Glamour, pregnancy, and cancer
The July issue of Glamour magazine features a story about 28-year-old Erin Zammett, a Glamour staffer who decided to get pregnant despite the fact she has a form of leukemia so serious as to be often fatal until recently.
Erin knew in advance she would have to go off her cancer med during pregnancy, which compounded the controversy of her decision. She is due with a boy Sept. 1.
Erin got hate mail when she wrote in Glamour last summer of her decision to get pregnant.
Stop for a sec before reading on. From whom do you think Erin got that hate mail, pro-lifers or pro-aborts?
Big hint. Here is the email Erin received that she said “got to me the most.”
“Frankly, it disturbs me that you value your own life, and your husband’s commitment, so little that you would risk everything so that your eggs may be fertilized. How selfish.”
Frankly, that sounds like a certain commenter on our blog. Say it ain’t so?
Kudos to Glamour, a decidedly pro-abortion publication, for letting Erin freely tell her story.
Liberal editorial staff must have had a difficult time not striking such lines as, “I started eating for two,” and “I’m very attached to the baby these days. Feeling him move is amazing, and I could stare at the sonogram pictures for hours.”
Then again, this is a wanted baby, so it’s ok to acknowledge him as a person, right?
The story is not yet available online, but you can access Erin’s blog.
[Photo, courtesy of Erin’s blog, is of her and her husband Nick.]
Jill Stanek is a nurse turned speaker, columnist and blogger, a national figure in the effort to protect both preborn and postborn innocent human life.
You know, so long as she keeps herself healthy and makes sure to monitor everything, I think she’ll do well. I read a story forever ago about a woman who had breast cancer and got pregnant and kept the baby, but it was during the 80s, when breast cancer was a big big deal. So I hope she does well.
I don’t understand her reasoning, I absolutely can’t, but eh. It’s her choice, and so long as she keeps herself healthy, she should, hopefully, be fine.
That’s ridiculous that she would get hate mail! Anyone who is truly pro-choice would support her for *choosing* to have a baby despite her illness. It’s pro-CHOICE, people! We like choices! We don’t hate babies!
I apologize on behalf of those individuals who like to call themselves pro-choice, and who then turn around and make a mockery of our cause. I’m ashamed.
Frankly, I find it admirable. Good for Erin! I wouldn’t do it, but that’s me (that’s my *choice*!!!!)
I don’t think you should crank out a child until you’ve tried – to the best of your ability – to ensure that you can be a mother to that child. It’s one of the things that drives me bonkers when substance abusers have children.
(Heck, I’m a dyed-in-the-wool militant feminazi, and I don’t think you should have children without trying your best to provide them with a sound, stable, male parent/role model. The stats on fatherless homes are STAGGERING!)
Laura, I’m actually reading a book about the importance of boys (although the book mentions that it applies to girls also–the book just happens to be on raising adolescent boys) having a male role model. I would never have a child without the support of a man. That’s me, though.
Kudos to Glamour, a decidedly pro-abortion publication, for letting Erin freely tell her story.
Hear, hear. Ya gotta give credit where credit is due.
Remember also last summer, when Seventeen magazine published an article titled “My Mom Made Me Get an Abortion”?
And now this from Glamour. Not bad for a couple of magazines that usually aren’t worth the perfume-scented glossy paper they’re printed on.
Leah… I don’t think you need to apologize for the actions/words of others, especially to these people here.
God bless Erin and her baby! God shall see her through!
It’s an odd decision to make at a time like that and I don’t know why she couldn’t wait until she was off her chemo to get pregnant. Most women would probably consider the impact of chemo drugs on their babies development and would postpone but there is no law against it, personal choices are just that but hopefully all goes well. Most drug guides state “do not take if you are pregnant” but as we don’t know the actual drug she’s taking or the risks of deformity etc we can only speculate. Again, as I say I hope all goes well but I take it she goes into it knowing the risks so fingers crossed.
Mary, fyi, the article stated the drug was Gleevec.
Laura says,
I don’t think you should crank out a child until you’ve tried – to the best of your ability – to ensure that you can be a mother to that child. It’s one of the things that drives me bonkers when substance abusers have children.
I don’t think you should have sex until you are prepared for the fact that you TWO may be bringing a child into the world, as only one form of birth control is 100% effective. It seems as though you may be judging her and her decision to have a baby when you fight for A WOMEN’S CHOICE!
