Gillian Relf (69) wishes she aborted her downs syndrome son (47)

DoYouEvenLift

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-2803834/I-wish-d-aborted-son-ve-spent-47-years-caring-s-shocking-admission-read-judge.html


Following a similar article recently, here's an honestly hard to read article.

Never really thought about situations like this. I always knew parents of downs syndrome children had a tough time but reading this put me in their shoes and considered how draining it would be to be the parents, caring for them until the day you die and the worst thing is, the older you get and closer to dying you'd become even more distraught because of the worry about what will happen to them after you do die. And then thinking about it from the sons perspective, although he may not know any better, is it even worth being alive if it puts such a burden on your family? Not that it'd be an easy decision to make for anyone, but in cases like this I wouldn't judge parents who chose to have abortions.

12 element

The Daily Fail

Dancor

12 element wrote: »

The Daily Fail

And yet it is the most commonly referred and linked online news site on this forum.

eviltwin

My heart goes out to her. I have two children with special needs, both very mild and relatively easy to manage, but there are days I just want to run away. I am lucky though, mine will be able to live independently. I do have an older cousin with a severe mental issue who needs constant care and his parents have sacrificed a normal life for him. It's a big ask. I hope this woman is treated with the sensitivity she deserves.

Philo Beddoe

Dancor wrote: »

And yet it is the most commonly referred and linked online news site on this forum.

Because the Mail online site churns out clickbait stories by the thousand, not because of any particular quality to their journalism.

mackg

I would not judge anyone who made a decision to abort a baby for whatever reason.

What's going to happen to the guy in that story when his parents die or are unable to care for him?

What's the point in living purely to suffer and struggle?

Shakespeare's Sister

mackg wrote: »

I would not judge anyone who made a decision to abort a baby for whatever reason.

What's going to happen to the guy in that story when his parents die or are unable to care for him?

What's the point in living purely to suffer and struggle?

I agree. But I'd say the Mail's aim is to rabble-rouse and polarise rather than to sensitively examine the reality of life with a very disabled child.

Shiraz 4.99

Why should she feel guilty about normal human nature ?.

Down Syndrome has been completely eradicated in Scandanavia.
Last figures I heard from the UK stated over 90% of parents choose to abort.

The only thing she needs to feel guilty about is not having the test done.

mackg

Shakespeare's Sister wrote: »

I agree. But I'd say the Mail's aim is to rabble-rouse and polarise rather than to sensitively examine the reality of life with a very disabled child.

I don't think it's worked in this case from a quick glance at the comments. Whatever about the Mail's angle fair play to that woman for being honest and telling her story.

RobertKK

It seems her mental health was the bigger issue, it comes across as if she made herself feel like a victim which made the situation far worse.

Oregano_State

RobertKK wrote: »

It seems her mental health was the bigger issue, it comes across as if she made herself feel like a victim which made the situation far worse.

"She made herself feel like a victim".

Come off it, she's clearly expressed her point of view. How would you respond to her saying that if she'd had the abortion, she would have been able to have another child that would be a help to her other son after she and her husband pass on, instead of a responsibility?

RobertKK

Oregano_State wrote: »

"She made herself feel like a victim".

Come off it, she's clearly expressed her point of view. How would you respond to her saying that if she'd had the abortion, she would have been able to have another child that would be a help to her other son after she and her husband pass on, instead of a responsibility?

It didn't stop her having another child, that is just an excuse. I grew up with a person who had DS, we as the person's family looked after her when her mother died, her father had died many decades earlier.
Woe to my family and the responsibility, oh how terrible this is, where is this attitude getting that man's mother?

bodice ripper

RobertKK wrote: »

It didn't stop her having another child, that is just an excuse.

who the **** are you to say how she felt about it?

cletus van damme

I've sympathy for her struggle but I find her attitude troubling.

She cannot claim to love him but wish she had an abortion - every single day she has this thought. She seems hung up on what she has lost rather than seeing any positive of it.
I also fail to see how she can have these thoughts "every day" and none of that affects her son. Anybody would pick up on those vibes.

It does seem like a "woe me" piece.

branie2

No mother would ever wish that.

Laois6556

When you know your life is coming to an end you look back on the positives and negatives as you know that's it now, you've had your go. The truth is that this womans life was made very difficult when her son was born. For 47 years she struggled looking after her son, her own needs were neglected in this.

Shakespeare's Sister

branie2 wrote: »

No mother would ever wish that.

Wish what?

Shakespeare's Sister

The hardline pro-life crowd just pretend not to see all the factors that destroy their arguments.

cletus van damme wrote: »

She cannot claim to love him but wish she had an abortion

In my opinion she can.

She loves him now that he's here, but that doesn't mean she can't simultaneously wish she could have changed things.

I know it doesn't make sense, but humans often don't.

kylith

cletus van damme wrote: »

I've sympathy for her struggle but I find her attitude troubling.

