When someone first said this to me, I was too shocked to say anything at the time. Even after a few weeks of contemplation, I cannot help but think..."WTF?!"
I still can't make sense of this comment. Are there people out there who think that if a baby hasn't developed to full term and isn't born into the world, that that baby isn't a person? How far along does a baby need to be before he or she is considered a real someone?
The image below from 1972 is a well publicized picture of a tiny fetus still in his/her amniotic sac, which was taken after surgery for an ectopic pregnancy. This baby is 6 weeks old. Our Pip was the size of a 6.5 week old baby when we saw her at our 9 week scan, so I imagine she would have been very similar in size and development to the little bubba in this picture.
When we saw the only glimpse of Pip we had at our first scan of doom, I could clearly see the shape of her head as well as the tiny buds on her body which looked like tiny hands and feet. That image has been burned into my mind and I don't think I will ever forget it.
A baby's heart begins to beat by day 21. By week 5, the brain has divided into 5 areas, some cranial nerves are visible and their facial features have begun forming. At 6 weeks, the heart has dividied into it's left and right chambers, it's pumping blood and although we can't hear it yet, it beats at the rate of 150 per minute, which is twice the rate of ours! Halfway through week 6, the baby makes it's first movements although mum doesn't feel movements until the second trimester.
I'm sorry, but to me that sounds like a human being. I don't understand how someone could dismiss a life just because of it's size.
To me, someone has died and that someone is my baby. She was alive and growing inside me and now she is dead. Is that really so difficult to understand?
I still can't make sense of this comment. Are there people out there who think that if a baby hasn't developed to full term and isn't born into the world, that that baby isn't a person? How far along does a baby need to be before he or she is considered a real someone?
The image below from 1972 is a well publicized picture of a tiny fetus still in his/her amniotic sac, which was taken after surgery for an ectopic pregnancy. This baby is 6 weeks old. Our Pip was the size of a 6.5 week old baby when we saw her at our 9 week scan, so I imagine she would have been very similar in size and development to the little bubba in this picture.
When we saw the only glimpse of Pip we had at our first scan of doom, I could clearly see the shape of her head as well as the tiny buds on her body which looked like tiny hands and feet. That image has been burned into my mind and I don't think I will ever forget it.
A baby's heart begins to beat by day 21. By week 5, the brain has divided into 5 areas, some cranial nerves are visible and their facial features have begun forming. At 6 weeks, the heart has dividied into it's left and right chambers, it's pumping blood and although we can't hear it yet, it beats at the rate of 150 per minute, which is twice the rate of ours! Halfway through week 6, the baby makes it's first movements although mum doesn't feel movements until the second trimester.
I'm sorry, but to me that sounds like a human being. I don't understand how someone could dismiss a life just because of it's size.
To me, someone has died and that someone is my baby. She was alive and growing inside me and now she is dead. Is that really so difficult to understand?
What a farking twit that person was. I'm so sorry you had such an insensitive comment hun, they obviously haven't had a loss like this. Yes, Pip was alive and growing AND A PERSON. I'm so sorry she had to leave :'(
ReplyDeletePeople say some really stupid things sometimes. My impression is, is that it usually comes from people too scared to acknowledge their own feelings, so to be confronted with something so intensely sad, they get defensive and try to minimise your feelings as their way of coping. I had one friend say to me when I described my miscarriage as "disturbing" that she couldn't see how it could be, and then proceeded to tell me the things I should be feeling (like that one particular feeling wasn't as acceptable as others were?!?!) Needless to say that friendship was put on hold for a while because I needed that time to recover without being surrounded by those sorts of ignorant, negative attitudes. Someone did die, it's a horrible thing to go through so you have every right to go through every stage of the grieving process.
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