On the republican VP candidate

It's kind of weird to think that on the tickets in the US there's a man the age of my husband, and a woman (almost) my age. It's even more impressive to think that she has managed to pursue a demanding career while giving birth to five children, the youngest born April 2008. The youngest also has Down Syndrome.
Apparently, Palin declared herself surprised since "her other pregnancies went so well". On the other hand, she's pro-life, so she decided to continue the pregnancy, after discussing with her husband.
Everybody is saying how nice this is, to see somebody who really believes in what she says (Palin is very strongly pro-life).
Somehow, I'm not so impressed. Palin went back to work three days after the child was born. It seems evident that, whoever has to spend hours and hours bringing this baby to the doctor, to the logopedist, to the physical therapist, etcetera, it will not be Ms Palin. So what will she do? Maybe nurse him. Spend some "quality time" with him. I mean, whatever time she can spare for her already existing children - the eldest is going to Iraq in September, but the other 3 still at home.
So let's recap. This woman chose to have a child at an age where she knew that Down Syndrome had a very high likelyhood. She knew that she was well to do enough that she wouldn't have to give up her job, and her life, and her husband, and her other children, to take care of the newborn however sick he was. So she made the same decision I made, when I decided not to test my feti for genetic anomalies. I knew that it wouldn't be the end of my life, either (although I'm sure glad that mine are so far healthy).
I fail to see how this example has any relevance to the many, many women who choose to abort a handicapped fetus. Or who choose an abortion for a million different reasons, most of which Ms Palin has no experience of.
Still, if she's the choice, maybe the Republican will stop saying that Obama is unexperienced? McCain is 72 and a cancer survivor; the chances that his VP will be promoted President are definitely significant.

Partial Birth Abortion: an outing

As many already know, the US supreme Court has upheld a federal ban of partial birth abortion.

The first time I read a description of this procedure, I was myself disgusted, and thought it should be forbidden. The article said that it was a procedure to call abortion and make legal the killing of a perfectly viable, term fetus, by extracting the body and then sucking out the brain before collapsing and extracting the skull. It does sound really bad. I couldn't imagine why any woman would want that.

I have since learned that it is a medical procedure performed when an abortion is necessary at an advanced pregnancy stage, usually because of a mother's health problem or a very sick, and sometimes already dead, fetus. The idea is that an abortion has already been ok'ed anyway, and that this particular procedure is preferred over a "natural" vaginal delivery or a cesarean because it presents less risks' for the mothers' health, particularly her ability to bear other children in the future. A typical indication are severe hydrocefalus cases, where any from of abortion that doesn't involve collapsing the skull is much more dangerous for the mothers' body.

I think that when more than one medical procedure is possible to treat a disease, mentally healthy human beings should be given an informed choice on what should be done to their body. I think money considerations should not play a role, as much as humanly possible.

I am appalled to think that in this case five men, none of whom has ever risked being pregnant with a very sick or dead fetus, much less had a direct experience of it, have decided that women who face such difficult situations will have one less choice. How many precisely will be impacted is too early to say.

I will never be in such a situation: my childbearing days are over, and I'm not in the US anyway. But my daughter? Who will take care of my daughter, and of my granddaughters, and of the generations to come? I'm scared, scared of going back to the Middle Ages. What if the Winter of Reason comes back, and engulfs the world?

Deep sadness

Sometimes things are just too sad.
The trial has started for a gynecologist that killed a woman by unprofessionality and neglect. He forced her baby out her womb and wounded her, and he didn't listen to her complaints that she was feeling really sick and losing a lot of blood. When the next doctor arrived, they had an emergency operation, but it was too late.
My midwife told me a few things about it. The doctor was the woman's private doctor. She extra paid for him to be there at delivery: this also means he was very tired, since his turn had just finished. He is well known to always want the birth to go faster than natural, and uses vacuum extraction much more than the other doctors. Plus, the next day there was a big sailing race, and the doctor was participating, so he was in a special hurry to go home and get some rest.
I was also in the hospital those days, in the maternity ward. Nobody told us anything, and it wasn't on the newspaper (my midwife told me after I went home). But I did see the beautiful baby, who never had his mother but a number of very sad looking people around: the father, the grandparents, uncles and aunts.
Most of all, I remember the elder brother, aged maybe 8, trying to hold the baby and feed it formula with a bottle. In my language formula is called artificial milk. At some point the elder brother asked: "Why do we give him artificial milk? Shouldn't he be getting natural milk instead?". Nobody answered that question. There was just a big silence. And then the child understood. He just said "Oh.". Very softly.
I was there, busy with my newborns, excited and happy. But that pause, and the little soft "Oh." really broke my heart, even if I didn't know precisely what had happened. I can't remember it even now without crying.