TV anchor’s baby defies terminal diagnosis
One of many reasons why a mother shouldn’t abort her baby with an adverse prenatal diagnosis is so she won’t be plagued with guilt and doubt the rest of her life when viewing heartwarming stories like the following. Note that abortion was recommended, standard eugenic protocol these days. Click on link to view video…
From WTAE ABC, November 23…
Pittsburgh – Thanksgiving has come a little early for WTAE… anchor Kelly Frey and her husband, Jason.
After a complicated and difficult pregnancy, Frey gave birth to the couple’s first child in September – a baby boy named Bennett….
[A]t just 2 months old, Bennett is a tough little guy and the whole family is enjoying the strong grip of his tiny fingers, especially since he wasn’t supposed to be able to hold on at all….
On Aug. 26, Frey shared with viewers the news of her pregnancy and the news that things weren’t going well.
“Tuesday, April 21, was a tough day, roughly 10 o’clock in the morning – a time we will never forget, the time we first got our terminal diagnosis. That was hard, very hard. It takes us right back,” Frey said.
Doctors diagnosed their son with holoprosencephaly, a severe malformation of the brain….
“Here we are, we went through that whole time in the pregnancy, all those months just watching him get bigger on the ultrasound watching him in my tummy. Little hands, little feet, little heartbeat. It was always hard. But it was always joyous, too. But when he came out on Sept. 22, whew!” Frey said….
On delivery day, Bennett beat the odds. Not only was he breathing on his own, he was crying, screaming, letting people know he was alive….
“I was so overwhelmed I was almost scared to touch him at first. Not in disbelief, but somewhat in disbelief because here is this child that we lived with the knowledge for all those months, 7 months that he was going to die. And here he was bundled up and he was alive,” said Frey.
And after 7 weeks in the hospital, including 3 serious surgeries, Bennett is now home with mom and dad.
“His brain had been compressed like a sponge – the cortex, the thinking part, because of all the fluid. And over the last 7 weeks, with the scan they have done, they’ve actually seen the cortex area of his brain expand…. We truly believe that’s why you can see him like this sitting here, cooing, eating, he’s not on a ventilator. He’s not on a feeding tube,” Frey said. “We’ve heard different prognoses and this and that. But then again, even the doctors are saying, ‘We simply don’t know to a certain degree of what he’s going to be able to do, because he’s already done what he shouldn’t be doing.”…
Not long before Monday’s 5p newscast, Frey told Clark by phone that Bennett was back at Children’s Hospital for more tests because he didn’t feel well over the weekend. She hopes to get him out quickly and back home before Thanksgiving.
[HT: Patricia A.]
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.
OOPS! It says ‘This video is not available in your country due to copyright restrictions’ My country? I’m in the USA…what’s the deal?
Got the same message….what’s the deal?
Try again…
I was able to watch it.
Thank you Jesus for your love and tender mercies.
What a beautiful family.
When you think about what could have been for so many, and how women are pressured into killing fetuses because they are or might be handicapped, it just spurs me on to work for the end of abortion!!!
It is my impression from listening to women that rather than giving complete information (about available treatments), resources and support services (support groups, widespread perinatal hospice, connecting her with other parents who’ve been in her situation), doctors and genetists are quick to only give frightening clinical descriptions and worst-case scenarios, and immediately suggest abortion, regardless. Organizations such as “A Heartbreaking Choice” reinforce this. Women are given the impression that having an abortion is the best choice or the only feasable option in the situation of an adverse prenatal diagnosis. Where’s the choice or empowerment in feeling like you did not have enough resources or support & abortion was the only feasable option?
Rachael C I also believe it’s the “perfect baby” mindset and the belief that everyone is entitled to the perfect baby.
Babies are commodities. They are not human persons. This is the mindset.
Therefore, an imperfect baby can be disposed of.
The truth is, the doctors are often wrong.
Praise God! It shows that doctors and medical science is not always right. There is always a chance that doctors do not know what is going to happen.
There is a woman at our church that was told that her baby had fluid on the brain and the prognosis was unknown. She went on to have a perfectly beautiful healthy baby boy!
Rachel C.
Love what you wrote!!
How is it choice when one feels they have no choice?
What a beautiful family and a beautiful baby! Thank you Lord!!
I like http://www.benotafraid.net
Rachel, thank you!
I just wanted to comment that it was great to hear those MD’s words at the end . . .humility is never out of place, is it?
I can not view the video for some reason, but the story is so compelling. It is in large part, the reason that 90% of all babies with Ds are aborted. Misinformation and a negative diagnosis from the professionals. Not a hard thing for me to imagine, after all of the women I have spoken with over the years, who come to find out the other side of the story. I am glad this beautiful family has been so blessed! Rachel C. I could not agree more. I am off to figure out how I can see the video.
