Passive vessels, step right up!
NS January 28th, 2009
I’m sure you’ve heard by now about the woman in California who gave birth to eight children (octuplets) on Monday. The story would’ve been big in and of itself (there has only been one other live birth of octuplets in the US) but the ’shocker’ was that they were only expecting seven. Baby number 8 was a surprise, apparently hidden away during scans and exams.
A few things bother me about this story. First and foremost, that the doctors have been the focus of the story, not the mother or the babies. The opening paragraph of this story in the LA Times is all about the team of physicians, surgeons and nurses and what a good job they did in planning the birth “for weeks.” No mention of the woman’s plans or fears for the birth, or mention of her health other than “Mom is doing well.”
The other thing that struck me is how the army of doctors were commended for delivering the babies so quickly — all eight were pulled from their mother’s womb within five minutes. I don’t find that commendable, I find it a bit scary and sad. This was obviously not a gentle arrival into the world for these babies. They were yanked out of there like gangbusters and “processed lovingly through an assembly line of medical workers.” I don’t care how gently they held the just-yanked-out babies, the person who should’ve been holding them lovingly was their mother and father. I realise that this was an impossibility in their situation, with so many babies to be delivered, but I’m sure it pained the mother immensely to not be able to hold or even see her babies as they emerged, instead passed down a conveyor belt of gloved and masked hands to an incubator and bright lights. To say that the workers held the babies ‘lovingly’ is a slight to the parents, who would’ve loved to be the ones holding their children first. But don’t forget, folks — doctors are GOD and if you don’t worship in their temple you will be excommunicated. Grrrr…
The silver lining in this story (and it’s a BIG silver lining) is that the mother is quoted as saying that she plans to breastfeed them all. Rock on, mama! Of course, others have already rolled their eyes and made comments about her naivety in thinking she could breastfeed eight babies when so many fail to feed even one, but those naysayers are likely thinking that she means exclusively breastfeed all of them for months on end. I’m sure that even if she can’t do that, the mother is perfectly able to ensure that each child gets at least some breastmilk, either by feeding them all for as long as she can cope or giving them each breastmilk and supplement with donated milk or formula. It’s certainly not outside the realm of possibility and I hate that people are being so negative and mean-spirited about it. The poor woman just had eight babies cut out of her and will have a long recovery and spend weeks, if not months, in the NICU visiting them and caring for them until they are well enough to go home. Why poo-poo her wish to give them the best start by ensuring they each receive at least some of her milk? I swear, some people just WANT others to fail. Meanies.
