- No words for her pain…
Couple Gets $4.5M Because Doctor Didn’t Suggest Abortion
How’d you like to growup, disabled, hopefully have had a happy life, then realize that your parents would have chosen to abort you if they had known you would be disabled? Well, little Bryan will experience that in his future thanks to his “parents” public lawsuit.
From LifeNews.com: A Florida couple will receive $4.5 million after winning a wrongful birth lawsuit claiming their son, born with no arms and one leg, should have become a victim of abortion. They complained the doctor in the case should have detected the physical disabilities before birth and suggested an abortion.
Ana Mejia and Rodolfo Santana filed suit in regards to the birth of their son Bryan, who is now a happy three-year-old boy. They asked a Palm Beach County Circuit Court jury for the money to be able to raise their son by requiring a Palm Beach Gardens obstetrician and the medical company she works for to pay $9 million towards the costs of his upbringing and damages for their pain and suffering.
Dr. Marie Morel and OB/GYN Specialists of the Palm Beaches were found to have failed to diagnose the disability and the jury awarded the couple $4.5 million. They determined that Morel was 85 percent responsible and the ultrasound tech 15 percent responsible for not informing the parents of the problems during the pregnancy.
“I have no words,” Mejia said after receiving the jury’s decision, according to the Palm Beach Post newspaper.
During the two week trial, Mejia and Santana both indicated they would have opted for an abortion had they known the severity of the physical disabilities of their son. They claimed the ultrasound tech at OB/GYN Specialists of the Palm Beaches and Perinatal Specialists of the Palm Beaches did not take proper ultrasounds that could have established the problems as the pregnancy unfolded.
“They went from the heights of joyous expectations to the depths of despair,” their attorney Robert Bergin told the jury in closing arguments Wednesday, according to the newspaper. “Ana and Rodolfo Santana know their mental anguish and their emotions are not important. The only thing that will help make up for their mental anguish is to know Bryan’s life plan is fully funded.”
The award is upsetting to pro-life advocates who say it promotes abortions in cases when unborn children are diagnosed with physical or mental disabilities in the womb and Paul Cooper of Pajamas Media said, the mother “will not win any mother-of-the year awards.”
“I hope when little Bryan grows up he never Googles himself or his parents. I can’t imagine the horror when he reads that his parents wish they would have killed him,” he said. “I wonder how quickly he will grasp that his parents think his life, since he has disabilities, isn’t worth living. I wonder if that jury considered how the disabled community would feel if they knew that a jury awarded these parents millions because they missed the opportunity to abort their disabled son.”
“Shortly after the jury made its decision I contacted Marc Sherman, Program Director for AccessABILITY Center for Independent Living, Inc. Sherman, who has been diagnosed with C5/C6 quadriplegia himself, had a strong reaction: ‘A disability is just a natural part of life. A person with a disability has just as much worth and just as much as importance as anybody else. It doesn’t matter what kind of disability, they have just as much worth and importance. They should get to choose how they want to live.’”
Well, I have some words for Ms. (Mrs.?) Mejia/Santana, whatever - you are a disgusting excuse for a parent to not love your child as it was born. Shame on you for blaming the doctor and ultrasound technician for what occurred naturally. Modern technology isn’t perfect and neither are human beings. But being perfect isn’t inherent in any of us.
Hopefully your son will realize that when he is full-grown and have the compassion to forgive you. But I wouldn’t blame him if he didn’t.
DCG
I hope the $4.5 million makes them as miserable as the majority of lottery winners.
Of course, once their lawyers have shaved off their cut, Ana and Rodolfo might just be on food stamps by Christmas.
I really feel for Bryan, as he doesn’t deserve “parents” such as these.
-But I bet he will grow up happier than his parents combined.
-Dave
When you look at a baby, it’s not just that: a body you can look and touch. But the person who takes shape within is formed by something you can’t see and touch -the Spirit – and becomes a living spirit. That’s the way it is with everyone “born from above” by the word of God, the Spirit of God.
Funny how my readings are aptly applying to my posts…
Bryan will grow up with a perpetual hurt. The mother of S, a friend of mine, cruelly told S she had thrown herself down the stairs in a failed attempt to abort S.
