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We have a WINNER!!!
*sigh* Maybe this family wanted their own reality show.
Plus think about the insane amount of money thrown at this pregnancy and delivery - dozens of medical staff working for weeks on it. While millions of Americans are out in the cold, unable to pay for their prescriptions and other necessary treatments. THIS is the kind of thing that should be considered elective and not paid for by insurance.
At least she seems to be eschewing the media for now rather than doing the standard "oh no how will I ever afford diapers for all 8 of these babies! Please donate to the fund set up in their name!" shtick.
Far more than you realize. Kaiser Permanente, Bellflower is a very vile hospital, the doctors are extremely abusive of the staff. I temped at that hospital and also at their sister hospital in East Anaheim, where the atmosphere is totally different. The doctors at Bellflower think they are gods and that everyone else only exists to serve their needs. In my opinion, the entire situation is probably the fault of the villainy of her doctors. My guess is they dreamed up the whole thing up to the point of even discouraging her from having selective abortions to reduce the number of embryos when all of them took. Other doctors interviewed on NPR talk radio say that the current policy is to discourage implanting more than one or two embryos just to avoid this sort of extreme danger to the mother.
Hypothetical. Mother decides to have only one child. That child becomes a criminal, and is an expense to the state the entire time incarcerated. Do we have the right to opine then?
But are you willing to have a state-mandated list of requirements for women to meet before having a child? Who makes the criteria / list?
It is hard to make any kind of judgement when there is so little information about the woman and her circumstances. Maybe we shouldn't be making judgements at all.
Suleman's daughter gave birth to the octuplets Monday at a hospital in Bellflower but has requested that doctors keep her name confidential. Media knew little about the woman until a family acquaintance told CBS' "The Early Show" on Thursday that the mother is "fairly young" and lives with her parents and her six children.
At least Sarah Palin moved out of the house before she started having kids she couldn't handle.
Hmmm, so no husband, lives with parents, already had 6 kids and now has 14 (so she's probably not working).
Boy, her state welfare checks are gonna push California even farther into bankruptcy, but it'll seem to her like she won the lottery every month.
But, you're right, what the hell do I care?
Anyone with a conscience and concern for fellow humans would limit their output.
Adopt kids that are already here if she wants another one that bad.
Agreed, if she (the mother and her parents) can afford to raise, feed, clothe, educate 14 kids, then more power to them. If the California taxpayers wind up supporting this family, then it absolutely IS our business.
It might just be that the mom and her parents are such incredible losers that they needed to make certain they had someone to take care of them in their old age. They may have needed a way to keep the house out of foreclosure and figured the banks wouldn't evict a woman with 8 infants.
(...but that's simply speculation!)
"But the grandfather warned that media may have a tougher time finding the family after the babies are released from the hospital.
'We have a huge house, not here,' said the man, who would only identify himself as Ed. 'You are never going to know where it is'."
The woman should have a mental evaluation...the whole thing STINKS!!
Its a great thing to do!
She also abandoned a Home, Filed for bankruptcy and her Grandfather will have to return to Iraq to make enough money to support these babies. The link above reveals ALOT for information. The daddy is not in the picture it seems.
And no. It is not a personal matter... it is an ethical matter.
I posted on this very early this am, and haven't been able to find any further information yet. The mother refuses to have her privacy invaded by releasing her name, but the grandparents have talked, and so have friends of the family. In spite of the grandfather, Ed, saying they have a "huge" house, they live in a neighborhood of 2 & 3 bedroom homes, which was shown on TV this am.
No father has come forth. This is very unusual, since it appears this family is Muslim. 30 years old and 14 kids...of course, there is the fundie bunch in Arkansas with 18 already.
If you add up the cost of even one kid, it is way the hell higher than the measly tax break.
I understand why doctors implants so many eggs, many of the implants do not take and sometimes none of them take, then a couple has to start over from scratch.
According to this story, this woman declared bankruptcy and:
She lives with her parents in a 2-3 bedroom house, and a year-and-a-half ago the family declared bankruptcy and abandoned another home. She conceived the babies through IVF, which doesn't normally transfer more than 2 embryos, and all eight embryos took.
There is no mention or information about the babies' father or where she got the fertility treatment. When she arrived at the hospital where she gave birth for prenatal treatment, she was already 3 months pregnant.
The babies grandfather is reportedly going back to Iraq to earn money for the doubled family.
Would be nice to know what clinic agreed to this, and if they did any background check on this woman. Since she's only in her mid-thirties, she should be able to conceive the old fashioned way. Where's the dad? Why are her parents putting up with her? Mindboggling. And worse yet, I bet the RWers will trot her out as an example of the hypocrisy of being for choice.
