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So, about those octuplets …

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It turns out the mother who gave birth to octuplets last week already has six other children aged 7 or younger, including twins.  One of her children is autistic. All of the children were conceived by IVF, allegedly using the sperm of a neighbour who asked her to stop having herself impregnated with the embryos that were half his. He plays no role in the children’s lives and isn’t listed on their birth certificates as their father. She has no reliable income, and lives with her parents, who declared bankruptcy last year. In her mother’s own words, she

has been obsessed since her teens with being a mother and had eight embryos implanted because she wanted “just one more girl” to add to her existing brood of six children aged two to seven.

I wouldn’t know where to start, if we were to make a list of all the things wrong with this situation. In some European countries, IVF is only available to legally married couples. Is it the government’s job to regulate that? I don’t know, but if we accept that the government has a role in monitoring adoption, to ensure that children aren’t adopted into unsuitable homes, it doesn’t strike me as unreasonable that the government have some role in monitoring highly interventionist ART like this.

But why is there a doctor in the entire country who would do this? We have talked a lot at PWPL about doctors having the right to exercise their conscience and refuse to perform abortions or refer to other doctors for abortions. Doesn’t it go without saying that doctors aren’t obliged to implant 8 embryos just because a woman requests it? While it sounds as if all eight of these babies are in relatively good condition, they range in size from roughly one and a half to three and a half pounds, and it is never desirable that babies be born so prematurely and small. And that’s the best case scenario when implanting such a high number – far more commonly, a number of them would miscarry (if that’s the right word). The risks to the mother of an octuplet pregnancy, never mind her seventh pregnancy in seven years, also aren’t negligible.

Did it never cross the minds of the people who impregnated this woman (and the situation seems murky – IVF isn’t cheap) to wonder about her mental soundness? I’ve known people – married, stable, financially secure couples hoping for their first child – whose specialists asked them to see a psychologist as part of the plan for fertility treatment, to ensure that they could cope with the additional stress that the various treatments, and the high chance of failure, can bring. Is ART such a lawless field in California that any woman, under any circumstances, can be impregnated with as many embryos as she wants, regardless of the risks to her health and the babies’, as long as the cheque clears?

This case represents a collision of a lot of problems. Should people with financial difficulties not have kids? Well, it’s irresponsible not to be able to provide the basics for them, but in a civilized country they won’t starve to death. Should single women deliberately bear children? The evidence is clear that this doesn’t set the kids up for the easiest life, but in a free country it isn’t anyone else’s place to prevent them from doing so. Should legal restrictions exist on how many embryos can be implanted at one time? Surely this is a medical decision, and yet none of the doctors involved seemed to be using good judgment. Should the criteria for IVF be as stringent, and by implication as regulated by government, as adoption? The small-government conservative in me screams “no,” especially if the government isn’t paying the tab, but you couldn’t really ask for a better example if you wanted to make the case that oversight is necessary.

I’d love to hear from those with a better understanding of the medical side of this, and also from our in-house medical ethicist!

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Brigitte adds: Oh my goodness. What a mess. And it’s not about to get better…

Seriously, like Rebecca, my libertarian side doesn’t want too much government regulation in private affairs. But my more pragmatic and rational side, seeing this sort of terrible story, wonders why it has been allowed to happen. I mean, I’m glad they didn’t abort some or all of the babies and that they all seem to be doing reasonably well. I really do wish those small children the best – I hope they manage to have as close to a normal and happy life as can be managed. But you see what happens when people are allowed to use science to defy nature. Even the ‘father’ of these babies had no say in the matter – how crazy is that?

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Véronique says: 2 words: reproductive freedom. Once you start down that road, who is to say when to put the breaks? As a society, if we want women the freedom not to reproduce even after a child has been conceived, we must face the other extreme: women who want to reproduce in spite of every shred of common sense (to put it mildly).

I have a very difficult time with infertility treatments, mostly because of the hardships they put on the babies. Parents are able to consent to the aggressive treatments they go through. 1-pound premature babies don’t. I believe that every life is worth living, even lives of suffering. I also believe that every life has a purpose, even disabled life. That being said, medically-created lives of suffering make me cringe. It’s one thing to embrace disability when it comes knocking on your door. It’s another thing to plunge head-first in a medical endeavor likely to create suffering, especially when the suffering is not your own.

Infertility treatments also make me reflect on the contrast between unwanted pregnancies  and the desperate want of children in the same environment. Have children become such commodities that we can create them or dispatch them at will? I guess they have.

Our society has a severe case of split personality, let me tell you.

At any rate we made a choice, as a society, to let science run wild. We could have put the breaks on several scientific developments that are now being questioned. We assumed that we would know when to put the breaks. As it turns out, some people do but many still don’t. I think that to reverse steam, we will need to experiment all the horror that some scientific pursuits have to offer. In this regard, I’m glad that the octuplets story is causing shock and outrage. It’s too bad that 8 frail lives now have to pay for that lesson.

Véronique adds to her comment: As an aside, am I the only one who is genuinely freaked out by the amount of personal information the media has access to regarding the mother and her kin? Information that they do not hesitate to share liberally, like it’s our right to know?