S has never “gotten over” that information. Both S and her mom are “liberals” and pro-abortion. S herself had two abortions, is now middle-aged and childless. Her mom was a social worker and, now 80 years old, recently lamented about all the poor single mothers who were once her case-load and said they should have aborted their children.
And so the sins of the parents leave their mark and are visited on the children….
No that’s not a happy story. So sad. I hope the kid out does every ones expectations.
This actually heppened to two of our closest friends in the late seventies. He was an OB-Gynof the highest integrity. Seems he did not order an ultrasound for a woman who later gave birth to a child who was less than perfect. Our friends were sued for eight MILLION dollars. The thing is, ultrasounds were not routinely done during that time period, and there was no reason to order one on this woman. After several years in court and endless stress, he was declared not at fault. His wife, who was in her mid-forties at that time, suffered a heart attack and breast cancer–I will remain convinced that these were caused by stress.
That’s awful D.W. – who will want to become a doctor now, with the cost of med-school – and the added cost of insurance – who will do it now? Many experts are predicting a great shortage of doctors in the upcoming decades.
The trail-lawyers had a good thing going before – now they are running our country!!!
DW,
There is ample scientific evidence that when we are under stress, our bodies release stress hormones that are very damaging to our health. I, too, believe that your friend’s heart attack and breast cancer were caused by the stress from her husband being attacked.
Eo and D.W. – The Word speaks on subject of intense sorrow and stress in both O.T. and N.T.-
“The spirit of a man will sustain his infirmity; but a wounded spirit who can bear?” Proverbs 18 14
Here – Jesus is under intense sorrow and stress – “And saith unto them, ‘My soul is exceeding sorrowful unto death; tarry ye here, and watch.” Mark 14: 34
In the Garden of Gethsemane, anticipating his death on the cross, Jesus was under such duress he sweated blood.
Yes – Oh, How He loves us, it still mystifies me.
Bryan deserves better, e.g., Someone who ‘actually’ loves him. Praise the Lord above, He does!
What fudging will they do when the day of reckoning comes…the day Bryan gets a reality check along with a ‘sick feeling in the pit of the stomach’ and confronts them about this?
Will she say, … “I have no words” …Then?
Hopefully, Bryan will know he isn’t alone in being a child of narcissists, and he isn’t crazy, and he is of infinite WORTH.
I remember reading the story of a couple who were told that they should have an abortion because their daughter would be deaf. They refused. At the time the story was written, their daughter was in college, majoring in music.
This is a prime example of people who should be drawn and quartered.
More bad parenting tales of our times… Kansas, this time.
“Kindergartener Brings Crack Pipe, Meth for Show-and-Tell,” br Bruce Olson, Reuters via Yahoo! News, 20 Sep 2011
http://news.yahoo.com/kindergartener-brings-crack-pipe-meth-show-tell-202314001.html
Mom arrested ’cause they were hers.
Shove your millions where the sun don’t shine! These people are sickening! And the false tears get me! Opportunists! I had the wonderful honor to fight for my son’s life who was disabled! With God’s help, he went through seventeen surgeries and boy did my son and I fight this battle! I can stand before Our Lord and look myself in the mirror with peace in my heart. I pray for my wonderful son daily, as he is a lost soul right now. But, he will come back to Our Lord as Jesus loves him very much. In any event, Jesus said, “Take up your cross and follow Me.” Great good ultimately comes out of suffering and doing the right thing in spite of great challenges. The mindset of these people reflects the gauge of our society! Lost, lost and lost!
Joan – you are right-on about wayward children coming back to the Lord. We have the example of the Prodigal son, from Jesus’ parable (which I’m getting ready to do a series on!!!) and this wonderful, wonderful promise to parents everywhere. . .
“Train up a child in the way he should go: and when he is old, he will not depart from it..” Proverbs 22:6 Amen and amen.
I know I am late on the game for a comment, but I just found out about this lawsuit. As a person who was born with amniotic band syndrome in 1957, I am absolutely mortified to even *think* that they would have aborted this person. If this is a standard norm for people to abort their baby with amniotic band syndrome then I MUST step up and speak out of how wrong this is! NO doctor EVER should face a lawsuit for a wrongful birth. By the way, back in 1957, they called it a congenital birth defect. it wasn’t until 2007 that I found out that my problem had a name and it was called ABS. This lawsuit is so very wrong. so wrong.
Thankfully Donna your parents had some common sense!