Friday, January 30, 2009

Here she goes...

Want to watch my head explode?

Read this.

Actually, don't bother. Allow me to Cliff's Notes:

- Woman gives birth to OCTUPLETS

- Babies are teensy (1-3 pounders)

- Woman lives with parents

- Woman is "fairly young"

- Woman was taking fertility drugs (but had "no idea" she'd end up with 8 fetus)

- Woman already has 6 CHILDREN

Alls I know is, if you elect to have 14 children you are never allowed to complain about how tired you are. EVER.

16 comments:

Anonymous said...

she has also been quoted as saying that she is going to breastfeed them. ALL. in my estimation, even if she tandem nurses, she's at about eight hours a day ON THE BOOB. that's not counting little things like eating, sleeping, bathing or taking care of the other children. and, as any new mother knows, that eight hours of boob time is not going to be one long chunk where you get the next twelve hours off to do your own thing.

and i hadn't realized she was living with her parents!!! and already had SIX children??? as americans we are so reluctant to confront this sort of hypocrisy and doctors HAVE SOME DAMN ETHICS. how about this for a start, if you can't feed 'em, you don't get to breed 'em with medical assistance?

Anonymous said...

how about this conversation with the doctor.

DOCTOR: "Unfortunately, this office will be denying your request for fertility drugs."

CRAZY WOMAN: "But, why? i thought, as an american, my reproductive rights are indisputable! " (i could go so many different ways with this, but i'm going to stick with the script).

DOCTOR "Well, according to a new american study, it takes $10,000 per year to raise one child." (true study - but elisava thinks this number is dastardly LOW)"It would appear you already have six children, so by the standards put in place by your insurance company, you should be making at least $60,000 per year before you will qualify for assistance to become preggo again. here on your form, you indicated you are making $25,000 annually and living with your parents. "

CRAZY WOMAN: " but that's not fair! my church says i can have as many babies as i like! this is religious perseuction!"

DOCTOR (WHO HAS SUDDENLY MORPHED INTO ELISAVA): "perhaps then your church can provide you with fertility drugs, and the means to take care of your "X" number of children afterward."

i'm just saying.

Anonymous said...

Said woman sells 7 of the 8 babies and buys a house. With this depressing recession - no one blames her.

-AuntShermie

(oh, and I just heard she's offering to rent out the other 6...)

Ali said...

E - your rant just made my day. Sing it, sista.

S - Amen.

Anonymous said...

I think my head just exploded!

Anonymous said...

a hot button topic to be sure. sorry to air my personal feelings on your blog. but i still gotts say DAMN.

Anonymous said...

She's also a single mom. I'm confused as well as to what medical professionals would think that artifically inseminating her to even have ONE more child (which was what she supposedly wanted) was a good idea.

As a tired CO-parent of one-almost-two kids, I'm confused as to why a single mother of six kids would want any more. isn't six enough?

BTW, this is the top story on the news out here in LA...the ethical question of why a mother who already has six kids is allowed by her medical team to use drugs to get any more kids. I'll report back later.....

Ali said...

E - Rant away. I've been reciting your dialogue to my husband ever since he got home.

T - Glad my head wasn't the only one that went boom. I... I just can't imagine!

J - YES! REPORT BACK, YES!

I almost didn't post this because I elected to have a child, even though we can't really afford him. Who am I to say that she's an unfit mother? She elected to have a RIDICULOUS AMOUNT of children but... nah, I can't defend her choice. I just can't.

Anonymous said...

okay, please let me clarify.
let me clear me throat! as the beastie boys would say. i will put this instance up too the duggars. those crazies have eighteen biological children. although i have personal problems with that, that's neither here nor ther with this comparision.

the duggars have there own means of support. how much comes from the church and how much comes from mr. duggar's job i can't say.
my trouble with crazy woman is that she obviously does not have the means.

an accidental pregnancy can happen to anyone. okay, to anyone having sex. but to actively engage in fertilty treatments when you can't take care of the ones you got (and again! i may be totally wrong here! perhaps she moved in with her parents to take care of them)
.....

Anonymous said...

okay, please let me clarify.
let me clear me throat! as the beastie boys would say. i will put this instance up too the duggars. those crazies have eighteen biological children. although i have personal problems with that, that's neither here nor ther with this comparision.

the duggars have there own means of support. how much comes from the church and how much comes from mr. duggar's job i can't say.
my trouble with crazy woman is that she obviously does not have the means.

an accidental pregnancy can happen to anyone. okay, to anyone having sex. but to actively engage in fertilty treatments when you can't take care of the ones you got (and again! i may be totally wrong here! perhaps she moved in with her parents to take care of them)
.....

Ali said...

I was reading an article about this on CNN.com and the rumor is that she went to a nonprofessional to get this done. How a nonprofessional could perform something like this I don't know, but that's what they're saying. They also said that she may have had fewer embryos implanted but oftentimes they'll split, which is how she ended up with 8. All I know is, I think it's going to be a hard road for those kids. And don't get me STARTED on the Duggars.

