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Email a FriendNot only is the age of viability dropping but the long term “success” rate for micro-preemies is on the rise. I know several women through my twins’ club who have had 22 - 25 weekers who are doing amazingly well with minimal problems. Not nearly the blind, mentally retarded horror stories you always hear people say will befall these kids. My friend Carolyn had micro-preemies. One of her daughter has CP but still manages a career as student/model/actress. Take a look and see if you can tell which one shouldn’t have survived. 
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u6s3klP3IM8
Little Ones Who Live
preemies and the pro-life cause
Posted by Arwen Mosher in Family on Friday, January 27, 2012 12:00 PM
Did you know that when Roe v. Wade was issued, it said that a woman has a right to an abortion only until the baby is viable outside the womb? The Supreme Court later rejected this, but I find that in discussions about abortion, few people are willing to defend the practice of aborting after the viability point.
But it’s interesting: the Roe v. Wade decision says that viability “is usually placed at about seven months (28 weeks) but may occur earlier, even at 24 weeks.” As I understand it (statistics are hard to find online, and vary), the survival rate for babies born at 24 weeks currently sits at around 50%. And babies who may have been as young as 21 weeks, 5 days have survived. So viability is kind of a difficult thing to pinpoint.
Preemies have been in the news lately, it seems. A baby whose birthweight was 9.5 ounces - less than a can of soda - was discharged from an LA hospital last week. In December, two other former tiny preemies made news as a report was released about their progress - now 20 and 7 years old respectively, they’re doing well.
A 2010 Gallup poll found that among 18-29-year-olds, support for abortion to be “legal in all circumstances” dropped drastically in the past decade and a half - from 36% in 1990-94 to just 23% in 2005-09.
I wonder if the younger generation - which is seeing its siblings and children on routine ultrasound, and watching medical advances keep impossibly tiny babies alive - is starting to understand the horror of abortion in a new way.
I’m not sure, but I think seeing pictures of preemie miracles like these can’t hurt.
Comments
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Posted by Patricia on Friday, Jan 27, 2012 1:41 PM (EDT):
It is a sad & sick irony that at some hospitals, while doctors work intently to save the life of a child born prematurely…down the hall, another child who surprises doctors by surviving a late term abortion is left to die (these situations are often referred to as “live birth abortions”...a “clever” euphemism for infanticide). Here, Dr. Ron Paul describes witnessing such a scenario:
http://www.lifesitenews.com/news/ron-paul-describes-witnessing-late-term-abortion-in-hard-hitting-pro-life-a/
Posted by RE on Friday, Jan 27, 2012 3:13 PM (EDT):
As encouraging as these stories are, I think that they don’t always portray the realities and challenges that micro-preemies have. Yes, wonderful miracles occur, and we should praise God for them. However, not all micro-preemie births have happy endings. Just because a family loses a baby born as a micro-preemie doesn’t mean they aren’t open to life. Sometimes God just calls children home earlier than others.
Posted by sarah on Friday, Jan 27, 2012 5:03 PM (EDT):
I don’t think anyone was challenging someone who suffered the loss of a preemie. They’re just pointing out the irony of those who claim that children that age aren’t babies yet so can be killed. In other words in a hospital you can have one child that age fighting for life and one down the hall being murdered.
Posted by Mourning on Friday, Jan 27, 2012 5:36 PM (EDT):
This is such a difficult topic to discuss. When does a baby become a baby?
I use to think that ultrasounds and knowing the facts of when conception began would stop a woman from having an abortion. Some states require a woman who is planning to have an abortion to know that, “human physical life begins when a human ovum is fertilized by a human sperm.”
I use to think that seeing an ultrasound of her little wee baby and knowing the facts would change a woman’s mind. Yet, the woman doesn’t even have to look at the ultrasounds photos. The woman can decline if wanting to know if there were twins. That, those sitting in the seats waiting for the doctor are engaged or even married.
I forgot to put a human face, feelings, distress, and knowledge of the mother into my own thoughts. I am currently mourning for a friend’s decision that I never thought would happen.
Yet, everything I read talks about those who get an abortion are poor, not knowledgable, and the woman is being selfish. After learning about my friend…
I realized I never hear about women who are on medication and can’t get off that medication (doctors just say to and the woman feels horrible etc.) and get pregnant. Then the woman feels she may be hurting/causing the baby to being deformed. I never hear about doctors giving support and saying that this life is so important that we can find a way for you to feel good and still carry this baby. I never hear how a woman feels invaded when she gets pregnant. That the sleepiness, sickness, and loss of oneself does go away. That the woman is a stable relationship. That even after birth bonding may not be right away.
I truly am rethinking how we should respond to those who are considering getting an abortion. I have the facts, I know as Catholics what we believe.
BUT, what if that seems to just draw the woman farther away and feel more like this Baby is a burden. I can’t imagine telling my children that they are burdens. I am mourning and am at loss. I’ve been clinging to Blessed Mother Mary and the trust she had to have.
Posted by Cin on Friday, Jan 27, 2012 9:12 PM (EDT):
These mothers you are describing are the ones I work with daily, trying to help them complete pregnancies with healthy babies. I suffered a pregnancy disease with my third and 4th babies called hyperemesis gravidarum—extreme, life-threatening nausea and vomiting in pregnancy—and now I volunteer as a moderator for the Hypermemesis Education and Research Foundation (HER) support web site.
We have many, many members who have aborted much wanted, much loved babies due to simple lack of proper medical care—what is in effect, for most, malpractise. Their illness is belittled and ignored and downplayed as they become severely dehydrated, lose weight, etc. Some women have their kidneys or livers fail.
So I spend a lot of time helping women learn as much as they can about the disease to get the correct treatment for them, and to avoid abortions. For those who have terminated, I spend a lot of time offering comfort, love, understanding, and hope that another pregnancy can turn out better—education of mom being the first step, so she can advocate for proper care.
From all this, I have learned many, many women abort due to pressure, fear, and bad medical advice. Many are severely dehydrated when it happens, clouding their LEGAL ability to give informed consent—and I also think restricting their ability to fully understand the decision and therefore their culpability in the sin. It is still serious, but God knows their bodies and hearts—he knows what physical state they were in when it happened.
I had a doctor refuse me anti-vomiting medications, yet offer me a late-term abortion over and over when I was 16 to 18 weeks pregnant. “We don’t know what the drugs will do to the baby!” she said.
“Well, we know what an abortion will do to the baby,” I countered—she soon was off my care team.
All this to say—each woman’s circumstance may be different. We need to tailor our outreach to their needs.
God bless you as you grieve, and may the Lord help your friend seek forgiveness and healing.
Posted by Beth on Monday, Jan 30, 2012 1:57 PM (EDT):
Cin,
It was so good to hear about your work and experience. Last week my FB page was filled with so much prolife info which perhaps may have educated some of my FB friends but what I really love to hear is personal experiences of women working on the frontlines hand in hand with women in difficult situations. We can shout and proclaim what abortion is and what it does but what we really need to do is the type of work you are doing.
Posted by Jill on Sunday, Jan 29, 2012 9:29 PM (EDT):
Cin, thanks for the work your doing on the HER forums. I’ve suffered HG in four pregnancies. HER got me through three of them. Could you please email me privately? I have an idea I’d like to float by you. Finnertyricardo at gmail dot com. Thanks!
Jill
Weird—my security word is idea 71.
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