I'm sorry, but purposely bringing a child in to the world under those circumstances is child abuse.
I highly doubt this skank will be getting all the free products and give-aways that other families with octuplets have received. Bankrupt single mother with 14 kids is not exactly a wholesome image.
I haven't heard anything about a father, this woman is living with her parents, and the family apparently just came through bankruptcy....any guesses who's going to paying for the medical bills, the upcoming well-baby visits, immunizations,etc.? I guess every tax payer in California should send a thank you note to the fertility specialist who decided it was a good idea to cram 8 fertilized eggs into the uterus of a bankrupt woman with six children.
If she wanted more kids she should have adopted one that was already here.
That aside, I understand the whole if people can choose abortion then they can choose life argument. That is completely valid, but based solely on what has been written, something should have been done, prior to this situation, psych eval, refusal from fertility clinics, to weed out the truly in need (people struggling to conceive) for fertility treatments and those who have something else going on mentally. Unfortunately without some amazingly bizarre luck, ie Lotto winner, finding unknown gold fortune in the backyard, these kids are going to have a very very tough go, hoping and assuming that the only problems they have is money related and attention starved. But eight at one time at the size each is usually delivered at leads to respiratory problems sometimes severe, it just seems so grossly irresponsible and unfortunate and maybe criminal that no one is mandated to try and make sure something like this doesn't happen unless by some natural fluke. And one last note, the other 6 range in age from 7-2 and two of them are twins, so basically 14 kids all under 8 for an unwed 35 year old living at her parents home, a 2-3 bedroom house, in an area, southern California, where cost of living isn't cheap.
Thank you, Dr. Tucker...
I really can't see an American clinic being so irresponsible as to implant that many embryos. sometimes they implant more than they SHOULD so they can boost their overall success rate. but this whole situation just borders on crazy.
Too many of these IVF and fertility drug patients have ethical problems with reduction but no problem whatsoever with playing God in the first place by planting humans like so many tomato plants.
But that was a different era. Something in this story doesn't add up. 14 kids, no father in the picture, father returning to Iraq to make more money??? Something's fishy.
My niece and nephews will have to be competing with them for dwindling resources in the future.
I think people like her need to be shamed.
On another note, I read this morning where her father said they have a "BIG" house "somewhere" he's not going to tell anyone and they will all be living there together. Fishy sounding.
What I wonder is if she thought she could make a lot of money by having so many kids, from selling her story, free products, etc.
Sentimentalists love large litters because they think "the more, the merrier". The truth is exactly the opposite. A young child needs a fulltime, devoted caregiver. You can't divide that need by eight without seriously damaging the child.
She had six of her own already. These latest births were not an accident.
Selfish.....irresponsible....
It's not sustainable and it diminishes the value of the lives that you create like so many widgets, one after the other. What will the lives of these children, who did not ask to be born, be like? Shame, shame, shame and shame on these stupid, stupid women.
BTW, I hope Rush Limbaugh dies. Not his body, just his radio show.
It's called responsibility--taking care of your body--not following some creed that tells women they must "be fruitful and multiply" just because the ancients thought we should.
Perhaps if you were a woman who really accepted responsibility for herself and her actions, you'd understand.
This woman did not act responsibly, and that whole meme about "god will provide" is such BS--only people provide--in this case, probably the State of California.
And there are issues that she couldn't take care of the family she already had financially in the first place. I'm a ZPG/NPG supporter but wouldn't legislate the number of children people have but this is re-goddamn-diculous!
you get the point.
/snark
I don't know this woman, her family, or her financial circumstances and without that my opinion is by definition uninformed.
Still -- we have almost 6.5 billion people on the planet. (For the biblically inclined, I would say that the "be fruitful and multiply" commandmant is the one divine order where we can say we've checked that box.) Using fertility drugs to have your 7th child? Attempting to carry eight fetuses to term (OK, they only knew about 7, but still)?
There are things where social disapproval is a much better avenue than governmental action. I'm assuming this woman's family and friends have been telling her she's nuts. And know that they're drafted for babysitting duty.
But it's not grandma's uterus, and I've overheard this rant the last couple of times the little mother turned up pregnant.
The mother-to-be just makes some incredibly foolish decisions, then she complains how difficult it is to manage with all those kids on one income.
If she went to deliver at a hospital that performs tubal ligations, there's be a chance that she could have all the unprotected sex she wants, without having to worry about another "oops", but that doesn't seem to be what she's going to do.
So I anticipate sequels.
