A mom in Australia is speaking out about being pressured to have an abortion because her baby was believed to have a disability.
In an interview with Kidspot, Jodie said she realized she was pregnant after ending a turbulent relationship. At 39, she had suffered multiple miscarriages, and even though her ex said he refused to be a part of their child’s life, she made up her mind.
“It was a very intense, confusing time,” she admitted, but added, “I didn’t think I could ever have a child, so it was now or never.”
She was resolved to raise the child on her own, but said doctors immediately began pressuring her to have an abortion. “They said because of my age, my past history as a smoker and other statistics that there was a high risk of Down syndrome,” she said. “They wanted me to look at abortion then. It infuriated me.”
Then, at 30 weeks, they said there were things “missing” from her baby’s body, such as the septum pellucidum, or membrane in the brain, optic nerves, and the pituitary gland. “That’s when they said, ‘We think you need to terminate’,” Jodie recalled. “It was horrendous. I was spiraling. I lost it. I burst into tears. I couldn’t hear anything after that. I looked up the reality of terminating a child at that gestation, and it destroyed me. I would be induced and give birth to a dead child. I just couldn’t do it.”
Jodie was told that her baby would likely be stillborn.
Still, Jodie felt that something wasn’t right. “Everything in me said, ‘No, this doesn’t make sense,’” she said. “What they were telling me didn’t feel right. I was adamant they were wrong. From that moment on, I stopped doing the ‘what ifs’ and just kept going.”
At 40 weeks, she went into labor, and miraculously, her daughter let out a cry. “She made this little squeak and I just melted,” Jodie said. “Then she cried and I was thinking, ‘Yes, she’s alive’ in response to all those people who said she wouldn’t make it.”
Not only was her daughter, Jasmine, alive, but the only medical issue she had at birth was jaundice. None of the other predicted diagnoses came to fruition. There did end up being some issues later, however.
“She was asleep and I saw her on the camera spitting out all this mucus and then she started going blue in the lips. So I put her on her tummy and patted her as hard as I could,” Jodie recalled. Jasmine, it turns out, has suspected spontaneous reflux, leaving her at risk of choking on her mucus at any time. “She sleeps right next to me with the camera on her 24/7, but I still don’t sleep much. I can sense when she shakes her arms and legs heavily when it starts to happen because she can’t get a breath. Only after that does she make a gagging noise.”
Still, Jodie said she is incredibly grateful that she followed her instincts and gave her daughter the chance to live.
“Before I became pregnant, I was seeing a suicide counselor but now I can’t imagine not being here. I’m a million percent grateful that I didn’t listen to the doctors. Humans should trust their heart. It speaks words,” she said. “She’s so intelligent already. She crawled early and is now on the verge of walking, she sings bits of the ABC song. She’s completely changed my world. I’m a different person and a better version of myself because of her. She’s everything that I’ve ever wanted in life in a tiny little package of perfection.”
