal with the kid's bad health, or the kid could be healthy given the circumstances. Anything is possible.

Yes, sometimes parents are overwhelmed by caregiving for a disabled child - I've heard it many times. If you have other children or a spouse, they can feel neglected, and often there are money crunches. Let's not even get into all the hell you can go through getting services for special needs children - it can be really bad.

By the way, I have taken care of severely disabled kids with brain damage, and severely disabled without brain damage. I knew a woman, Catholic and anti-abortion, who had three disabled children in a row. We wondered what was going through her head that she would continue to have these disabled babies, as was our right to do so, but we wondered about her right to do so too. These babies costed hundreds and thousands of dollars for their medical treatment and the extremely marginal education they got. When they got older they weren't total leeches on society but still, we just couldn't see the wisdom of bringing 3 of them into the world.

As healthcare dollars become more and more scarce (Medicaid and Medicare), I wonder where the money is going to come from to pay for these babies. We have well children who have never been to the doctor for a checkup, and then we have these babies who cost $100,000 their first week of life. I'm sorry, but cost and ability to live unnassisted is going to matter very very soon in this world - read the newspapers.

I'm "pro-choice", so I will say that if this is her wish, I wish her all the best. There will be challenges for her and the children. I hope that friends and medical staff will step in and work with all their hearts to make this successful for her and the babies.

I don't know what I would do... but I think I would probably make the same choice she did (yes, even though I favor abortions for those who want them.)

For the record, our first child was born with a severe handicap. He died when he was a year old, so yes, I know what I would be getting into and I would still make the "don't abort" decision for myself.

So I hope she gets a lot of support and warmth from those around her.

It really makes you wonder, about ancient times..when they talked about mythological humans..with two heads...if maybe they weren't so mythological.

she should stick with the plan to keep the twins, I know of a set of Twins like that!