As has been pointed out--freedom of choice also allows for the freedom to behave stupidly. When I heard that the mother-to-be was pissed at a couple of us because we hadn't given her a baby shower, I told my friend (who'd related this to me), that the mother-to-be is mistaken--her baby shower was our taxes that help her raise the children she has, and that if she dared to confront me directly with this complaint, that was exactly what I would tell her.
So far, I haven't heard anything about baby showers from the mother-to-be. What she does know is that I don't think it's my place to tell her whether or not to have more babies--that's her job, and this is how she's doing it.
So once again, I say for child tax credits there should be a two-child cap. Any kids more than two (unless adopted), no more deductions.
We shouldn't be paying idiots like this.
its theft
it is going to cost an estimated $1million dollars per baby in NICU costs. Somebody has to pay for that and its not her.
If fixing our healthcare system means limiting the number of fetii you can implant and bring to term, is america ready to make that decision?
i am.
It used to be that fertility doctors implanted multiple fertilized eggs, because some didn't survive. The ethics practices in fertility medicine now dictate that fewer fertilized eggs are supposed to be implanted. And she's not saying who did the fertility treatment.
Ethics, hell -- is she insane?
14 x 25 = 350.
And just for full disclosure, I've never felt the urge to procreate and so did not.
SNARK.....is this person a Mormon? (you know the thing about the more children one has...the better one's chances of being a "queen" or "king" in the afterlife.....
and two....I have one child (now grown).....but for 21 years of her life we paid the same in insurance premiums that my fellow workers who had up to 6 kids paid.....what's fair about that? I figured I was helping to pay their premiums!
This is even worse than that one couple with 18 or 20 kids.
Still, there aren't queues of women lining up for Xtreme Procreation; so I'll just recognize it as the odd news anomaly it is.
but that was before common sense parenting became frequently construed as "child abuse"
She lives at home with her PARENTS !!??!!??
She's unwed (not that I care) but she lives with her PARENTS ?!?!?!?!?
Who the hell is going to pay for all these freeking kids ?@?@?
WE ARE!
She might as well be down there on that compound with the religious nuts with their 400+ kids for cryin out loud!
We always try to think of the neighbors. For example, I was once giving our cat a treat on a warm day when the window was open, and I was unaware that the whole thing was being overheard by our neighbor's burly boyfriend who was standing on her porch waiting for her to answer the door.
Me: "Ooooo, de nice widdle kiddy widdy want de yummy tweetsies? Ooooo. What a gooood widdle girwlie she wad! Wess she wad! Wess! She just wwwoooooves her tweetsies! Ooooo. Yummy yummmm yummmmm....."
At that point I look up and notice the boyfriend on the neighbor's porch close by with this incredulous expression on his face. Immediately my voice drops two octaves and I say to the cat, "Alright, that's enough! You're lucky I feed you at all, ya little pig."
Just at that point our neighbor answered the door and said, "Oh, hi, honey!"
He just stood there for a moment still staring our way with that frozen expression, and then kind of shook his head as he turned to her and said, "Huh?".
http://static.guim.co.uk/sys-images/Media/Pix/p...
Besides making Dannykat happy & content, it was also designed to gross out the neighbor, who was eavesdropping. I knew this, but chose to behave as if I was innocent of this knowledge. Dannykat didn't mind--he's such a slut! Fortunately, he's the only cat in the household--spoiled baby.
So now you know a little something about my evil sense of humor.
EWW! Now I have to take another hot shower! :)
The gal who used to live in the apartment downstairs from me used to sunbathe in front of the apartments (garden apts, where there's some trees & grass by sidewalks going from the front doors to the parking area). My current neighbor says she used to be showing everything she had (practically). I'd tease him about that & he always insisted that he wouldn't have touched it with anything of his.
But some folks are exhibitionists, others are happy when doing housework in the nude.
I say just get to a clothing-optional beach & chill out every so often--less chance of unnerving the neighbors!
NOBODY wants to see that sort of thing!
:)
It's been awhile since I'd been to the beach, clothing optional or regular. But the one by Sandy Hook was lovely when I last visited it. By late July-August, the water temps are quite comfortable, and on a sunny day, one can bake like a lizard on a rock or frolic in the waves, as one might wish.
Dude--you've gotten me craving strawberries and coolers! And it's supposed to be a high of about 28 degrees outside tomorrow!
That settles it--I'm staying indoors tomorrow.
