Two minus One Pregnancy

Earlier today I read a magazine article from NY Times about two minus one abortions. Now, I am not going to get into a discussion about whether or not I believe in abortion or women’s rights. What I am going to discuss is elective abortion where you choose to allow one baby to survive while you kill the others.

The article had a variety of examples of women who killed their babies. Two of the women mentioned made me see red. Both women faced infertility. Both had to have help getting pregnant.

Now, my husband and I are going through the same thing. We have lost baby after baby, pregnancy after pregnancy. We have grown attached to the babies that grew inside of us and were forced to bury one during a still birth procedure. We would do anything for a child(ren). If modern science was capable of allowing us to get pregnant and we found out we were having twins we would jump in excitement. It would NEVER cross my mind to abort one of the twins.

These women went through years of fertility treatment and pain to finally be given the news they were pregnant. Then, they find out they are carrying more then one child. One was carrying twins and already had children. The other was carrying triplets, had no children, and had for years tried to have children. They both found doctors who would eliminate some of the babies so they were each carrying one child.

Mind you, this is not elimination from septuplets to quads due to medical reasons. The mother’s lives were not endangered. The baby’s lives were not endangered. They simply did not want multiples. The cold-hearted choice they made without a lot of feeling. "And somehow, making a decision about how many to carry seemed to be just another choice." Continuing to read the article I became more and more irate at the hypocrisy. They were worried about money, yet because the procedure was not covered by insurance they paid $6,500 for the abortions.

‎"Even the twins would be robbed, because, at best, she could give each one only half of her attention and, she feared, only half of her love." I found this statement to be offensive to every parent out there with twins. Love isn’t about halves, or quarters. You can have six children and love each child with all of your heart. Love isn’t limited or quantitative. Love, is not a quantitated emotion. A person can love limitlessly. Loving others and being loved is two different things.

The concept of abortion is hard enough for me to stomach. Abortion based on incest, rape, and medical necessity has a bit more of an explanation to me. Abortion for birth control enrages me. Abortion based solely on the fact of a baby being an inconvenient is ridiculous, immoral, and unethical.

After having yet another miscarriage, being told yet again that I am a freak of nature and a freak of biology, wanting nothing more in life then to have a healthy baby I cant wrap my mind around those who are given the gift and turn it away.

If you don’t want the baby give it to someone who does. How are you going to tell your healthy child, hey you had a twin but I choose to kill him because he was an inconvenience to me?  You are only alive because the needle did not hit you.

Maybe, just maybe, weve allowed modern science to go from helping and curing to killing and destroying. How much more can society take before it implodes on itself?