Any mother who hears that her unborn child has little chance of surviving outside the womb faces a heartbreaking choice: go through with the pregnancy and birth, or end the pain now.
For my parents, it wasn’t a choice at all.
Twenty years ago, they were newlyweds joyfully expecting their first child. Halfway through the pregnancy, they learned that their daughter – my sister – suffered from anencephaly, a fetal anomaly with a 100% mortality rate in the first year of life. A quarter of the babies with this condition die before birth. Others die in the hours or days after.
Anencephaly prevents the closure of the neural tube in the first weeks of life, which prevents the brain and skull from growing and developing normally. Babies born with this condition commonly lack large portions of skull bone and brain tissue. Their senses and motor functions are impaired. Estimates suggest that more than 90% of anencephalic babies are aborted.
Arizona, Delaware, Louisiana, Massachusetts, South Carolina, Utah, and West Virginia make exceptions to their abortion restrictions for cases of lethal fetal anomaly. Maryland makes an exception for any fetal anomaly at all. In these states, unborn babies diagnosed with a condition that threatens their lives or makes long-term viability outside of the womb highly unlikely can be aborted at any stage of the pregnancy.
Abortion proponents value these exceptions because many fetal abnormalities cannot be diagnosed before an ultrasound at 18-22 weeks of pregnancy, which is well past the abortion cutoffs in many states. Other states allow abortion at any stage, for any reason, including fetal anomaly.
My parents’ original doctor, as well as many of my mother’s law firm colleagues, encouraged an abortion. Even today, plenty of articles and discussion boards about anencephaly advise abortion as the most compassionate, painless solution for mother and child. Some cite the ugliness and weakness of an anencephalic infant, or the emotional and psychological pain the mother will experience in carrying to full term. Isn’t it for the sake of the parents’ “selfish joy,” Cristiane de Oliveira asks, to prolong the infant’s life until birth?
Mary Grace Kurt was born July 9, 2003, two weeks premature. Pictures still sit on our bookshelves at home of Mary Grace in my mother’s arms, a hospital cap covering her half-formed skull. Yet, she was perfect. My parents fell in love with her dainty hands, chubby toes, and sweet face. They dressed and baptized her in a tiny white gown my mother handmade during the pregnancy. Family and friends came to visit my parents and meet Mary Grace. Three days later, on July 11, she passed away peacefully in their arms.
Why give such a child a chance at life? The joy, peace, and beauty that gushed from her short existence blessed every generation of my family, including the four children my parents would go on to have. Suffering is no reason to end a life early. Whatever emotional and psychological hardship my mother endured during the pregnancy were repaid a hundredfold in Mary Grace’s three days of life outside the womb. All she ever knew was love and comfort: the gentle embrace of my parents and grandparents, breastmilk, and warm clothing. Babies who are severed from life with cold forceps or suction machines suffer an unspeakably crueler end.
The beauty of my parents’ choice further unfolded in the years to come, when they chose to celebrate Mary Grace’s birthday each year and tell her story to their other children.
They wanted us to know that we, like Mary Grace, would be loved unconditionally, no matter our health, physical appearance, or abilities. Their children were a blessing to them, not a burden.
Babies with fetal anomalies can bring astonishing happiness to the families that receive them, even amid the tears.
In a world that preaches “compassion” and sugar-coated selfishness, let’s demonstrate true love. No matter the heartbreak and grief, no one deserves to die before his or her time. We must firmly reject exceptions to abortion restrictions for fetal anomalies and defend the inherent dignity and value of every unborn child’s life.