It makes me wonder if such wide-ranging information about me is available out there. Not that my life is that interesting: all my babies were conceived the ol’ fashioned way with the same guy, imagine! When I got unexpectedly pregnant with the baby I’m about to deliver, people would ask me “How did this happen??” and I would answer “Do you want the G-rated version or the X-rated one?” Lesson: don’t ask stupid questions you don’t really want answers to.

Anyhow, when I was young and innocent I used to think that surveillance and the availability of personal information in the public square were only bothersome to those who had something to hide. You want to pour over my phone records? Go ahead and bore yourself to death. But now I realize that the problem lies with letting anybody and everybody (including the media, the government, the insurance companies, the banks, the neighbours…) decide what exactly is “something to hide.”

Thanks, CTV

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I realize it’s a bit heart-sinking to realize that there is out there an “online dating service for cheaters” (i.e., adulterers).  But at least they won’t be advertising during the Super Bowl.  I guess that’s something to feel good about.  (Work with me here, people.)

So, on behalf of parents, married people, and all Canadians with even a modicum of public decency, I would like to thank CTV for this decision.

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Rebecca adds: The phrase “defining deviancy down” springs to mind.

One day, I want to write a book on the need for stigma and shame. No government should be in the business of policing people’s extramarital activity, but no healthy society can afford to condone adultery. In an era in which non-judgmentalism is one of the major virtues, necessary concepts like ostracism and social disgrace have lost all meaning, and a desire not to hurt people’s feelings by passing judgment on their behaviour has created a culture in which hearts are broken and lives ruined.

Just one night….

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An interesting – if mortifying – article in today’s Citizen. One that hits particularly close to home: our family enforces a strict no-sleepover policy from birth until making your own mortgage/rent payments. Our children are mostly okay with it… except when they’re not. In a nutshell:

“Children kick up a big fuss. Parents need to get more backbone.”

Sleepover invitations start with school. Yes, that’s 4 years old in Ontario. When my older children were young, the no-sleepover policy was mostly based on self-preservation: I didn’t want to feel like I had to return the favor. Plus, who needs a cranky, sleep-deprived 6-year-old? Really. But as my children grew older, my concern moved over to the parenting skills and judgment of my children’s friends’ parents. What do they consider an age-appropriate game? An age-appropriate TV show? An age-appropriate movie? An appropriate age to be left alone in the house while the parents go out? An appropriate way to spend adult time? Do I want to find out the next day, when my child comes home, and tells me that Jimmy’s Dad turns into a screaming drunk after 9 pm? What is the first comment everybody makes when a family turns up dead at the hand of another family member? “They looked so normal!” I don’t trust anybody’s definition of normal but my own, especially where my children’s well-being is concerned.

As my older children crawl into adolescence, the issue of sexual health, morality and behavior comes to the fore. At the age where children are slowly growing discernment skills, hormones come a-kicking and your child’s safety no longer depends on your parenting skills or how well he or she has internalized family values but also on how well their peers have been brought up. In today’s culture of entitlement, there is nothing I trust less. Reading the article mentioned above, I realized that the three parenting dilemmas presented in the introduction were not so many dilemmas but a progression of the first dilemma into adolescence and adulthood. As a parent, where do you draw the line? Notice how the parents featured in the article relate their “decision” to allow sleepovers not so much as a decision but as a progression from one thing to the other. Do I want to leave my child’s sexual health in the expert hands of parents who are cornered into compromise by their teens? Even for one night?

That’s how it works at my house. What about yours?

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Patricia adds: I don’t  have a general policy against sleep-overs. I just find that very rarely are they a practical fit with my kids’ schedules, my firm belief that no one can deal with life unless they’ve had a good night’s sleep and my general reluctance to have to reciprocate.

It goes without saying that any family my kids is staying with will be one which I know very well. And I feel pretty confident that any of these mothers and fathers would laugh hysterically at the very idea of a co-ed sleepover for 12- or 13-year-olds.

Honestly, this is not exactly rocket science. “The dear little androgynous puppies” all snuggled up in the rec room. Does that really sound like a good idea to anyone?

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Rebecca says: This hasn’t been an issue yet in our family – nobody is old enough yet to want to sleep away from the parental home. Since the question hasn’t arisen, I haven’t wrestled with it. What I do worry about sometimes are plain old simple playdates. While one devoutly hopes that daytime playdates between elementary school children won’t involve anything remotely like sex, there are lots of other matters in which other kids’ parents might make different judgments than we do. This applies to trivial things, like sugary snacks and whether or not to call adults by their first name, but it also applies to more important issues, like how much TV or video gaming is permitted, what specific shows or games are allowed, and the influence of others in the house, like older siblings, who may behave and speak in ways that you wouldn’t normally want your child to be exposed to.

One doesn’t want to raise hermits, but on the other hand, it is depressing to put a great deal of effort into insulating your child from a particularly noxious trend, only to find out that in ten minutes’ conversation with a classmate, they have learned all about the latest inappropriate TV show/song/gossip or whatever.

