I appreciate that while Prudence says she is ardently pro-choice, she is willing to look at the situation from this woman's standpoint. However, I think the point of this woman's message is that she doesn't necessarily want the child, but that she is morally against having the abortion. I was a little disappointed that the idea of adoption wasn't suggested. Just because this is a married woman with a family, that doesn't mean every newly conceived child either needs to be kept for the sake of obligation or aborted. There are many couples that would love to adopt an unwanted child (I myself am suffering from infertility and would love this opportunity), and this woman could consider the option to give her baby up for adoption. I don't think anyone would judge her negatively, considering she is currently trying to give her best effort at salvaging her marriage and raising a child with a disability. I congratulate this woman for trying to stick to her morals and beliefs, despite the overwhelming pressure to "get rid of the inconvenience" and abort. There have been studies to show that negative effects of the emotional baggage that comes post-abortion, and I fear that this would not help the situation as her husband thinks, but actually add more stress and tension to an already delicate situation.

liner5913:

There are many couples that would love to adopt an unwanted child (I myself am suffering from infertility and would love this opportunity), and this woman could consider the option to give her baby up for adoption.

Amen to that! My husband and I adopted after 5 long years. If I had the room and the money, I'd adopt again. I almost had the chance to adopt a friends unwanted baby but the young woman decided on abortion. :( Then she had the nerve to whine that it hurt. Awwww. (Sorry all you pro choice, don't whine about something like that to an infertile woman.)

I wish this young LW luck. I do believe it is her marriage that is in trouble. Hubby made the same choices that she did that led to this second pregnancy. If she wants the little one, keep it and love it. If she doesn't, adoption is a great choice for all concerned. My "healthy white infant" turned out to be disabled, but he's mine. All 6'1" of him!

Can pro-choice women getting abortions whine about it hurting if they were raped? What about if it was to save their life, or maybe just an organ or their feet, if diabetic? What about if it was a wanted child but was so severely riddled with birth defects it wouldn't survive outside the womb? Gee, I wonder why your pregnant friend didn't want to give up her baby to her judgy "friends" who second-guess everyone else's decision and then say that's cool because they're infertile and their pain is worse than everyone else's.

....adopt. they're loving children. if you got a yen for kids and lots of parenting, go to it, your nearest adoption agency is waiting with open arms.

Facts: He wants to abandon their Down's syndrome daughter, abort their child and wants his wife to stay home and care for his aging mother. The man is a coward and she a slave. The responses on this thread are morally bankrupt.

You know, I understand that these cases do happen, but the chances of them are absurdly small. Yet these are always the cases that get thrown around first, though they comprise less than 5% of all abortions. That's not the case of Pinkmun, so your examples really don't make much sense here. If I was in her case I'd be upset too! How insensitive of her friend!

Way to assume, insult, and go off topic in one post.

Just because a woman happens to become pregnant without meaning to, this doesn't mean that she bears any obligation to anyone else, infertile or fertile, friends or enemies, to carry the fetus to term. And if she decides not to carry the fetus to term, and the medical procedure to end the pregnancy is painful, it's a bad friend who doesn't feel sympathy.

She didn't say she didn't... I don't know what she felt since these situations are usually messy and have several emotions involved.

Say a friend had an expensive, one-of-a-kind sculpture, and knew someone who REALLY wanted it, and knowing that, hired a pro who smashed it into pieces. Complaining to that friend that the cost of destroying it was huge and set her back quite a bit would be a little insensitive, no?

I realize a child and a sculpture are not the same and perhaps my analogy is too simplistic, (best I could think of off the top of my head) but if we took abortion out of the picture, that still makes the friend sound pretty callous.

dslack:

Just because a woman happens to become pregnant without meaning to, this doesn't mean that she bears any obligation to anyone else, infertile or fertile, friends or enemies, to carry the fetus to term. And if she decides not to carry the fetus to term, and the medical procedure to end the pregnancy is painful, it's a bad friend who doesn't feel sympathy.

