Disabled babies & abortion.
 

If you were told during your pregnancy that your child would grow up and have a mental health condition in future life, would you abort?

If you were told your unborn child has Down's syndrome, would you abort?

Just interested.

absolutely not. If you're not prepared to look after a child who is anything less than perfect then you shouldnt get pregnant in the first place...My brother has a disability, and i know my mum wouldnt change him for the world. If i got pregnant and found out my baby had downs syndrom i would be so incredibly insulted and angry if my doctor even suggested an abortion, which is how it used to be.

Based soley on your examples, no, i wouldn't. I do think scans for Downs etc are important because it allows parents to be prepared, bear in mind though, 'disabled' can encompass everything from Downs, to conditions where a baby may not survive a few hours after birth.

Yeah disabled is a rather a big word I should probably have used something else.

I wouldn't abort, no.
My Uncle has Downs Syndrome and he leads a happy, content life - or at least he appears too.
I think I'd love my child whatever and wouldn't be able to abort.

to be honest it would depend on the disability and whether or not I knew the severity of the disability.
Downs Syndrome...I dont know if I could persoanlly handle the care requirements and so on. I know people with Downs Syndorme lead relatively normal lives so I guess abortion wouldn't be an option...perhpas I would adopt if i thought i couldn't cope.

I am very fortunate that my son is perfectyl healthy. I'm not sure how I would have reacted had I been told he was to be disabled in some way.

As it stands, right now, I am more likely to sway towards abortion if I thought my child was going to be disabled (and this would depend on the disability itself and severity etc) but when pregnant it is a totally differnet story.

I'm not sure my comments are even valid because I have never been in that situation and therefore do not know the heartache involved.
Its all so easy to say "yes it's right" or "no it's wrong" when you've never had to really expereince it

Never I was supposed to be born with spinabifida (sp) or clef pallet because of my mums medications so was my brother the doctors insisted with both of us they she abort us because the risk was so high both of us were born without any problems so there is always a chance and even if you argued it would be unfair there is still a chance that you could be aborting a 'healthy' baby and even so its just plain wrong everyone has a right to life

QFT! I dont think I can say 'no its wrong to abort disabled babies' because I dont have the experience to say.

No way absolutley not because a baby is a baby no matter what he or she's condition is xxx

I imagine, having a disability myself, would keep that child, give them the best care etc needed as I possibly could and pray they suceed in this life :) Many many children out there with disabilites are going to do so well in this life and many of them already are :)

I think it's really sad when mothers could have a severly disabled baby but don't see any other options other than abort :( See, if I was in that situation and really didn't think I could cope, I'd least try to at first, try and get help as much as I could. But I know some people couldn't bear to do that.

I think it totally depends on the "disability" or condition, like Shona said. There are several conditions that a fetus can be diagnosed with that will nearly always cause it to die before birth, and if it doesn't die then it will die within hours after birth. If it was one of those, then yes, I would abort.

However, if the child was going to have a disability that wasn't going to kill them anyway, probably not, but it really would depend on the exact situation.

Personally I would never be able to abort any child, disabled or not.
However, I do wonder sometimes if I would cope with a disabled child or a mentally ill child, mostly because, and I know it sounds selfish, but mostly because of my mental health issues.
I would want my child to have the best life possible, and would choose to put him/her up for adoption over struggling to care (emotionally) for both it and myself.
I don't know, that probably just makes me sound like an absolute bitch, but does anyone else kinda get what I mean?

I totally get what you mean deleted.

I think it's got the point now, with me, I can't ever see myself having kids because I would be so scared they'd have a mental health problem and I couldn't bear that. I couldn't bear my children going through what I did.

For me it would depend on the severity of the disability and also to some extent how pregnant I was, for example Down's syndrome, wouldn't abort. However if they were going to be a vegetable, never be able to communicate with people, never be able to feed,dress or do anything themselves, then I would have an abortion, as early on as possible.

I know it was mentioned in newspapers a while back that some people were aborting babies because they would likely be born with a cleft palate, that I think is hideously wrong, it's such a repairable problem, and ok so the child will most likely have some facial scarring, but that's a cosmetic problem, not a life-limiting disability.

With regards to a mental health condition, it's incredibly difficult to say, because all mental health issues vary in their severity and have periods of illness interspersed by periods where life is better. I wouldn't wish a mental health problem on any child, and I guess sometimes I wish I'd been aborted or smothered at birth rather than be alive. So it's difficult, I guess I probably wouldn't because both therapy and drugs are improving which would mean a better outlook for them.

I wouldn't. In fact when I was pregnant I opted not to have the downs syndrome test, because there's a risk to it (big needle, tiny fetus, small space...), and I knew I'd keep the baby anyway.

Also, there have been a lot of cases where the mother's been told her fetus had a disability/desiese and when born, the baby has been completely fine.

People who would keep the baby no matter if it's disabled or not...

What are your opinions on those who know they are carrying genetic diseases and so opt for IVF and only implant foetuses that don't have the disease?

I agree with this. I wrote what I think I would do but of course can't give a definite answer because I haven't actually been in that situation myself.

I'm alright with that. Aren't fetuses at that stage VERY VERY young and don't have feelings yet so it doesn't matter that much if they're not implanted? On the abortion debate, I am largely against it, but if it has to happen, I'm of the school that think extremely early abortions are ok (I'm talking before eight weeks or so).

Actually I think that it's quite a responsible thing to do. If you know you have a big liklihood of concieving a disabled baby naturally, it's doing the best thing for your child to 'tweak the circumstances' as it were. I know many people will disagree with me though.

The reason I didn't want the downs syndrome test and would keep a disabled baby, is that by the time I found out, I'd be into my second trimester (past 12 weeks). In my opinion, by that time the fetus is a 'baby' and I wouldn't kill a baby.

Say, hypothetically I found out the baby I was carrying was disabled at say, three or four weeks old I would THINK about having an abortion. I'm not sure I could go through with it though. Logically I don't see a problem with it but in my heart that embryo is my baby.

Did you know that legally, in the UK you can have an abortion UP TO BIRTH if the baby is disabled or the mother has mental health problems? I totally disagree with that. Blatently the baby can feel pain by then.

The termination to term thing is something i found strange at first when i learned about it, when abused, the legalities of it are gross but i'm aware that sometimes it's the 'best' option for parents, doesn't mean it's easy, simple or a 'good' thing but that it can leave them all at peace. One situation i'm aware of that admittedly wasn't to term, but was quite far along, the couple discovered their little one had a severe case of Edwards Syndrome (i think) and the baby barely had a heart etc and the stats were such that the baby may not survive birth, let alone the first of many operation immediately after birth. They wanted their little one to be at peace and not have to suffer. That's obviously a very simplified version of things, but i think it's one of the extreme examples that means the legislation needs to be there.

Sorry, but are you pro-life then?
Because the way you phrased it, it just seemed like it. Putting foetus before Mother?
The baby may be able to feel pain, but what if the mother was going to go through A LOT MORE emotional and physical trauma?