Lighter blogging for the next little while

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I’ll be away on holiday sans computer for the next little bit. So I won’t be blogging–and I thought I’d let you know. (I also won’t be able to crack the whip on the other women. You thought they were on this site of their own free will? No, no, NO–we’re the anti-choice side, remember? This is all part of an indentured servitude plan I created. Here’s to no mutinies while I’m gone.)

And no, you don’t want to know where I’m going, in particular if you are experiencing the minus temperatures and tons of snow that we’ve gotten in Ottawa lately. Mahalo for your understanding.

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Brigitte is not at all jealous: No, I really, really like shovelling… Have fun!

Not that there are any repercussions to abortion

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This article talks about an increase in pre-term births in Canada and made me think of other studies I’ve read linking abortion to subsequent pre-term delivery. It’s a link I’m sure you won’t hear about in the mainstream media, so I thought I should mention it on this site. A couple of articles on the link between abortion and pre-term delivery for your reading pleasure, here and here.

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Patricia adds: This is not directly on the same subject as Andrea’s post, but bear with me.

An Australian hospital’s pregnancy advisory service has released an analysis of reasons why women using its service are considering abortion.

Victoria’s Royal Women’s Hospital’s Pregnancy Advisory Service is the state’s largest public “pregnancy support service”. Women with an unplanned or unwanted pregnancy can contact the service about their options, including abortion and continuing the pregnancy. That said, it sounds like the greatest “service” the PAS provides is abortion referral: The Medical Journal of Australia reported recently that of the 5,462 women who contacted the service between October 2006 and October 2007, 90 per cent were seeking an abortion.

Of the 3,018 women surveyed on reasons for seeking abortion, 34 per cent listed their primary reason as “do not want children now” or “not the right time”. Another 547, or 18 per cent, said they already had enough children, 263, or 9 per cent, said they were caring for a young baby, and 339, or 11 per cent, said they were too young.

Financial, relationship or medical reasons together (together! I would have thought these were the major reasons) accounted for 19 per cent of cases. Rape accounted for 1 per cent.

Is it just me or, with the exception of the rape category (just 1 percent), do these reasons seem somewhat underwhelming? I realize that it’s hard to make statistics compelling but the rhetoric of the pro-choice movement always seemed pitched at the level of “women’s lives destroyed” if access to abortion is compromised in the slightest manner. But does it really seem to you that a woman’s life is “destroyed” if she has three children instead of two (as she had planned)? Or if she has a child a few years ahead of schedule?

I know that such an event can cause hardship and even suffering. But I’m just not sure that any of these reasons indicate that “women’s lives are at risk”.

And do any of these reasons seem compelling enough to risk the kind of repercussions associated with abortion – those mentioned in Andrea’s post and others?

Once in a blue moon…

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…something positive happens on campus–like learning and thinking. McGill University recently hosted Mary Meehan to represent the pro-life feminist view to students. Read the report here, sounds like it was a good event.

Mary Meehan, a self-proclaimed feminist, liberal author, and public speaker from Maryland, defended the pro-life movement last night as she stood before a packed Leacock 232 at Choose Life’s third official event.

Choose Life, a new interim club at McGill, invited Meehan to explain her seemingly contradictory political beliefs. “I think a moment’s reflection reveals that liberals indeed are anti-choice on many issues …the death penalty, most wars, torture, rape, racial discrimination, and many more. They should add abortion to the list,” Meehan said.

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Véronique adds: I graduated in November from McGill with a Master’s degree in law and a specialization in bioethics. I found the law faculty aggressively liberal: we were never exposed to a conservative argument except maybe to mock it. That being said, I never felt threatened or excluded at the biomedical ethics unit. It was very clear that nobody — teacher or student — had a sanctity of life approach to anything. (No good offer will be turned down!) But I could always make a good sanctity of life argument without feeling like I would be tarred and feathered out of the place. I have excellent memories of studying bioethics at McGill, pro-life feminist and all.

Because 100,000 a year just isn’t enough…

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Vicky Saporta, of the National Abortion Federation, on why “we must remain vigilant in preserving reproductive freedom”. You have the feeling sometimes that these people will not rest until every darn pregnancy is labelled unwanted and terminated. What do they want, half a million aborted babies a year? 2 million? Would that be enough?

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Andrea adds: I’d just like to have a Count the Euphemisms contest. Quite an article.

21st anniversary of the Morgentaler decision

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PWPL got started just over a year ago to remember today’s anniversary and to say clearly that Morgentaler is no champion of women’s rights. Here’s a short YouTube clip to get you better acquianted with the man himself.

[youtube:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tCuQhKIgasg&eurl=]

Look, it’s not, in my opinion, particulary great poetry. So I’m not going to spend tons of time delving into inner meanings. But given what Morgentaler has spent his life doing–I think it’s worth noting that he himself seems pretty conflicted over the whole business of who women are, and his relationship to them. Still want to read the book Morgentaler, A Difficult Hero–we disagree on the “hero” part; it’s the “difficult” part I’m interested in.

h/t Flaggman’s Canada

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Brigitte is shocked, shocked: The clip ends with the host starting to explain that the book is self-published. With a straight face… The guy deserves an award.

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