She doesn't have any obligation to anyone else to carry the baby... but complaining about your abortion to an infertile friend is unbelievably callous and insensitive. I guess someone in the position of getting an abortion only views a baby as an unwanted problem, and doesn't understand what it feels like to desperately want one and not be able to. So many arguments and hurt feelings would be prevented by people just imagining themselves in someone else's shoes.

dslack:

Just because a woman happens to become pregnant without meaning to, this doesn't mean that she bears any obligation to anyone else, infertile or fertile, friends or enemies, to carry the fetus to term. And if she decides not to carry the fetus to term, and the medical procedure to end the pregnancy is painful, it's a bad friend who doesn't feel sympathy.

True, but sympathy goes both ways. The friend knew the other woman was infertile, and knew she wanted to adopt her child, had she not aborted. It was insensitive of her to complain about the pain to that one friend.

Had it been an abortion because of issues other than convenience, her friend the poster surely would have been more sympathetic.

I expect that the not-mother knew her friend was hurting over the fact that she couldn't now adopt her child, and was, in an admittedly-horribly-hamfisted way, trying to empathise - "I understand you're in [emotional] pain - it wasn't easy for me to do and I am in [physical] pain...". Yes, it came over as a horrid thing to say but I'm sure the friend meant well. It would be strange indeed for the friend to be able to say exactly the right thing - she was probably feeling guilt at having denied her friend, guilt for having the operation (I am fervently pro-choice, but I don't believe that anyone feels good about actually going through with it) and it probably was painful. So I'd go easy on the friend's horrid comment - she almost certainly didn't mean it to sound as callous as it did.

I would guess giving up a baby for adoption is pretty damn hard too. I think if I were a woman and had a baby, I'd just raise the damn thing, you know? In for a penny, in for a pound. I won't say there aren't wonderfully deserving people out there looking to adopt, but that certainly wouldn't be a factor in my decision.

If this chick wants to do it so bad, have the baby. This likely means she's going to be a single parent with two kids, and a few notches lower on the socio-ecnomic ladder. But hey if that's what you want to do, quit being wishy washy and freaking do it already.

I strongly considered giving up my son for adoption, when his father left "because I wouldn't abort." However, since we'd already included the other kids in the news, and they'd already lost so much with their father leaving and us having to move, I decided to keep him. The only times I regretted that decision was when he needed better care for his disability, and I couldn't afford it at the time.

Now I'm only glad I kept him. He's independent, bright, and has plenty of friends.

about these people. I understand they're big, life altering decisions. But I swear half of these people's problems stem from the fact they're paralyzed into inaction due to their own insecurities. Wouldn't you like to grab one of them, shake her, and say, "make up your own damn mind!"

This whole baby thing is a pretty big deal. I never had to deal with it directly (except for praying to Christ a gf wasn't pregnant! ha!). But I gotta say, IcogNeato, I'm ready to throw down. Like I knock up my gf now, and it's on! I'm buying the house, the crib, the stroller...ahhh, what else do you need? ha! Diaper Genie? I'm going to be a total Kmart dad.

Anyhoo, back to the original point, I think giving a baby up for adoption would be painful. It's practically the same thing as an abortion, at least from the mother's and father's perspective, it seems to me. I don't want to offend anyone, and I'm talking out my arse here a bit because I've never had to deal with babies. Maybe I'm sterile and I'll have to adopt. Point being, I don't think it's so, so easy to tell a woman, "oh just give up your baby for adoption. That'll solve everything!" I bet there's still plenty of residual pain for a lot of mothers following that decision too.

Even if she is physically and emotionally able to go through a high-risk pregnancy while being the sole caregiver of a special-needs child and an elderly parent, with no emotional support (or whatever the active opposite of emotional support is) from her husband (and how many of us could honestly say with any certainty that we could get through the physical and emotional meat grinder of a preganancy under those circumstances?), do we really suppose for a minute that even of she agrees to give the child up that will be enough to make her husband happy?