She cannot claim to love him but wish she had an abortion - every single day she has this thought. She seems hung up on what she has lost rather than seeing any positive of it.
I also fall to see how she can have these thoughts "every day" and none of that affects her son.

It does seem like a "woe me" piece.

Yes, she can. Have a look at the documentary The Boy Whose Skin Fell Off, about a man with EB, a condition that causes painful blistering at the slightest touch. His mother cared for him all his life and obviously loved him but openly said that had there been a test when she was pregnant she would have terminated, and he agreed with her.

Bringing a child into the world to know nothing but confusion and pain does not mean that you love it any more than the woman who made the decision to terminate a child with the same condition - she just decided that not having to live with that pain would be better for her and her child. It doesn't mean that the woman who terminates a child with a disability didn't love it and didn't grieve for it.

RobertKK

bodice ripper wrote: »

who the **** are you to say how she felt about it?

She was not made infertile by DS.

She chose to not have another child.

branie2

Shakespeare's Sister wrote: »

Wish what?

That she had aborted her son.

kylith

RobertKK wrote: »

She was not made infertile by DS.

She chose to not have another child.

She decided that she would not be able to cope with a small child, a severely disabled toddler, and a baby. Do you think it would have been fair to a child to bring it into a family where its needs may not have been able to be met because of the demands placed on its parents by a child with DS?

kylith

branie2 wrote: »

That she had aborted her son.

A mother can, and some do.

One eyed Jack

cletus van damme wrote: »

I've sympathy for her struggle but I find her attitude troubling.

She cannot claim to love him but wish she had an abortion - every single day she has this thought. She seems hung up on what she has lost rather than seeing any positive of it.
I also fail to see how she can have these thoughts "every day" and none of that affects her son. Anybody would pick up on those vibes.

It does seem like a "woe me" piece.

She can of course. Human beings aren't cut and dried and they can often have conflicting feelings and emotions.

I'm sensing the Daily Mail though has decided to focus on these stories and is actively seeking these people out, and I don't think their motives are anything to do with empathising with this woman's and her son's welfare.

RobertKK

kylith wrote: »

She decided that she would not be able to cope with a small child, a severely disabled toddler, and a baby. Do you think it would have been fair to a child to bring it into a family where its needs may not have been able to be met because of the demands placed on its parents by a child with DS?

Maybe it would have helped her mentally.

Shakespeare's Sister

branie2 wrote: »

That she had aborted her son.

But she's a mother.
I'd say there are plenty of mothers who think this.
Maternal ambivalence, or even maternal resentment... horrible, grim idea - it feels like women should only love and cherish the life they carried for nine months - but unfortunately it's not always the case.
Look at all the neglect and abuse and infanticide that goes on.
Then there are mothers who would never dream of neglecting or abusing their child or causing them to suffer in any way, but they still harbour feelings of ambivalence/resentment towards the child. It seems awful, but if they can't help it, can they be blamed?

kylith

RobertKK wrote: »

Maybe it would have helped her mentally.

Because what she needed was more stress and guilt in her life?

Summer wind

I really feel for this family. It must be terrible to want and wish so much for your son and live every day with the knowledge that most of it can't happen. That poor man must have been through so much in his life.

DoYouEvenLift

Is every pregnant woman tested for these things nowadays also?

RobertKK

kylith wrote: »

Because what she needed was more stress and guilt in her life?

Why does she have guilt?

Is her son trying to kill himself wishing he wasn't born?

cletus van damme

kylith wrote: »

Yes, she can. Have a look at the documentary The Boy Whose Skin Fell Off, about a man with EB, a condition that causes painful blistering at the slightest touch. His mother cared for him all his life and obviously loved him but openly said that had there been a test when she was pregnant she would have terminated, and he agreed with her.

Bringing a child into the world to know nothing but confusion and pain does not mean that you love it any more than the woman who made the decision to terminate a child with the same condition - she just decided that not having to live with that pain would be better for her and her child. It doesn't mean that the woman who terminates a child with a disability didn't love it and didn't grieve for it.

That docu (which I haven't seen ) may make that point but that's EB and this is Downs. they are not comparible.
Did she say it was because of the pain he was in or because life was tough? there is a big difference.

kylith wrote: »

Bringing a child into the world to know nothing but confusion and pain .

Get the fcuk. To say that about Downs is so wide of the mark that i don't know how to answer that.

To the others that quoted me and disagreed - so be it we disagree.


Shakepeares Sister - I may be Pro life (thanks for quoting me) but this isn't actually an abortion discussion per se. It about her attitude 47 years year to a living breathing child.

kylith

RobertKK wrote: »

Why does she have guilt?

Is her son trying to kill himself wishing he wasn't born?

Stephen may not have the mental capacity to do so.