Oh, she's also 33. So how old was she when she started having kids if she's already got 6? And do you really need fertility drugs if you've managed to get knocked up 6 times?

Anonymous said...

Well the news report didn't say much (as usual)....they interviewed a couple fertility doctors (one from USC) that talked about how it's not their job to "select" candidates based on how many children they already have. I think we're all in agreement here - it's not the NUMBER of children she has necessarily, but rather her means of supporting them. Because at the end of the day, if she has 14 children and cannot support them, then guess who ends up footing that bill? The Duggars are crazy in many ways, but at least they are able to feed, clothe and house all of them without support from taxpayers.

The specialists mostly talked about how it is never their goal to implant that many embryos, that 2-3 is risky enough and *most* doctors would not willingly implant 8. Also, if she were taking drugs to make her eggs big and fat, then they usually do ultrasounds prior to ovulation and if there were 8 eggs ripe and ready to go *most* doctors would counsel her to back off and not try that month. They threw that emphasis around a lot "MOST", and I kind of took it to mean that they think the person responsible for it was not necessarily One of Them. Also, in the press conference they held a few days ago, the lead ob/gyn made a point of saying that she "took over care of this patient" at about 23 weeks. So no one knows who was involved prior to that point. (and can I just say wtf on the loooong-assed press conferences about this? I am out on maternity leave myself, waiting for my own kid to pop out and WAS NOT A HAPPY PREGNANT LADY when the pre-empted the Bonnie Hunt show to interview the anesthesiologist AT LENGTH about what method of pain management he used. I mean really? Wouldn't the standard methods of pain management for a c-section apply?????)

So. Who really knows what the situation is....I kind of feel bad for her parents. I mean, I love my kids, would do anything for them....my mom is a HUGE help to me on an almost daily basis and I know she loves being involved and close with all of her grandchildren.......but FOURTEEN?

Woman with a Hatchet said...

Well.

Wow.

Eric mentioned this to me earlier and I can't help but wonder what level of mental instability you have to have in order to do this to yourself, your existing family and the unborn children you're about to have. Why would you do this?

Now I get that some people may not be happy at "just" 6. However, there's the normal route: one baby at a time, to get more. Clearly, if you shop around you can find insanely unethical doctors anywhere.

Also, Elisava, there's no way in HELL she can BF 8! What do you do with the other SIX while 2 are on the boob and the other SIX are screaming from hunger? Not to mention the OTHER six kids, ranging in age from 2-7. Who is feeding them while the mother is tied to a pair of nursing infants?

We assume, possibly incorrectly, that all 8 will survive the next several weeks. Those poor, poor babies.

As for the Duggars, their form of support was to have their church help them, turn themselves into a TV spectacle and create their own church when their previous church wasn't fundie enough for them. My beef with THEM, regardless of the money issue, is the fact that they use their older kids as parents for the younger and none are allowed to be children (or to think for themselves! or go to SCHOOL! or interact with the "outside world" in an unmonitored fashion) and instead are little worker bees, always. That's not a life or a childhood. It's servitude.

I see very little difference between the way they are treated and the Mormon thing where the crazy sects are marrying off 14-15 year old girls to old men.

There's freedom of religion and then there's Going Too Far.

Also, where the hell is the husband/father of the original 6? What is HE thinking about all this?

Anonymous said...

From what I've heard the first six kids are all under age seven. Which means that she will have 14 kids under age 7. WACK-A-DOOOOOO!

Ali said...

Oh I'm getting all riled again just reading your thoughts. It's insane. INSANE.

J - Awesome report! (When's your baby due, BTW? Unfortunately for me, you probably won't have time for goofy, ranting blogs once Numero Dos arrives which bums me out. I enjoy your posts.)

Hatchet - Couldn't have said it better myself. (Can you feel the steam building? About to blow!)

B - Apparently she has a nanny and the grandfather mentioned something about them going in to hiding in a "really huge house" (his words) they own somewhere. The shots of the one they're in now look awfully middle class but who knows.

As far as the baby daddy, nobody's saying who it is (or if there's only 1). They're just calling her a single mother. Oy.

Anonymous said...

I have been alternately fuming/stunned about this ever since I heard the story last night. The woman CANNOT be in her right mind. I feel sorry for all of her kids, just don't see how anyone can adequately nurture 14 kids under the age of 7.

And the doctors on TV seem so PROUD of themselves for pulling this off, which makes me even madder. Maybe they and the hospital will agree to donate their million dollar fees on the care of these babies since they were dumb enough to give this woman fertility drugs in the first place. I don't imagine the mom has the means to pay it, and most health insurance plans have a million dollar cap.

I saw the thing with the grandpa bragging about a big house, too--maybe he's hoping somebody will donate one to the family, like the McCaugheys' deal?