Posted on 07/18/2004 11:39:14 AM PDT by dennisw
July 18, 2004 LIVES When One Is Enough By AMY RICHARDS as told to AMY BARRETT
I grew up in a working-class family in Pennsylvania not knowing my father. I have never missed not having him. I firmly believe that, but for much of my life I felt that what I probably would have gained was economic security and with that societal security. Growing up with a single mother, I was always buying into the myth that I was going to be seduced in the back of a pickup truck and become pregnant when I was 16. I had friends when I was in school who were helping to rear nieces and nephews, because their siblings, who were not much older, were having babies. I had friends from all over the class spectrum: I saw the nieces and nephews on the one hand and country-club memberships and station wagons on the other. I felt I was in the middle. I had this fear: What would it take for me to just slip?
Now I'm 34. My boyfriend, Peter, and I have been together three years. I'm old enough to presume that I wasn't going to have an easy time becoming pregnant. I was tired of being on the pill, because it made me moody. Before I went off it, Peter and I talked about what would happen if I became pregnant, and we both agreed that we would have the child.
I found out I was having triplets when I went to my obstetrician. The doctor had just finished telling me I was going to have a low-risk pregnancy. She turned on the sonogram machine. There was a long pause, then she said, ''Are you sure you didn't take fertility drugs?'' I said, ''I'm positive.'' Peter and I were very shocked when she said there were three. ''You know, this changes everything,'' she said. ''You'll have to see a specialist.''
My immediate response was, I cannot have triplets. I was not married; I lived in a five-story walk-up in the East Village; I worked freelance; and I would have to go on bed rest in March. I lecture at colleges, and my biggest months are March and April. I would have to give up my main income for the rest of the year. There was a part of me that was sure I could work around that. But it was a matter of, Do I want to?
I looked at Peter and asked the doctor: ''Is it possible to get rid of one of them? Or two of them?'' The obstetrician wasn't an expert in selective reduction, but she knew that with a shot of potassium chloride you could eliminate one or more.
Having felt physically fine up to this point, I got on the subway afterward, and all of a sudden, I felt ill. I didn't want to eat anything. What I was going through seemed like a very unnatural experience. On the subway, Peter asked, ''Shouldn't we consider having triplets?'' And I had this adverse reaction: ''This is why they say it's the woman's choice, because you think I could just carry triplets. That's easy for you to say, but I'd have to give up my life.'' Not only would I have to be on bed rest at 20 weeks, I wouldn't be able to fly after 15. I was already at eight weeks. When I found out about the triplets, I felt like: It's not the back of a pickup at 16, but now I'm going to have to move to Staten Island. I'll never leave my house because I'll have to care for these children. I'll have to start shopping only at Costco and buying big jars of mayonnaise. Even in my moments of thinking about having three, I don't think that deep down I was ever considering it.
The specialist called me back at 10 p.m. I had just finished watching a Boston Pops concert at Symphony Hall. As everybody burst into applause, I watched my cellphone vibrating, grabbed it and ran into the lobby. He told me that he does a detailed sonogram before doing a selective reduction to see if one fetus appears to be struggling. The procedure involves a shot of potassium chloride to the heart of the fetus. There are a lot more complications when a woman carries multiples. And so, from the doctor's perspective, it's a matter of trying to save the woman this trauma. After I talked to the specialist, I told Peter, ''That's what I'm going to do.'' He replied, ''What we're going to do.'' He respected what I was going through, but at a certain point, he felt that this was a decision we were making. I agreed.
When we saw the specialist, we found out that I was carrying identical twins and a stand alone. My doctors thought the stand alone was three days older. There was something psychologically comforting about that, since I wanted to have just one. Before the procedure, I was focused on relaxing. But Peter was staring at the sonogram screen thinking: Oh, my gosh, there are three heartbeats. I can't believe we're about to make two disappear. The doctor came in, and then Peter was asked to leave. I said, ''Can Peter stay?'' The doctor said no. I know Peter was offended by that.
Two days after the procedure, smells no longer set me off and I no longer wanted to eat nothing but sour-apple gum. I went on to have a pretty seamless pregnancy. But I had a recurring feeling that this was going to come back and haunt me. Was I going to have a stillbirth or miscarry late in my pregnancy?