She may feel guilty about wishing that she had terminated the pregnancy, guilty that her other son will be responsible for Stephen after she dies, guilty that her older son may have lost out when he was a child because so much of her time was taken up caring for Stephen, guilty that it's somehow her fault that he has DS.

No-one has any right to judge her for the way she feels. The whole family deserves our sympathy and support.

RobertKK

cletus van damme wrote: »

That docu (which I haven't seen ) may make that point but that's EB and this is Downs. they are not comparible.
Did she say it was because of the pain he was in or because life was tough? there is a big difference.



Get the fcuk. To say that about Downs is so wide of the mark that i don't know how to answer that.

To the others that quoted me and disagreed - so be it we disagree.


Shakepeares Sister - I may be Pro life (thanks for quoting me) but this isn't actually an abortion discussion per se. It about her attitude 47 years year to a living breathing child.

That is true, my relation with DS didn't have pain or confusion, moody but liked a good laugh.

Shakespeare's Sister

cletus van damme wrote: »

To say that about Downs is so wide of the mark that i don't know how to answer that.

There's a spectrum of severity when it comes to DS though. I know a couple who have a little boy with DS and he brings them huge joy and they do consider him a blessing. I hate when people dismiss those experiences - some people love to say nobody is happy with a disabled child and any who say it's a blessing are lying etc. But in this case, she doesn't view her situation that way and she can't help how she feels.

To the others that quoted me and disagreed - so be it we disagree.
I've 4 kids and I've accepted them as they are and will be.

Nobody's disputing that, but you're not everyone.

Shakepeares Sister - I may be Pro life (thanks for quoting me) but this isn't actually an abortion discussion per se. It about her attitude 47 years year to a living breathing child.

I was referring to RobertKK's posts - I didn't know whether you were pro-life or not, and I don't have a problem with people who are pro-life (I'm not so pro-choice that I think an abortion is ok in every single situation, only certain ones) just not hardline about it.

RobertKK

kylith wrote: »

Stephen may not have the mental capacity to do so.

She may feel guilty about wishing that she had terminated the pregnancy, guilty that her other son will be responsible for Stephen after she dies, guilty that her older son may have lost out when he was a child because so much of her time was taken up caring for Stephen, guilty that it's somehow her fault that he has DS.

No-one has any right to judge her for the way she feels. The whole family deserves our sympathy and support.

You say no one has the right to judge, yet some people here are judging people with DS and thinking them as being inferior human beings as if the people viewing them this way are perfect themselves.

Oregano_State

RobertKK wrote: »

It didn't stop her having another child, that is just an excuse. I grew up with a person who had DS, we as the person's family looked after her when her mother died, her father had died many decades earlier.
Woe to my family and the responsibility, oh how terrible this is, where is this attitude getting that man's mother?

You're really grasping at straws here.

Physically, yes I'm sure she was capable of having another child. Her point, which is more obvious than a reporters phone going off in a Roy Keane press conference, is that the time and energy she had to invest in taking care of her DS son meant that she would not be able to put that towards taking care of another baby.

She also indicated that she had only every wanted to have two children.

Also, Down's Syndrome people can be functional to varying degrees, some grow up to be quite independent but in this case it appears that Stephen is very low functioning and so this woman's experience could be quite different to your own.

WILL NEVER LOG OFF

That's an absolutely heartbreaking story. i wonder how prevalent her feelings are amongst mothers of people with DS.

I was in a local cafe here last friday and beside me, was a woman in her 60s, with a man with DS whom I assume was her son. It's difficult to judge their ages but he perhaps he was around 40. And she was helping him eat his lunch, but the look on her face was what got me. She was smiling so kindly at him, and you could tell she was completely devoted. But who knows the anguish DS has caused her? Maybe if she could turn back time , she'd not go through with the pregnancy .

It's not our place to judge those complex emotions . The lady in the DM article was very brave in telling her story. I wouldn't for a moment doubt her love and devotion for her son.

kylith

cletus van damme wrote: »

That docu (which I haven't seen ) may make that point but that's EB and this is Downs. they are not comparible.
Did she say it was because of the pain he was in or because life was tough? there is a big difference.

I mentioned the documentary in answer to a question about how could you say you loved your child, but also wish that you had terminated the pregnancy. IIRC it was because of the pain he was in, the difficulty she had in raising him, and the fact that he could never have a normal life even though he was not mentally disabled.

cletus van damme wrote: »

Get the fcuk. To say that about Downs is so wide of the mark that i don't know how to answer that.

How is it wide of the mark? She has said that he had a blood disorder that caused him paid and would have killed him. DS often comes with other medical issues such as heart defects, increased susceptibility to infection, respiratory problems, gastrointestinal disorders, and childhood leukemia. She said that Stephen struggles to communicate and would become distressed and refuse to go out with her, and that she is afraid that he won't understand why she and his father will one day no longer visit him.

kylith

RobertKK wrote: »

You say no one has the right to judge, yet some people here are judging people with DS and thinking them as being inferior human beings as if the people viewing them this way are perfect themselves.