It is called:
M A N I P U L A T I O N
A very common and pervasive form of ‘witchcraft’.
I use the term ‘witch’ in a gender neutral sense.
Men indulge in ‘manipulation’ about as equally as women.
It is usually ‘girlymen’ (think Harry Reid) who fear confrontation especially if they believe they cannot obtain the object of their desire if they use the honest and direct approach to negotiation.
yor bro ken
I just wish EVERY mother in this situation could hear stories like this one, and get out of the ‘doctors are God’ mindset. Doctors don’t know EVERYTHING. I agree with Rachael “doctors and geneticists are quick to only give frightening clinical descriptions and worst-case scenarios”, that’s why 90% of Babies with Down Syndrome are aborted. What a sweet and ENCOURAGING story! Thanks, Jill! :)
Why don’t we pro-lifers go the whole 9 yards and campaign for NO ABORTIONS in the USA. Let Canada and Mexico pick up the abortion ball. I would rather my tax dollars go to make more provision for the unwanted live babies, something on the order of what the Booth Memorial Hospitals used to provide. I myself am a Booth Baby (back in ’37) and our adopted daughter was also a Booth Baby in ’64.
Doctors please stop practicing so much defensive medicine but give women options, also give them options of hope (we can’t predict perfectly) so they will make an informed decision. I am so grateful that they choose life for Bennett, look what joy they would have missed. “Better to have lived and loved than not to have loved at all” and to have end up killing your baby. I can’t tell you how many times I have heard of women being given death sentences for their child because of prenatal diagnosis that were off base and the babies turned out either fine or with treatable conditions. Can someone please do research on this maybe Jill have people report on this blog how many stories of women that have not aborted and had this happen? STOP THE KILLING even if the outcome is a imperfect baby. THOU SHALL NOT KILL. Maybe if we could get good data on this situation we can turn this around. Also all doctors could give out info on ways to choose life for their baby, even places where adoption services are available.
As I stated in another post on this site, something ‘similar’ happened to me. Our daughter was not given a ‘fatal’ diagnosis exactly, but we were told she had ‘markers’ for Down Syndrome, and we were sent to the ‘genetic counselor’. I told him we didn’t need to be there because, regardless of the outcome, she was our baby, and we were having her. Turns out the tests were WRONG. There isn’t a THING wrong with our daughter. Some women would have believed that ‘diagnosis’ and aborted, and in fact, too many of them DO. If only the word would get out that too often those tests are INACCURATE, a fact that even doctors themselves will actually ADMIT on occasion. They cause needless death and needless WORRY…very often for nothing.
Hi Pamela. Thanks for your story. Is there any way we can get the word out about this and get some honest statistics about this? Jill and moderators maybe after the Thanksgiving holiday weekend could we get a thread going about this and ask women to post their stories and other prolifers to post stories about women in this situation. Does anyone have any idea how many misdiagnosis there are?
Sorry mods, I meant to check the box to get a response regarding prenatal misdiagnosis.
I think we have to be careful to always distinguish between diagnosis and screening. Ultrasound can diagnose – but it’s a different kind of diagnosis than amnio. There is much more room for error and misinterpretation.
There are lots of stories of misdiagnoses out there, but if we are talking about a screening test to begin with, then it’s not right to say that a different outcome is a misdiagnosis, kwim?
Compounding the issue of determining stats on misdiagnosis is that when there is an abortion, there is not always a post-mortem to verify or document. You can find journal articles expressing the need for better protocol and diligence in documenting post-mortem after termination.
The other difficulty re getting stats is that you may have a misdiagnosis of the first suspected condition, but the baby may have another condition or a lesser severity, etc. How will that be documented in a way we can use and where would we find it? Even in my case, we were told baby had HLHS, but in reality she had HRHS (still needed surgeries, still complex defect, etc).
I wish it were more cut and dry because believe me, the stats would tell a fascinating story! No matter what, there is always room for hope. And a good outcome doesn’t always mean the baby is born without this or that – it can mean that the parents themselves are transformed – a point that is sometimes undervalued.
i watched this in new zealand
Thanks Monica, you bring up some good points that should be clarified. the difference between screening and diagnosis. My point is I have worked with my local CPC for years (not as a counselor but in other capacities) where we are having more clients with these stories. Thank God they find out about us to get the support they need and they are very appreciative, but how many women are we missing that want help and support. We have had clients who were basically told they had no option except to abort their babies and were belittled if they refused. I worked in healthcare for years and I have seen how women can be manipulated to think they have no options especially when doctors practice defensive medicine. When women don’t know how to get and give informed consent and don’t know what questions to ask to be aware of their options it makes it me very sad.