So Sad For The Children
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| Wed, 07-15-2009 - 5:53pm |
When this was first in the news, I wasn't particularly supportive of her choice, but I could understand her desire to have children. I wondered whether she would be there for them, or whether she would succumb to one of the many illnesses/diseases of older age before they grew up. Sadly, the children are without their mother and father:
Maria del Carmen Bousada, World's Oldest New Mother Who Gave Birth At 66 Reported Dead
July 15, 2009
MADRID — A Spanish woman believed to have become the world's oldest new mother when she gave birth at age 66 has died, leaving behind twin toddlers, newspapers reported Tuesday.
Maria del Carmen Bousada, who reportedly died Saturday at age 69, gave birth in December 2006 as a single mother after getting in vitro fertilization treatment.
She told an interviewer she lied to a California fertility clinic about her age, and maintained that because her mother had lived to be 101, she had a good chance of living long enough to raise a child.
Bousada's death was reported by the newspaper El Mundo and Diario de Cadiz. Cadiz is the southern province where Bousada lived her whole life.
Diario de Cadiz quoted her brother, Ricardo Bousada, as confirming her death but refusing to disclose the cause. The newspaper said she had been diagnosed with a tumor shortly after giving birth.
There was no word on who would raise the children, named Pau and Christian. Bousada had once said she would look for a younger man to help her raise them.
In January 2007, she told the British tabloid News of the World that she sold her house to raise $59,000 to pay for the in vitro fertilization.
"I think everyone should become a mother at the right time for them," Bousada said in a video of the interview provided to Associated Press Television News.
"Often circumstances put you between a rock and a hard place, and maybe things shouldn't have been done in the way they were done, but that was the only way to achieve the thing I had always dreamed of, and I did it," she said.
The retired department store employee said she told the Pacific Fertility Center in Los Angeles that she was 55 – the clinic's cut-off for treating single women. She said the clinic did not ask her for identification.
Bousada lived with her mother most of her life in Cadiz. She hatched her plan to have children after her mother died in 2005, she said, initially keeping her plan secret from her family. When she finally told them she was two months pregnant, they thought she was joking.
"Yes, I am old of course, but if I live as long as my mom did, imagine, I could even have grandchildren," she said in the video.>>>
~OPAL~ 

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I am opposed to the idea of much older women having a child or children through in-vitro. The woman may think that it fulfills one of her needs, but as this example makes clear, offspring may be orphaned early; or have a parent who just does not have the energy and stamina to raise a baby, a toddler, a child, a teenager.
The nonsense of "love is enough" simply doesn't address the considerable effort also entailed in childrearing.
Rather than insist on becoming a parent, it would be much better if an older woman finds another outlet for her maternal instincts--volunteer at hospital nursery, as a foster parent, work as a volunteer at an elementary school--there are many options which don't require longevity or 24/7 commitment.
Too many people (Octomom included) are short-sighted or selfish in their desire to reproduce. You can't change your mind about parenthood; or take the children back if you change your mind or feel you have a "defective" product!
Jabberwocka
Never thought about the hormones which would be necessary to stimulate ovulation, and a possible link to cancer, but you're right to raise the question. HRT studies were stopped abruptly because it was shown that the hormones were in fact causing far more problems than solutions.
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http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2002/jul/10/research.medicalscience.
Elizabeth Edwards was on "Wait, Wait, Don't Tell Me" a month or so ago. She sounded hoarse and tired. Was promoting her book "Resilience". Talk about an appropriate book title! I wish her the best. She married a philandering, narcissistic jerk and now faces cancer with no real surety that he'll be there for her.
Jabberwocka
As a more "mature" woman I could not
"Too many people (Octomom included) are short-sighted or selfish in their desire to reproduce."
I agree.
It's not like a puppy
Yea, I agree, we should all waste some time to judge the actions of others because we've never made choices that others disapprove of, which of coarse automatically will make those choices right or wrong. Damning others for their choices is stupid, just don't do it yourself if you don't like it. I bet most of us sit in church too. What a waste of time,eh?
Basically, The woman wanted a baby and she didn't live as long as she thought she was going to. The truth is that we can be young and assume we have time and that may not be true, but we live our lives to the fullest, or we try, not knowing if each day will be our last. Why should she have assumed her's would be any different?
Life is about living and loving. In my opinion there's nothing wrong with giving life, whatever the age. If anything it's simply just sad, they lost a mother who loved them. I bet those children wouldn't appreciate all the negative things small minded people have to say about their mother.
At least she loved them enough to give them life, perhaps they were meant to be here, who are we to judge? So what if she lived her life differently, people are different, our choices differ. End of story.
This is a board. We comment regularly on our perceptions of stories in the news. Nature of the beast, as it were. If it's a waste of time or stupid to post here, then join the club since you just did so as well. As to whether we sit in church or not, I don't see how religious affiliation would affect what's been posted. BTW, some of us aren't Christians. Some are.
The children of whom you spoke are very unlikely to come to this specific site and read our comments, negative or positive.
A woman who undertakes parenthood at the age of 66 is an idiot or a self-absorbed fool if she doesn't give some thought to her advanced age and the future of her children. Assuming that one will live as long as one's parents seems indicative of both!
And I absolutely disagree that "she loved them enough to give them life" since at the time of conception she didn't KNOW them but was instead making a point of flying in the face of both ease and good sense. Pretty selfish kind of "love" to do so, IMHO.
Jabberwocka
I guess I was lucky.
I guess I was, too.
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