Perhaps if abortion weren’t so easily available, substance abusers would think about having tubal ligations!!! I know a crack abuser who says she has had @ least 9 abortions. She sells her body on the streets. She and her crack abusing hubby had a baby last year. A family member now has custody of this child. She STILL has not had a tubal ligation. Why? There’s always good old abortion to fall back on!!!
Heather4life said:
Perhaps if abortion weren’t so easily available, substance abusers would think about having tubal ligations!!!
Heather4life,
Margaret Sanger would be proud of you. What you’re proposing here is eugenics, pure and simple.
This woman desperately needs help to overcome her crack addition. I fail to see how having her undergo a mutilating surgery would help her do that.
It simply cannot be stated often enough: If we as pro-lifers fight abortion while simultaneously believing there is nothing wrong with contraception — of which sterilization is one example, in addition to being a form of mutilation — we do so at our own peril.
Abortion is the fruit of contraception.
I didn’t know where to post this, so I’m posting it here for those of you who have asked about my pregnancy. I posted an update this morning on my blog, you can see it here. Thank you so much for all of the prayers…and those of you who are, please keep praying if you will:
http://bethany.preciousinfants.com/2007/06/25/the-results-i-got-today.aspx
Another update…
http://bethany.preciousinfants.com/2007/06/25/im-sorry.aspx
Bethany, I will e-mail you.
John, I meant no offense to you. I feel that crack abusers generally have a high # of abortions. I feel that they should fight their addictions, but I also feel that some should opt for steralization. If they can’t refrain from sexual activity [as most cannot] I think sterilization is in order!…Sorry.
John, I know a crack addict who sells her body on the streets. She’s had 9 abortions. How many more children should she abort before getting a clue? I totally disagree with you on this one.
Heather4life said:
I feel that they should fight their addictions, but I also feel that some should opt for steralization.
Heather,
Drug addicts cannot fight their addictions by themselves. They need help from others — intensive counseling, rehab, etc. — along with, of course, some intensive spiritual support as well.
If this woman you know were an animal, then there would be no problem with sterilizing her.
But she’s not an animal. She’s a human being.
Thus, her body is created in the image and likeness of God. Mutilating it would be an abomination before Him. Furthermore, it won’t help her.
Jesus died for her sins, too, and she needs His love and the love of those of us who love Him to help her get out of the prison of her addiction.
John, I see what you are saying. I know many people who have overcome their addictions, but I know others who have been through rehab. 25 times or more. This includes heroin addicts, crack addicts and alcoholics. A lot of the female addicts sell their bodies for drugs. They don’t seem to want steralization. Abortions are their birth control of choice. I know women who have had tubal ligations. They are not mutilated. A simple procedure.
Heather4life said:
I know women who have had tubal ligations. They are not mutilated.
Even though they don’t realize it, they are. That’s precisely why sterilization — and all other forms of contraception, too, for that matter — are so downright evil: Most of us don’t see (refuse to see?) the utterly unnatural and sinful nature therein.
Tubal ligation takes a woman’s perfectly healthy fallopian tubes, cuts them, ties them, and prevents them from doing the very thing they were created to do, thus fitting well within the parameters of the definition of the word mutilate: “to injure, disfigure, or make imperfect by removing or irreparably damaging parts.”
Tubal ligation also carries with it a whole host of side effects, both short term and long term.
Technically it does mutilate women, Heather. It shouldn’t be required of a woman to have a ligation: it should absolutely never be a requirement. But I see nothing particularly wrong with the procedure. Unfortunately, it is more often than not seen as an elective procedure, and thus not covered by insurance. It’s prohibitively expensive, most doctors won’t do it unless you have children or are over thirty, and it’s difficult to find a place to do it even then.
Less, The 40 year old crack abuser I know could sure use one.
Maybe she could, but ultimately it’s her choice whether or not to have the procedure done.
Right and that’s why she’ll have more abortions.
P.S. An abortion can be just as “mutilating” as a tubal. A woman I know had 7 abortions, and ended up with a hysterectomy due to severe damage to her uterus. Look at the girl in the above post who died from a perfectly legal abortion. Now that’s mutilation. The tubal will at least prevent another baby from being killed.