Mum of 9 Files Lawsuit Claiming Her Reproductive Rights Were Violated When She Was Sterilised Without Her Consent

[Earlybird]

This emotive story is beginning to gain national play, and is causing an ethical, moral, social and economic discussion in America.

Many say what the lawsuit claims occurred was/is barbaric, but the Mum's personal past has become a sticking point in the court of public opinion.

Background highlights:

• Mum had her first baby at 13, and quit school at the same time
• Mum has 9 children from four men - first two when she was a teenager, subsequent 7 were conceived while in 2 long term relationships.
• Mum has never been employed and receives financial aid from the state for 2 of the 4 children who live with her (the other 2 are supported financially by their father)
• Grandmother has custody of 3 of the children, who live with grandmother
• Mum has a litigation history having sued a chain of chemists in 2001 claiming they sold her an expired spermicide which failed to prevent a pregnancy (she won)
• - Mum was sterilised when she was 35, so in theory, had quite a few reproductive years ahead of her.

Part of why the story is beginning to get national attention is the overwhelming outpouring of angry public sentiment toward the Mum.

Extremists hail the doctors as 'heroes'.

More measured/moderate opinions are finding it difficult to defend the Mum because 'rights come with responsibility' and this Mum has been 'irresponsible' by continuing to have children she cannot afford to raise.

news.bostonherald.com/news/regional/view.bg?&articleid=1222682&format=&page=2&listingType=Loc#articl eFull

What is your view?

Rights do come with responsibilities but sterilisation is not a measured reaction, it is draconian and inappropriate.

I also note she gets disability benefits for non hodgkinsso is not just doesn't wanna work I gues, and she is engaged to and lives with her working partner and their 3 children.

Based on the article, she went into hospital for an elective c-section, and wanted/planned for doctors to insert an IUD. She claims they tied her tubes instead. The hospital cannot locate a signed consent form agreeing to that procedure.

If this story is as reported it's a fucking outrage.

IMO, it doesn't matter how many children you have borne, what happened to them, there is never any justification for sterilising a woman against her will. Never ever ever.

(and I do work with children of parents that you'd think should be sterilised if anyone should...and I still believe that)

And she was after an IUD as well, which is hardly a sign she is randomly producing surely?

If she is classed as disabled and cannot work due to non-Hodgkins lymphoma, is it medically safe for her to be pregnant and give birth?

TRhat's her option

And as she asked for an IUD rather besides the point?Clearly she was not planning a pregnancy at least in the foreseeable future.

I won't ever chooseto have another baby,too high a risk of disability plus my family is ocmplete. I amacting in order to makecertaian of that but even though my kids cost the DWP a bomb nobody has a right to sterilsieme and the same for her

But she talks about eventually wanting another child, and says she is afraid her current partner will leave her if she cannot have one with/for him.

There probably is more to it but there is still no way its right in any way to sterilaise trather than insert an IUD. It doesn't matter how many kids you have, how old you were etc...Her body and Her choice.

If her partner, fiance, full time worker raising own kids, pays for them and helps care isn't that her own choice?

Not one I might make but I come from a family of far bigger messes (16, dad second youngest, grandad alcoholic, nan invalid), kids turned out OK in the end

I don't understand how the doctors could have known enough about her personal situation/background to make that decision on 'society's' behalf.

Doesn't add up to me.......I wonder if she signed the consent form, but has now changed her mind (and the inefficient hospital losing the paperwork means nothing can be proved).

That is alot of speculation on my part though......

if she didn't consent to the operation, then the hospital is way out of order, and any other details about her life that have surfaced, are irrelevant.

Earlybird that's exactly what I thought - I don't see how a surgeon can just 'decide' to sterilise a woman in this way.

Got to be more to it than this.

I was wondering the same as earlybird and was it during the section or the IUd?

Being sterilised without concent is completely unacceptable. It does not matter who the person is.

I have two children and I don't plan to have anymore. However neither my husband or I feel emotionally ready for sterilisation. Prehaps this woman doesn't feel emotionally ready to be sterilised.

If true (and her history makes me wonder) then it is outrageous. There is no way a doctor has the right to do that on a whim. It should be treated the same as though she were attacked on the street and left maimed. I don't see what they are discussing unless forced surgery is legal there.

Having said that cases like hers make me wish we had a one/two child policy, but that's not the point.

Well done the doctors in my opinion. Children are a responsibility and not a right. This is something that should be done a lot more. The state is not there to pay for people to have child after child after child. You pay for them in their entirety have all the kids you want but if society is bailing you out then sorry the choice shouldn't be yours to go on having an infinite number of children.

Solemonade- what was the justification in taking away her DP'sright to ahev children then, bearing in mind he fots all the random responsibility criteria from what I acn see/

lemonadedrinker, as you can see from the last bit of my post I have no time for people who churn out kids without any plan or intention of looking after them. However you can't have doctors taking it into their heads to sterilise people just because it seemed like a good idea at the time. (if that is what happened)

I agree onagar, but if you take a more structured approach to it then people start banging on about how it is just like nazism.

peachy - Her DP has a choice to go and reproduce elsewhere if he feels he must! However I would have thought he has quite enough parenting on his hands!

Does that mean the state can decide to sterilise anyone when they lose their job, lemonade? Or how many children should you be allowed to churn out? And what if you then get a job- do they pay to have the tubes untied?

Besides, she lives with her working partner. Does that mean all SAHMs should be sterilised?

Yes cory that is exactly what I am advocating! What a ludicrous suggestion. If you can't see that situations like this are relatively rare and could be considered on a case by case basis then you are clearly living in a diferent world.

The article implies that she lives with her working partner and some of her children.

Her Mum has custody of 3 of her children, who presumably live with their grandmother. Who supports those children? Can't possibly be the birth mother who is unemployed, and most certainly isn't the current partner who is not father to those children.

We know holw old shewas when dc1 was born, maybe we need to focus on that, assume there was something Not Right ging on, and it could be that after the most horrendous of starts Mum is now in a stable relationship, a SAHM (is that the same as general unemployed, being supported by your DP and on disability? becuase if it is steriliseme, I am a carer on CA and a SAHM) and caring for 3 children not raised on benefits.

I am not suggesting she should have any mroe but sterilsiing against the wishes is inhumane,esepciallya s actually, she seemsto have beaten a few odds to have got to this stage.

I do know someone similar (not as many kids, but 3 fathers, kids distributed etc) and she is anything but evil; she is lovely and it has broken her heart, but she had a history of abuse and simply couldn't cope with a large family at a very young age. God forbid she is assumed to be less than human (which is what ahs happened here- she has been nuetered like a dog rather than a person) if she ever manages to get her life sorted and her demons banished.