Parents go to court to battle for the life of a severely disabled baby.

[wannaBe]

except this time they are on opposite sides

God how awful.

that is my worry riven......
how long before babies won't even be saved at birth? imo this is a slippery slope to go on and will have a knock on affect

There's a case in Devon of a nine year old apaprently,although not many details are in the news.very sad that anyone has to go through this.

I think the only difference brain amage or not makes, is that if a hospital withdrew care for my child I would be shredded completely; if I thought for a moment my child knew that I was not preventing that it would have destroyed anything left IYSWIM. Morally, it makes sod all difference, a child's life is a child's life.. And then only when brain amage is very severe,most children with brain damage have understanding after all.

Personally I think the final decision should be the mothers.

Obviously DH disagrees with me.

There are plenty of mothers with no emotional boind or intelligence though- DH's Mum threw him down hard on the bed at 6week,declared him wrong and never had any warmth for him again. Should she have ahd final say over him? I think not.

I think thats why the court role is central; it does bring all that in, although tbh I am alrgely with Riv on the morality. Seems barmy when there are people out there, adults with capacity and horrifying progressivce diseases who would choose to limit their pain themselves etc are being denied- it seems totally arse about tit, to be frank.

Yes sorry thats what I meant, that they cannot get the euthanasia they so vocally request

I'm not sure I am pro euthanasia, but I certainly am not pro it only for caseswhere people are too disabled to choose /copmmunicate that choice themselves. that seems bizarre to put it mildly

why should it be the mothers choice?
the father should have a say as well.

of course

I wonder if the child will struggle to breathe using the portable but I think that is a chance worth taking.

I'm making assumptions on that btw.

Saw this article today about a little boy who can't breathe unaided but certainly does have a good quality of life.

Wow that article is intersting

Some of the comments,I mean- so what if baby RB doesn't contribute anything? DS3 is unlikely to, does that mean we should dispose of him- or is the fact we see further waht makes us human?

All these comments babout no quality of life- and then he can enjoy 30 minutes of painting.that'snot a just,that's amazing- and enough.

No idea why the input of the dad is so devalued; I have known PMLD kids be raised be single dads who have done an astounding job, love is not gender dependent

Yes I know, I thought 30 mins of painting was pretty good for a 1 year old! If he is capable of that, who knows what he will be able to do when he older?

another mother wanting her child to die

I know
dd will never walk or talk "properly" but her quality of life is probally better than a"norm" as she has much less worry

Looking at that interview you linked to 2shoes,I wonder hoe well reported that ase is- she says she wants a gentler life ecven if shorte..... I think that is very different from the aggressive removalof support that is hinted at; I think she means no more major operations etc, just paliativecare,whch IMO is a bit different and possinbly what I might opt for- her son seemsadorable and I would think he has a good quality of life, but there are some procedures that could actively be detrimental..... there'sdefinitely a mid way between asking for support to be withdrawn and chooding tojust take a less firefighting approach to it all IYSWIM

Not sure I worded that well

OK see if this amkes sense-my Uncle has cancer (I dont eally know home sono sympathy needed). He has had several recurrences and is on his 9th set of chemo. If I was in his position, with no real hope of recovery and I do know that he loathes chemo and the pain it causes, I wuld probably choose to stop and have a high standard of end of life care instead.

If it weremy child I suspect i'd fire fight all the way, but I can see after ten yers you migt start to question that. But Imight choose to refuse a major op, if I genuinely beleived sufferieng would be an outcome of it

I do get whta you mean peachy.
have to say I don't understand why the mother felt the need to go public in this case. surely it is something private and betwwen her and her sons doctors.

Ah now that I dont understande ither 2shoes

Though- maybe becuase she saw how other cases were being repotrted and wanted people to hear her line about a gentler life?

or to "sell" her story.
I am abit about these people, having seen how hard parents fight to keep their children alive, these storys just seem weird to me.

I've been thinking about this, and I wonder whether there is actually an element of conflict between the disability and the medical needs.

It is unthinkable to suggest allowing a disabled child to die and rightly so. Because disabled children can and do grow up to have fulfilled happy lives, and quality of life with a disability is subjective because what to one is unbearable is a fulfilled life to someone else.

But take the disability out of the equasion and concentrate only on the medical needs, and suddenly the thought of allowing that person to die doesn't seem so horrific.

If a mother watches her child go through years of painful and agonizing treatments and surgeries knowing that that child will die in the end, is it unreasonable of her to think that perhaps it would be better for that child to have a peaceful death now, rather than going through years of pain to prolong the inevitable? Tbh I'm not so sure that it is.

Is our judgement perhaps clouded by the disability thus leaving us unable to see the real plight of the child? If the child had been born without the disability but unable to breathe, would we be so quick to say he shouldn't be allowed to die in peace? I'm not sure.

I have thought a lot about this and tbh I don't think you can seperate the 2.
if a child is born not breathing the chance of them not being disabled is very low. so not really likely.
but I do get what you mean.

I think it's very unfair, even cruel, to have a go at the mother for this being in the public domain. I don't know how it got into the public domain, whether it was by her wish or not anyway. But however it came about, I'm not in the mother's shoes or the father's shoes and have no right to judge them.

They are suffering enough at the moment, is it really right to criticise them?