I had a boy, and everything is fine. But thinking about becoming pregnant again is terrifying. Am I going to have quintuplets? I would do the same thing if I had triplets again, but if I had twins, I would probably have twins. Then again, I don't know.
I can't think of a more devastating indictment.
In your imagination, maybe. Witnesses to abortion have no legal right to physically stop them, that I know of. There is nothing this man could have done but use his power of persuasion. Beyond that, he was powerless.
darn, no email address.
She saw nothing to fault. Its just like choosing between Coke and Pepsi for her.
The viability argument is flawed because it is based on a false premise.
A fetus is viable in the environment it was designed to be viable in at that particular stage of life, namely the womb, only by removing the fetus from its natural environment, does it cease to be viable. But that is true of every human being, and indeed all life. Put a born human being under water, and he is no longer viable, take a fish out of water, and it is not viable.
Viability is an matter of medical technology , not ethics. As our medical technology advances, the time of viability for a fetus taken out of the womb changes. The issue of when human life begins can not determined by the level of avilable technology, that would imply that a fetus that is considered a human life in modern day USA suddenly ceases to be one if the mother is suddenly dumped in the amazon jungle. What is truly not viable is a system of logic that can lead to such an absurd conclusion.
Who gives a shi- about bogus legalities when your child is about to be murdered in front of your very eyes?
A bad law is no law.
And I'd rather be judged by a bunch of liberals than have to answer to God for my inaction.
How far would you go? Would you kill the doctor?
40 million dead babies later and counting.
I can see violence being used to stop this violence one day.
Infanticide is but one facet of the crucible.
My views are no "Talibanista Histrionics".....it's just realism. If we ever do take up arms here to defend against encroachment on spark issues like gun confiscation, I can see the fight against infanticide becoming literal quickly.
It would probably end the couple's relationship. It might get the dad fined or jailed, but it might get the mother to think about what she's doing and save the babies. It might not. She could always go somewhere else to murder the babies. But it seems like the dad's best shot.
Amy Richards' story, "When One is Enough" (7/18/2004), about the "selective reduction" of her pregnancy with triplets, made my skin crawl. This couple didn't want to have to "start shopping only at Costco and buying big jars of mayonnaise," so they simply killed two of their three babies, to make their lives easier.
They knew exactly what they were doing. "Oh, my gosh, there are three heartbeats," she wrote. "I can't believe we're about to make two disappear." Then "a shot of potassium chloride to the hearts of" two of the three babies, administered by "the specialist" (Dr. Mengele?), and, presto change-o, the problem of triplets is solved.
This is narcissism carried to a murderous extreme: killing your own babies because they would be too much trouble to raise. To this mom, "it's all about me." More than 10% of the words in her article are "I," "me," and "my." Nothing in the world is more important to her than her own comfort and convenience, not even the lives of her own children.
Scripture says that the prince of this earth is Satan, but some Christians don't want to believe it. After reading this story, how can they not? If our society condones this, why are we shocked at middle class "prom moms" who drown their inconvenient newborns in toilets or toss them in dumpsters? Why are we shocked at anything at all?
-Dave
My email to the author:
Your life is dedicated to the advancement of women.
With that in mind, what gender were your aborted twins? What if they were girls? What about their advancement?
"Was her Manhattan apartment really so much more important than her children?"
Was her apartment worth her immortal soul? God calls sodomy an abomination. This is far worse than that. Not from rape. Not from incest. Not to save the life of the mother. Just to save an apartment and avoid buying large jars of mayonaise.
[I was reviewing a Rush tape and thought I'd look this up on the web. He was also sickened by this. It was something to hear. So I checked out Google and get pinged back to the FR. Lots of people talked about this on the web, but the FR's link was at the top.]
God bless you and everyone here for caring!
2005 Bump. This article must never be forgotten. Amy Richards is the poster-child for the American left.
My wife and I found out on 12-21-04 we are having twins. We could not be happier. I could never even think about doing this.
Yeah, but I believe the one lady actally had and kept her baby, even though she was unmarried. Big difference between her and this nasty piece of work, imo.
In the 19th century, doctors discovered that the baby moves and is alive even before it can be felt by the mother.
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I saw proof of that myself at my 11 WEEK ultrasound. S/he was doing a Jane Fonda workout in there.
Not alive...give me a break.
Congratulations!!
Thank you.
The key is to impeach judges. Simply waiting for the leftist creeps to retire is not enough.
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