I haven't seen anyone say that they think people with DS are inferior, just that they can empathise with this woman and understand why she would have terminated had she had the option.

cerastes

cletus van damme wrote: »

I've sympathy for her struggle but I find her attitude troubling.

She cannot claim to love him but wish she had an abortion - every single day she has this thought. She seems hung up on what she has lost rather than seeing any positive of it.

Its been answered, surprised someone thinks its not possible to have contradictory feelings about something

branie2 wrote: »

No mother would ever wish that.

Did you miss the first post? there is at least one that is, and there are and will be many more, its more lacking to suggest this isn't more normal, Id say its probably even a widespread opinion.

bodice ripper

RobertKK wrote: »

You say no one has the right to judge, yet some people here are judging people with DS and thinking them as being inferior human beings as if the people viewing them this way are perfect themselves.

there is a difference between putting down a human being, and intervening before the human being happens.


I would have an abortion in a heart beat if I found out early on that I was pregnant with a seriously unwell fetus.

Grayson

RobertKK wrote: »

It didn't stop her having another child, that is just an excuse. I grew up with a person who had DS, we as the person's family looked after her when her mother died, her father had died many decades earlier.
Woe to my family and the responsibility, oh how terrible this is, where is this attitude getting that man's mother?

I'm trying to figure out if you think she had another kid afterwards or if you're trying to say that she could have had another?

If it's the first that's not right. Andrew is his OLDER brother.
If it's the second, then you're also wrong. As she said, he took up an awful lot of her time and energy. It's not like she would have been able to adequately care for a baby when she had a kid with bad DS.

cletus van damme wrote: »

Get the fcuk. To say that about Downs is so wide of the mark that i don't know how to answer that.

Did you even read the article. Could you not tell that the guy is severely disabled. He barely communicates and is still incontinent. He'll sit in the middle of a bus and refuse to move.
There's a huge spectrum of DS. Saying that poster doesn't know what he's talking about because you happen to know someone who's at the higher functioning range. It's like telling someone they're a liar when they say it's sunny in japan just because it's raining outside your house in Ireland.

indigo twist

DoYouEvenLift wrote: »

Is every pregnant woman tested for these things nowadays also?

It's not routinely tested for in Ireland. The option may be available for certain women at higher risk, e.g. family history or older women.

Sometimes certain physical features observed during a scan may indicate the possibility of DS, however scans are not routine in some Irish hospitals (I.e. many women give birth without ever having received a scan.)

Of course, even if anamolies are found as part of a scan or any other tests - women have to travel abroad should they decide not to continue with the pregnancy.

Ave Sodalis

RobertKK wrote: »

You say no one has the right to judge, yet some people here are judging people with DS and thinking them as being inferior human beings as if the people viewing them this way are perfect themselves.

Nobody is thinking that.

RobertKK

kylith wrote: »

I haven't seen anyone say that they think people with DS are inferior, just that they can empathise with this woman and understand why she would have terminated had she had the option.

Then why in the UK is the abortion rate for women pregnant with an unborn child with DS at 90%?

WILL NEVER LOG OFF

indigo twist wrote: »

scans are not routine in some Irish hospitals (I.e. many women give birth without ever having received a scan.)

pregnancy without a scan? that is pretty much unheard of. i hope.

PopePalpatine

bodice ripper wrote: »

there is a difference between putting down a human being, and intervening before the human being happens.


I would have an abortion in a heart beat if I found out early on that I was pregnant with a seriously unwell fetus.

Don't you know you're meant to stick it out for the whole 9 months, and then spend the few hours of that baby's life listening to its pained whimpers? It's what Jebus wants!

Ave Sodalis

RobertKK wrote: »

Then why in the UK is the abortion rate for women pregnant with an unborn child with DS at 90%?

It doesn't mean they think they are inferior. If they truely believe that people with DS are inferior, what's to stop them getting rid of the child after it's born? Your logic here is not adding up. Abortion=/= inferior child.

mackg

RobertKK wrote: »

Then why in the UK is the abortion rate for women pregnant with an unborn child with DS at 90%?

Because people don't want to run the risk of having a severely disabled child? Tbh I don't know because I'm not all those people.

bodice ripper

RobertKK wrote: »

Then why in the UK is the abortion rate for women pregnant with an unborn child with DS at 90%?

Because these women don't have to ask you.

bodice ripper

PopePalpatine wrote: »

Don't you know you're meant to stick it out for the whole 9 months, and then spend the few hours of that baby's life listening to its pained whimpers? It's what Jebus wants!

well, Jebus can show up and give me some good reasons why we live in a Vale of Tears.