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Thu 4 Jan, 2007 01:33 pm
News today of the couple who have had their mentally very disabled daughter operated on and given hormone treatment so that she never grows larger than the nine-year-old she is at present. Her mental age is 3 months. They reckon she'd lose human contact if they were no longer able to lift her and carry her about.
I think this is OK but disabled people's organisations are a bit steamed up about it over here in Britain. It will be no worse for her, and a lot easier for the parents, and who is to say their rights are not important?
What do you think?
Re: Couple whose disabled daughter was operated on
Clary wrote:News today of the couple who have had their mentally very disabled daughter operated on and given hormone treatment so that she never grows larger than the nine-year-old she is at present. Her mental age is 3 months. They reckon she'd lose human contact if they were no longer able to lift her and carry her about.
I think this is OK but disabled people's organisations are a bit steamed up about it over here in Britain. It will be no worse for her, and a lot easier for the parents, and who is to say their rights are not important?
What do you think?
Can you give a link?
Having been a nurse , and taken intimate care of truly bed-bound people , I can absolutely see why they are doing what they are.
And I agree.
( to elaborate more later if necessary.. )
I haven't read any of the articles, but there are many links on google news, with a lot of the headlines fairly foreboding.
Well, most of the forboding headlines have moved down the google line up to make way for more seeming on the defense. Here's a pov from a Scientific American article.. (I still haven't read any of them yet.)
http://blog.sciam.com/index.php?title=title_5&more=1&c=1&tb=1&pb=1
I agree with you clary.
The parents have rights too.
They've been caring for this child for 9 years, and want to continue to do so and keep her socialized.
Seems to me it's helping everyone's quality of life.
From Osso's article:
"Despite the parents' claims, many criticized their actions, arguing, among other things, that this could open the door for parents to impose medical treatments on their children designed to suit."
I can't stand this type of argument. It assumes mass abrogation and self-interest. If each case were as thoroughly investigated as this one, there should be no problem. And if parents truly didn't want to look after their own children, they could easily have them assigned as Wards of the Court, where the State would then be responsible for their care.
This is not exactly the same, but the suffering is.
A Canadian farmer killed his daughter and went to jail. He had cared for her and loved her. He could not stand watching her suffering. I think he should not be in jail.
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Latimer was convicted in 1997 for the murder, but the conviction was thrown out amid questions of possible jury tampering by the prosecutor. A second jury also convicted Latimer, but said that the life sentence with a mandatory ten years before parole was too harsh given the "suffering he had already endured as the father of a child with severe disabilities". The judge agreed to go against the Charter of Rights to sentence Latimer to two years -- one year to be served in jail and the rest on his ranch. Saskatchewan's Supreme Court overturned that judge's decision and imposed the life sentence.
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http://www.inclusiondaily.com/news/crime/latimer.htm
Well, that was a very controversial case which generated the same argument from interest groups - who's next, the elderly? mentally handicapped... paraplegics... etc etc...
He had no right to take her life. If he couldn't stand to see her suffer, he should have gotten some help. I can't remember his wife's position on this - was it ever mentioned? I mean, she lost her daughter thanks to her husband... and then she lost her husband. I think his action was very selfish, in a way... HE couldn't stand to see his daughter in that condition... he had no personal idea of her existence - he could only speculate.
I wonder whether she recognizes her parents? I wonder whether she can smile?
I've been reading and becoming less freaked out.
I was also freaked out until I understood the details. It's still weird, but not as creepy as it first sounded.
Mame wrote:From Osso's article:
"Despite the parents' claims, many criticized their actions, arguing, among other things, that this could open the door for parents to impose medical treatments on their children designed to suit."
I can't stand this type of argument. It assumes mass abrogation and self-interest. If each case were as thoroughly investigated as this one, there should be no problem. And if parents truly didn't want to look after their own children, they could easily have them assigned as Wards of the Court, where the State would then be responsible for their care.
I so agree. Floodgates policy - such an irritating argument used by this sort of person or authority.
I think she can smile, and does recognise her parents.
Walk a mile in my shoes before you comment.
Heart breaking.
I think of friends of mine who have a far less disabled child...(he CAN interact to some extent, though it seems he will never talk and, despite every intervention, has no effective use of his hands and cannot walk.....but at least he is alert and responsive and can enjoy simple pleasures) whose tiny mum is still, somehow, able to lift him to dress, toilet, wash etc......but, since he is taller than her at 11 years of age, and will soon be heavier, will not be able to do so for much longer, and already carries injuries (she is in her fifties).....
The lives of folk with profoundly disabled loved ones are so hard.
oh that is a sad thought, yes, we who have no burdens of that sort are well blessed...
My stepson has a child who is equally disabled as the girl in the story. She is nearly fifteen. They have nursing help, but I cannot imagine the strain on the family having to care for her physical necessities at adult size.
For those who are quick to criticize, it might be helpful if you were to become a caregiver for a person in this kind of condition, even for a day. I am not freaked out by what those parents did, and I don't think that you would be either.
When you read that every minute 9 children die in Africa, our debate seems less important. The parents of a severely afflicted child are trying to lower the suffering of that girl. Many are opposed to any interference. Judging by the 4.8 million children who die yearly in parts of Africa (and could be saved) this case is not worth the media attention.
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Child mortality trends raise particularly grave concerns. Currently, 4.8 million children in Sub-Saharan Africa die before the age of 5 every year - that is 9 deaths every minute.
With one fifth of the world's births, Sub-Saharan Africa currently accounts for 45% of child deaths.
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http://tinyurl.com/y8w85u
You are right, d i, but we still have to deal with our little local sufferings - it is not in human nature to neglect the near and familiar for the far and strange. And medical ethics has a wider application, doesn't it?
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