Guide to Informed Choices
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about "my child" who is inside of my body. Dr. Bernard Nathanson quotes a study in the
New England Journal of Medicine where 9 out of 10 women seeing an ultrasound chose to go away pregnant. 87
That‘s something, isn‘t it? Certainly not all, but many women are able to get past their terror and realize that this child is already real, and that he or she does not have to mean the end of the world. Could that be the real reason clinics prefer you don‘t see ultrasounds? Yes, they criticize pregnancy centers for allowing a non-doctor to show you an ultrasound, yet they have been found to do the same! 88 Some clinics also prevent women seeing it. Violet wrote to me, ―When I tried to see the screen on the ultrasound, the woman turned the monitor away.‖
This action was clearly not to protect Violet — she wanted to see. In fact clinics often list this as clinic policy on their website: ―The woman does not observe the fetus on the ultrasound
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screen in this process.‖ 89
Is this so she won‘t be burdened or so she won‘t change her mind?
Quotable Quote ―I was stunned when I saw on the ultrasound a tiny, living creature spinning around in my womb. Tap-dancing, I think. Waving its tiny arms around and trying to suck its thumb. I could have sworn I heard it laughing.‖ 90
—Madonna, WORLDMag.com , October 1996
Reason #8 ―Ultrasound shows us it‘s a real baby‖
Reason #9 It‘s not just a bunch of cells!
Your amazing fetus The first trimester Nobody wants to perform abortions after 10 weeks because, by then, you see the features of the baby, hands and feet. 91
MD: Doctors Talk About Themselves
t‘s just a bunch of cells, you‘ll probably hear. But do they ever tell you just what
is in that bunch of cells? Probably not. The first 12 weeks, also known as the first trimester, is the time I call ―from blob to baby.‖ It really is an amazing time. Let‘s see what the ‗cells‘ are doing each week. Before we see what is growing, let‘s look at the sizes we are talking about. These come from a pregnancy book and have been rounded off:
Week 1: 0.005 inch, think the period at the end of a sentence
Week 7: 1 inch, think a medium green olive
Week 10: 2.5 inches, think a kiwifruit
Week 12: 4 inches, think your fist I
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Week 18: 6 inches, think the length of a pen
Week 21: 8 inches, think a small doll
Week 26: 10 inches, think your elbow to wrist
a ruler
Week 35: 14 inches, think your knee to ankle
Week 38: 15 inches, think a newborn 92
These measurements are only crown (head) to rump (backside) measurements. The complete height would include the fetus‘ legs also.
Week 1
At conception the sex and traits of the child are determined. The fertilized egg floats from the fallopian tubes down towards the uterus, repeatedly dividing in half until it resembles a ball of cells that look like a raspberry. The cells then separate into two groups — the cells that will develop into the baby‘s placenta and amniotic sac and the cells that will develop into all different tissues in a baby‘s body. 93
Ever wondered? How does a cell know what cell it will become and how to become that cell?
Week 2
This ball of cells floats down until it finds a cozy home in the folds of the uterus. The placental cells play an important role by attaching to the wall of the uterus and sending hormonal messages to your body so that it continues producing progesterone. Without progesterone, you would have your period and lose the pregnancy. 94
How does a pregnancy test work?
It detects the presence of a pregnancy hormone named human chorionic gonadotropin (called HcG for short). If it tests positive for the hormone, that means you are pregnant, as HcG is produced by your baby‘s placenta. If you‘re wondering how it gets into your urine, well, it crosses the placenta and gets into your bloodstream and then is gotten rid of in your urine.
Week 3
The ball of stem cells now flatten and separate into three layers, according to what part of the fetus they will become. Next the cells lengthen like a sheet and fold in onto themselves, forming a tube that is the beginning of the spinal cord. Three parts of the brain: the hindbrain, midbrain and forebrain are now visible as bumps. The embryo now has a top and bottom, left
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and right, front and back. 95 Another tube also forms, straight down the middle, and this tube will become the digestive system. 96
Why is the embryo so small to begin with? To better survive, the embryo spends most of its initial energy growing the placenta which will transport nutrients from mom. 97 Then, when the placenta is going strong, the embryo can think about growing herself. That explains why if you look at an early ultrasound you will see more of everything except baby!
