Just read this today

Grief, Gratitude and Baby Lee  - from the LATimes.

This was written by Stephanie Simon, who also wrote that LATimes profile of the Arkansas abortionist a couple of months ago.

(I'm thinking she might be working on a book of some sort)

This one is different - it's about the work of Choices Medical Clinic in Wichita, located right next to Tiller's mill. More than just a CPC - it's a full scale clinic which also happens to have a specialization in perinatal hospice:

Several medical students Stringfield has mentored at the local Catholic hospital plan to open their own perinatal hospices. Outside the antiabortion community, the concept is also gaining support, driven by improvements in prenatal diagnostics, which allow more women to learn of birth defects earlier in pregnancy.

Hospices serving the terminally ill in San Diego, Fresno and Kansas City, Mo., run well-regarded perinatal programs. Several hospitals around the country, including St. Joseph Hospital in Orange County, offer a similar service. Trinity Kids Care, which serves Los Angeles, is also moving into the field.

Choices, which opened in 1999, has guided three dozen families through its hospice.

The story is told through the experience of one woman, pregnant with twins, one with severe anencephaly. It will break your heart, but it will also help you see the preciousness of life, in case you needed a reminder.

Be Not Afraid - a website we've blogged on before - full of stories from parents who received devastating prenatal diagnoses and chose to carry to term.

They talked for more than an hour. Stringfield asked Danielle about her fears, finances, even her heartburn, and listened attentively, jotting notes. Finally, he led her into the clinic's darkened sonogram room. Danielle was so worn out, she barely looked as Tammy squirted ultrasound gel on her stomach in the shape of a smile.

Then the twins appeared on the screen in blurry black and white.

"There's Lee!" Tammy called. "There's his leg and his knee and his little fist."

Danielle's jaw unclenched. Staring at her son's curled fingers, she beamed, eyes glistening.

"Want to hear his heartbeat?" A rhythmic whoosh filled the room.

"My baby," Danielle said, her voice swollen. "No matter what, that's my baby."

Tammy switched off the heartbeat and Danielle looked back at the screen. "I don't ever want to forget him," she said. "Memories fade. I don't want to forget."

Comments

[American Papist]

It's long enough to be a short story (and then some). but it is so worth the read:

Describing the healthy infant and the
"Two heartbeats, amplified by fetal monitor, echoed through the overheated hospital room, strong and steady and nearly in sync."

Reading that sentence stopped my heart for a moment.

and then by the end I was in tears. you are right it is hard to read. but it so cements your faith in God's ultimate goodness in the midst of suffering - God bless the mother for going through with her pregnancy.

Oremus pro innocentii!

[American Papist]

BTW, there is an Anencephaly Support Foundation to help support parents who choose to bring their infants with anencephaly to term:

http://www.asfhelp.com/asf/home

[Christina]

That was very moving. I've blogged on it myself. Though I'm astonished that the LA Times publishes something so favorable about prolifers, and women choosing life. (But they put in a nice paragraph about what a swell guy Tiller is, so I guess they'll be forgiven... ;))

[adjuration]

'Dr. George R. Tiller specializes in terminating late-term pregnancies after the fetus has been diagnosed with a birth defect: a deformed heart, missing kidneys, Down's syndrome, anencephaly.

He calls his work a "reproductive ministry," and he offers his patients many of the same services as the hospice. Tiller encourages parents to hold, dress and photograph their aborted children, whom he delivers stillborn but intact. His staff takes ink-prints of tiny feet and hands; he brings in a chaplain for baptisms. Letters from grateful patients line the clinic's walls.'

Several years ago, when I first read about these services Tiller offers - 'baptisms', dress and hold the baby, etc. - my mind boggled and I thought about how support for what he does would evaporate if people knew this was going on. Now it's approvingly mentioned in the LA Times without irony. Does the reporter not know the difference between a baby dying and a baby being killed? She seems to be presenting this story as a consumer choice - some folks feel better if they hold the baby while it's alive, some don't, different strokes for different folks, isn't it great that we've got people to provide each service? See, this story shows why "choice" is so important.

This is not meant as a pro-life newspaper story. It's about the mother and her "choice", not really about the baby and his life.

Lord have mercy.

