This question has burned at the back of my mind since a long
time. They talk about a normal pregnancy usually. But I think of it in a very
different context.
More than a political view, I think we all hold a very
personal stake in this question. Consider this:
Would you like to give birth to your child when you know
he’s going to be mentally or physically handicapped?
Days back I was reading a book by Jodi Picoult called Handle
With Care. It dealt with a couple who had a girl who was diagnosed with
Osteogenesis Imperfecta type III while she was still in the womb. They still
decided to not abort her. What followed were moments of happiness but more than
that… a chain of hardships. Their marriage almost fell apart, their first
daughter strayed and developed bulimia nervosa, which is an eating disorder,
the mother sues her best friend cum gynecologist to be able to earn monetary help for the
daughter’s future needs. She claims in court that had she known of the problem, she would have terminated the pregnancy which she'd been lying about because she'd not say that even if she was held at gun point. Point being, no matter how noble we want to think or
be or believe, when we consider the first question more things than just the
desire of having that child matter:
Can the disability or handicap be cured?
How bad will it or can it get?
Will your circumstances- social and financial- allow you to
take the liberty and give birth to this child?
And will YOU be able to handle it? Emotionally speaking!
Let’s face the facts. Apart from will, you definitely need a
supportive environment to be able to raise such a child. You need to have the
finances, the resources and finally some family support to an extent. If you do
not have practical, affordable, effective and accessible resources (a part of
it is medical facilities) you can’t possibly make this child survive or not
hate yourself wanting to give up every time it gets hard. If you’re too lucky,
you’ll work on some kind of a denial mechanism to refute the fact that it’s getting
too tough to handle. And then how would it feel to see that child suffer every
minute of his or her life which could be shorter than yours! It tore me apart
every time Jodi Picoult described how the child was getting on with her life in
the book.
We all deal with certain issues in our life. We struggle to
come to terms with them. How would it be to give birth to a child who has to
learn to struggle from the very minute that the child starts breathing? There
is absolutely nothing to help, no consolation. Everybody would just keep
thinking of those two words- what if…?- which give rise to a million questions
in your mind! What if this disability didn’t exist? What if I was different?
But will anybody be able to answer those? Well, nobody would know any different
than what they’ve seen.
I know that families and couples who now are living with
such children or family members will think I am anti-disability or
anti-handicaps but trust me, I am not. In fact, I have had my share of
relatives who are living with fatal problems and incurable disabilities and they’re
loved like none other. If given a choice, their parents would like to do that
all over again because what they got in the bargain was a beautiful child that
is an indispensible part of their lives. I understand why people claim that it
is more important to love your child than anything that your child suffers
from. This would help you pull through. But who are you kidding?
Normal kids can’t get through just with their parents’
support. They want to commit suicides for being too fat or too ugly or if they’re
bullied. How can we say such utopian things for the handicapped or disabled
kids? Are you guaranteeing the fact they will have everything else perfect in
their life if they overlook that one limitation? Life is a lot tougher. It
bullies you, it betrays you, it eats you within and compels you to not talk
about it. Then what?
Yes, I’m angry. Just because you want to say that such people
deserve a life (which I don’t deny) why are you giving it to them if you
already know that what will follow their birth is a just a non-terminable series
of agonies, loss of faith and moments of despair which (let’s face it) are more
in number and degrees than the moments that are simply divine. Also, say if a
child has some mental disability or disease, I can only remotely imagine the
million pieces it would tear his/her mom and dad every time they realize that
they can’t live longer than their child, that there might not be somebody who
would love their child they way they do, that the future of their child is
uncertain to the extent of not knowing how he/she will survive after them! That
dreaded question- how will she/he survive by herself? Can she/he?
It is not about the right of a child to live. Everybody has the right to life. But they should also be given a chance to live a life where they don't have such problems! And they parents get that choice. If given a choice would you not choose a life free of this handicap?
Can a parent really live through this every moment? Can a
child be subjected to live through this just because deep rooted belief and
thought says “Good or bad- it’s mine and I’ll handle it”?
Are you really going to forget that the child has to live that life?
Are you really that selfish?
