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| Baby Violet can enjoy life because of the bravery of her mother Mikayla |
A couple who had difficulty conceiving took a brave step when their second baby in 10 years was found to have spina bifida, a condition affecting the spinal cord that can lead to a range of disabilities with paralysis a possibility.
Abortion was one option put to the Australian couple, Mikayla and Peter.
“Realistically, not a lot of people will keep a baby who has spina bifida — it’s just the reality of it,” Peter says.
“We had two pregnancies in 10 years, and were like … if there is something out there that we can do, we will do that,” he says.
Their appreciation of the gift of new life that they have received comes through in those few words. They accepted the doctors' offer to use their skill, and they themselves prepared to do whatever was necessary to give their daughter a chance to flourish.
Their story is given in a splendid pictorial account of two cases of in-utero surgery on the Australian Broadcasting Corporation website, which can be found here. The account has photos of the surgical effort to deal with the spina bifida.
At 25 weeks’ pregnant, after undergoing a series of health checks, Mikayla and her baby are scheduled for open maternal foetal surgery at Brisbane's Mater Mothers’ Hospital.
On hand to manage the delicate procedure is a specially trained team of 15 staff, which includes a neurosurgeon, plastic surgeon, anaesthetist, sonographer, midwife, theatre nurses, and two maternal foetal medicine surgeons.
Because the spinal repair is performed on the baby while it’s still in the womb, the first part of the operation involves opening Mikayla’s abdomen to access her uterus.
“You are operating on two people virtually at the same time … through the mother, through the uterus and through the membranes,” obstetrician Glenn Gardener says.
Once inside the womb, neurosurgeon Martin Wood repairs the hole in the baby’s spine.
“Meeting parents taking on this intervention with all of the risks to the mother and the foetus … I don’t know as a parent what I would have done in this situation,” Dr Woods says.
“Every single one of the mothers- and fathers-to-be that we have met and dealt with as part of this team — the decisions they’ve made on behalf of their children are just so brave.”
Their bravery is for the sake of the child, the tiny human they have brought into existence, the person who deserves only the best response from them.
The account ends in an upbeat fashion about the prospects of Mikayla and Peter's daughter:
Twelve weeks after having open maternal foetal surgery, Mikayla gave birth to a healthy baby girl named Violet, via caesarean section.
“They could tell everything was fine and she came straight to me for a breastfeed and didn’t leave me the whole time,” Mikayla says.
Now seven months old, Violet doesn’t need a shunt [procedure], and there are promising signs she will walk.
What a loss to the world if Violet had been aborted!
Personal bravery in accepting the consequences of one's actions and in concern for another living being is seen, too, in the case of women who have an unplanned pregnancy and who shun the easy option of abortion.
Such instances have been highlighted in the account of a British doctor who helps women who start a medical abortion - using drugs only - but decide they have made the wrong decision about destroying their baby and then seek to reverse the treatment.
The doctor, cardiologist Dermot Kearney, suffered himself because of the treatment he offered women who changed their minds during a medical abortion. The Medical Council banned him from offering the treatment and he had to take the Medical Council to court over the matter. But the result was that the council withdrew its ban and cleared the procedure that he offered.
Dr Kearney has helped 32 women to give birth to healthy babies after reversing the effects of the abortion drugs. He said:
“My hope is that woman across the UK will now be told by medical regulators and abortion providers that abortion reversal treatment is safe, that it is available, and that success is possible if they regret their decision to have an abortion and choose to seek help.”
Mothers, fathers: be brave!
💢 See also why we must protect people with Down Syndrome - A career path for people with a disability
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