Saturday, November 19, 2005

Wrongful life suit? 'I wish my daughter had never been born.'


When is it wrong to be born? That is a question facing an Australian court. A mother, Olga Harriton, says if she would have known that her daughter would have the birth defects she was born with, she would have aborted her. Alexia Harriton, 24, is blind, deaf, and has mental retardation as a result of her mother's contracting rubella during the first trimester of her pregnancy for Alexia. Exposure to rubella during prgnancy, by the way, can lead to autism. Alexia is suing to the doctor who misdiagnosed her mother's rubella for "a lifetime of suffering" in Australia's "wrongful life" suit. "Lawyers for the Sydney woman argued in Australia's highest court Thursday that Dr. Paul Stephens is liable for the costs arising from a lifetime of medical treatment that Harriton needs to survive." To read the entire story, see the Court TV article.

I can understand regretting a child's disabilities and wishing it were not so and even imagining how life would be better if the child did not have the disabilities. But to wish that the child had never been born, is quite another matter. In my darkest moments, perhaps this thought has crossed my mind. I can not imagine life without these girls of mine, exactly how they are. This "mother" would prefer no child to the child she has! I am sure she has suffered (which one of ya'll has not suffered?) but life is sometimes very hard. What do ya'll think?

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