[Sonetka]

That might be how she's presenting it, but it's certainly not the impression I took away - the descriptions of the newborn baby boy were at once so endearing and so heartbreaking. I cried, and I don't often do that at something I've read. I doubt the average reader could finish that and think "You know, this is nice and all, but she shoulda gone to that Tiller guy and gotten it all over with right away."

[Veronica]

If you see this article as pro-choice propaganda, then you completely missed the point of the story. It is a testimony of the heroic love of a mother to her unborn baby in the midst of a very desperate situation. And yes, it was a story about the baby and its brief, yet precious life, and I was very moved by it... may God bless the mother for the amazing love she demonstrated.

[cw]

What amazing strength we are given when we ask for it. Thanks Amy.

[Alia]

This article brought back a lot of memories for me. When I was ten, my youngest brother was born with anencephaly. He didn't survive the birth, but my mom did get to hold him. She talked about how she ran her hand over his head, where his skull was missing, and how his eyes were open and brown (the only one of us to share eye color with our dad). She said even if she'd known earlier in the pregnancy what was going to happen (this was before ultrasound was available), she still would have gone through with the pregnancy because she still got nine months and a few moments with him. His death also brought her into the Catholic Church. In death, my brother had a huge impact on my mother's life.

[Tom Haessler]

I don't know if American Papist is a guy or a gal, but I'm a guy and I wept almost uncontrollably when I read this amazing and powerful tale of love and redemption. A wonderful true life commentary on the new encyclical. I never knew there were hospices for newborns. My experience of them is with the deaths of my parents and other old people. The one exception is a young high school student I knew who died of cancer. She had been horribly abused physically and emotionally by her father and step-mother and waited every day for them to come and say good-bye. They never did.

[Louise]

Crying my eyes out. Thankyou Amy - beautiful, but heartbreaking story.

At least baby Lee's parents loved him.

How incredibly tragic for Tom's friend, whose parents' didn't.

[adjuration]

Sonetka and Veronica:

Sorry, I didn't mean to imply that the story is not moving - it is quite moving.

But I think the intent of the writer - and her editors - is open to question if she believes (and can write after witnissing these events) that Tiller "offers the same services" as the hospice. "Baptizing" and dressing up a baby you've killed is not the same service as helping a mother see and share the life of her child - any child - no matter how short a life it is. The writer's sticking that stuff about Tiller in a story like this reveals a moral blindness that took my breath away.

[Peggy]

Oh my! What heartache. Fertility is a gift!

I confess to being annoyed by one sentence: "Outside the antiabortion community, the concept is also gaining support, driven by improvements in prenatal diagnostics, which allow more women to learn of birth defects earlier in pregnancy."

Is the author implying that this is the idea of people other than "antiabortionists" and "anti-abortionists" are not doing constructive things like this? Or does she mean that this constructive activity is also starting to take hold in other medical facilities that are not necessarily pro-life endeavors?

The really creepy thing about Tiller (besides his butchery) is that they are admitting they are killing babies--and it's okay!

[Sonetka]

Adjuration - no worries, I didn't think you meant that it wasn't moving. What I meant to say was that I see what you mean about the writer dragging Tiller the Compassionate into it - why do it at all, really? I wouldn't be at all surprised if the writer was trying to get the idea across that "these are both equally valid choices blah blah blah" but I think it unlikely that that's the impression casual readers would *actually take away* with them. I think the overriding impression is of the mother's grief and love and of her gratitude for getting to spend two days with her baby son.

Peggy - you are so right. Fertility is one of the greatest gifts we receive (alas, we don't usually appreciate it until we find out that it's a gift we didn't receive.)

[Peggy]

Sonetka,

That is why I said that. We have children whom we've adopted--definitely the greatests gifts we have ever received! We love them so dearly. Sometimes, however, my heart still aches knowing I will never carry a child in my womb or hold a newborn who came from me and my husband. This sad story made me think about that.

God bless!

[Tragic Christian]

I'm glad you picked up on this story, Amy. It moved me, too, except ...

For the LA Times' editorial need to call the pro-life movement "antiabortion." At the same time, they call the other side "pro-choice." We're the "anti's," you see. Boo, antis, yay, pro's!

This reached its absurd zenith in an opera review last year, where the reviewer talked about the opera's erotic, loud, "pro-life" (i.e. pro- love, sex, enjoyment, etc.) message. The editors reflexively changed "pro-life" to "antiabortion," even tho' there was nothing about abortion in the opera!!