Children:
Tiffany, Heather, Cody, Dylan, Dermott, Jordan, Taylor, Brittany, Wesley, Rumer, Scout, Cassidy, Zoe, Chloe, Max, Hunter, Kendal, Katlin, Noah, Sasha, Morgan, Kira, Ian, Lauren, Q-bert, Phil
or try the Sarah Palin Baby Name Generator
You do realize that you are mostly coming off like a bunch of nosy old ladies...
This is just not right, esp. considering the average household income is in the $40Ks, which is not much these days, and is probably already falling with all the layoffs. If you want so many kids, you should support them yourself and not expect help from anyone. Having kids is a choice, not a mandate, esp. with all the birth control avenues these days.
It most assuredly is a religious mandate. Got to keep the rolls up, the tithes coming in, and butts in the pews.
I notice that the family is from Whittier, California. Let me see, there was another famous crazy person from Whittier, wasn't there? Maybe there really is something in the water.
( if that ) and vote straight ticket Republican.
So that is how they are going to win the representative and senatorial seats back, with their numbers. I can only say that I hope she finally, has gotten her wish of more than six kids. For goodness sake, she sounds like a human puppy mill.
Thank you kindly
On the other, I am a firm believer in population control since our planet is being overrun by humans, and this is just totally irresponsible. did they pay for the in vitro procedure out of their own pockets? or was an insurance company paying?
For heaven's sake though - WHY is it necessary to have 14 children?? You want that many, how about ADOPTING SOME THAT NEED LOVING HOMES!
I adopted three children, and now am a single mom, which I never imagined. Am I to be judged for ending up single? Nah. I'm not gonna judge her either.
I cannot imagine any ethical physician being involved in this woman's apparent "choice."
It seems no other way around this than the woman is irresponsible, crazy, and bizarre. Her poor parents, being next in line to care for 14 kids.
I hope CPS keeps an eye on these poor kids.
I wonder what her thinking is . . . They're from Iraq: are they Xtians or Muslims?
It's everybody's business as Americans use more of the world's resources than anyone. Plus, how on earth can they AFFORD to care for these tykes? Now the g-father may be bailing, going back to IRAQ to earn money (does that make sense or is he just escaping the insanity?).
It raises a question about who decides whether or not a woman can have children?
So, as far as I'm concerned, the woman who gave birth to the octuplets exercised her right to have children.
But I have to wonder about the judgment she used in making this choice. If she can't afford to raise the children she already had, why would she want to have more babies?
And why is it being called a miracle? Enough with this shit! There are a couple of billion "miracles" on this planet who are living on $1.50 or less per day. It's not a miracle--it's a result of a person's choice to have children at a time when the medical technology exists to make it possible to have multiple births of an order that is uncommon.
I hope for the best for the new babies and their siblings--now that they're here in the not-so-miraculous real world, they'll definitely need it.
Fourteen kids is the new social security.
Enjoy.
Sorry for the kids.
Having been raised in a large family is a very Catholic neighborhood in the 50' & 60's among even larger families, I can tell you that there is not much if any one on one time with a parent. It's more like being part of a herd. I have two children like almost all of my fellow baby boomers who have children. There is a reason we limited our families and it has to do with spending time with our children. Some people love having a lot of kids (personally I don't get it) but I resent those who think they deserve monetary support and media attention just for being great breeders. In reality I have only known one couple who chose to have a very large family (17 kids). Everyone else was of my parents' generation and didn't have availability or religious permission when that sort of thing was important.
According to this woman's mom, she's been obsessed with children since she was a teen. All children were IVF because her fallopian tubes are clogged up. Psychiatric evaluation, maybe? And now grandma is saying she's not going to be around to help raise these other eight. Hey, lady, maybe get your daughter help before you all ended up in this untenable position? Now I am thinking that is young woman did this as much for a cry for help as anything else. Forcing her parents to be grandparents in a way they were not parents for her? Where'd she get this money for all these IVF treatments? I am starting to feel sorry for this woman. She is seriously messed up.
I get more than a 'bad feeling'. This woman needs psychiatric help, and probably needs for the state to monitor the family monthly to see if the newborns should be placed in foster or adoptive homes for neglective behavior by the parents.
Jeeebus. Hubby and I limited our family size due to finances, why the hell can't other people????
And the grandpa is hightailing it to Iraq just so he can have one damn moment of peace!
Hubby and I are the parents of 2 very wanted AND very very very planned-for kiddos (kindergartner daughter and 21 month old son) and what Kate of Jon and Kate plus 8 says about kids is the gospel: "Lawd! One of 'em is always crying!" Can you just imagine the decibel level of 14 of 'em????
This doctor that implanted the eggs should be held responsible just like a father would for abandonment!