Almost all my friends and family thought I shouldn't have kept J. This was before he was even born. They thought that I was too young, that I was throwing my career away (I was still at uni), that I didn't get the reality of having a child.
I think it's fair to say that I didn't get the reality of a child, but who does until they have one? I certainly didn't get the reality of having a SN child, but I think that the same applies.
At times, my life feels horrific. Sometimes I feel like everything is too much, but I do what most of us on here do: I whinge/ rant a bit, have a fag and/ or some wine (if J's in bed!) and get on with it. Because, at the end of the day, it's not J's fault he has SN, and life is harder for him than it is for me. I'm responsible for keeping him safe, for fighting for him, for trying to make him happy. Sometimes that fight feels like too much, but that's what you have to do for your children.
What I find so abhorrent about this story is not that the woman gave her baby away (I think that that in itself could be seen as a sign of love, to give a baby away if you know that you can't look after it and it will have a better life elsewhere).
It's WHY she gave her away. Not because she couldn't cope with another baby (because she had more), but because she didn't want THAT baby. It didn't fit in with her perfect world. Didn't match with the designer furniture.
But to profit from having made that decision? To tell the world that you basically see your child as a 'thing'? To admit that, without even trying or going through what most parents would willingly put up with for their children, on the basis that it's a parent's job to fight for and care for their child, she just discarded her like an unwanted toy? Makes me feel very very sad and confused.
Thank god for Tania.