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We always thought we would have kids. We started trying when we believed we were ready. A month went by, then two months, six months, a year. Nothing happened.

Something was wrong, but nobody could tell us what - and they still can't to this day. We tried IVF three times but our results were not good. We were devastated.

Eighteen months after our last IVF cycle, we knew we would not be having our own children. And, somehow, we have moved to a life that is much different to the one we thought we'd have.

This blog is about what we do now we know we won't be having children - the thoughts, dreams, realities, sorrows, and joys that have become our new life path.

I hope you will enjoy what I will be sharing, and I hope that if you are at the point where life without children is a reality for you, that you might find some hope and inspiration here.

Monday, November 24, 2014

An unwanted child...

There has been a story in the news this past week about a woman in Sydney, Australia, who dumped her newborn baby boy into a drain pipe. She intentionally dropped him into the drain, where there was a 2.5 metre drop, expecting that the fall would kill him. The baby survived for six days (nobody knows how!) and was rescued after passing cyclists heard his cries. He has been taken to hospital and is reportedly stable.

The “mother” is being charged with attempted murder – and yet it seems has been allowed to name the baby.

The Department of Family and Community Services has said the act was one of desperation.

I know I don’t know the facts and maybe I’m being overly unsympathetic – but there is no justification, no circumstance, and no level of desperation that makes what this woman did anything but evil. I know there are such things as postnatal depression, but what she did – which was premeditated and with full understanding that the baby would likely die – is inexcusable.

You only have to look at the location of the drain and the structure of the drain to know that this was not a spur of the moment, impulsive act. She had to go to the drain which is quite isolated off a major road. Once there it would not have been easy to put the baby into the drain given that its entry was low down and quite small.

Why, why, why can someone like this have a baby and I can’t?

Most of the time, now, I am okay with not having a baby. I have a good life and I pursue all sorts of interesting things and I spend amazing times with the children we have in our lives. Then something like this comes about and I cry for hours wondering whether there is any fairness in the world at all.

And why should she have any right, whatsoever, to name this tiny, precious, baby boy?

God?

Got any answers?

I didn’t think so.

New Story from Sydney Morning Herald

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Commenting as anonymous as I can't recall my log in.

I just came across your blog today, when feeling particularly low and lost and feeling as if I don't know what to do next. Like I should be raising babies... But I'm not. So in a desperate attempt to find someone else in my shoes I did a Google search and found you. Your blog is just the reminder I needed in my low moment today, that life does and will go on. It can and more importantly will be grand, but you've reminded me it's okay to have a weak moment every once in a while.

Kate Bettison said...

Thank you for your comment. I spent so many years thinking I shouldn't feel angry, or low, and that there must be some way to get to a point where I would be okay for the long term. We are told all the time by different sources that anger (in particular) is a bad emotion - but in reality, it's an emotion just like any other and it's how we face it and deal with it and give it space that is really important.

You and me - we're human - and that's okay x