At four weeks you can distinguish little arm and leg buds and small spots where the eyes are beginning. 98 At this stage the embryo is curved and pink, with a spine clearly running down the back. In fact, he looks a little bit like a seahorse with a big red heart! Many important organs, such as the stomach, liver, gallbladder and pancreas, begin developing at this time. 99
Abortion stops a beating heart Your heart works pretty hard. From the moment it gets going it doesn‘t rest night or day till your life ends. It all started long, long ago in a place called the womb. At that time your heart was big compared to you. You were small but your heart took up most of you! You were only 3-4 weeks* old and you had a clump of muscle cells that were the size of a poppy seed. (In case you didn‘t know, poppy seeds are those tiny black seeds they put on top of some bread.) One day, out of the blue, for no humanly known reason, one of the cells began to twitch. Then another cell and another started to join in. As they jolt to life they start to twitch together. The poppy seed sized clump continued to beat, grow and divide day by day until it was big and strong — the kind of heart you needed to last you for 3 billion heartbeats — 75 years, or more. 100
When the heart first started beating it moved at 20-25 beats per minute, compared to an adult‘s heart rate of 70- 80 beats per minute. 101
Just think, at around the time you‘re just wondering about that missed period, this little heart is already beating!
*opinions vary from 20-28 days Week 5
The arm and leg buds continue to lengthen and little pads develop where the hands and feet are forming. 102
The skin
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layers on this little human being are transparent in places, allowing the developing internal organs and backbone to show through. 103
Many parts of the body are being worked on including the gut, lungs and kidneys. 104
But it doesn‘t look like a baby yet… Some people have pointed out that in the very early days of gestation the human
embryo resembles the beginnings of other animals. Now they are right!
However, just because we start off amazingly similar to, say, a chicken embryo, doesn‘t mean that we should value that embryo as much as a chicken embryo. Although the human may resemble the embryos of other animals, she is not one of them. There is only one possible future for her and that is as a human baby.
From a spiritual perspective each person is a creation of love from the moment we are created — not born. I believe we are a soul loved and sent by God (Jer. 1:5) with a purpose that only we can fulfill. I believe that even while our bodies are undeveloped as a baby, we have a fully developed soul. Therefore, humanly and spiritually, the appearance doesn‘t change the inner identity.
PS. Actually, most abortions take place after 6 weeks, when you can clearly see a definite baby shape starting to take form, so in a way this concern is not even relevant.
As the embryo grows and the face starts to take on more shape, he becomes more familiar looking. You can recognize where the mouth, nose and ears are forming. The eyes are also developing — they look like little black marbles where before they were just spots. 105
The embryo can‘t see yet, of course, and eyelids don‘t protect his eyes yet, although they do start developing during this week. 106
Too amazing! We
are designed with future
generations in mind. At just 3 weeks old embryo is developing either primitive sperm or egg cells! If it‘s a boy, by week 6 the penis begins to form and at 12 weeks the
testes are
producing testosterone. 107 If it‘s a girl fetus, at 12 weeks she contains all the eggs she will ever have — 6 or 7 million, more than enough for a lifetime! 108
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Week 7 By week seven your little fellow has been working hard on developing and all major organs now exist. 109
Each of his fingers has taken form, although they are not finished developing by any means. 110
The toes tend to take longer for some reason. At this early stage, they resemble little webbed flippers, the cells between them having not yet been dissolved. 111
His brain is developing too with 100,000 new nerve cells a minute! 112
Girl reassured — believes nothing is formed yet ―The nurse gave me a ultrasound and I asked to see. I was happy to see that my 7 week fetus just looked like a lump with no recognizable parts.‖ 113
—―Zoe,‖ I‘mNotSorry.net
She moves! As the little one stirs she may begin to curl her toes, make a fist, kick or other movements. Her body is now sufficiently developed to allow these simple movements. Helping those movements, the knee and elbow joints are now working and the fingers and toes are separate. 114
Quotable Quote ―So in less than 8 weeks, what began as an indistinguishable mass of tissue has begun to take on a humanlike shape.‖ 115
—Doubilet et al, Your Developing Baby
Week 9 Between 9 and 12 weeks the embryo will double in length. 116 His neck lengthens, and at the same time his head begins to lift off his chest as if he was uncurling or stretching himself. 117
On to a different matter now — the tongue. Although incredibly you can actually see a photograph of the tongue at 7 weeks, by 9 weeks it looks larger, flatter and just like your own (though of course it‘s not completed yet). 118
The fetus‘ sex is determined from conception, but both male and female fetuses start out looking the same. Then around nine weeks external sex differences start to appear. 119
Did you know? Embryo is Greek for ‗swell‘ and these eight weeks are a massive growth period. In fact, if you were to continue growing at the same rate, at birth you would weigh 28,000 pounds! 120
Week 10
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By week ten, the fetus has well-formed fingers and toes. 121
Just beginning to grow are the fingernails. 122 By birth they can be so long he may have already scratched himself with them! The personalized fingerprints, which identify us all, start developing from 10 weeks, though they won‘t be laid down properly until 17 weeks.
123 The fetus‘ face continues to become better proportioned as the eyes, which were on the side of the embryo at 6 weeks, are now on the front of the face. The nose has risen up a bit instead of looking flat, and the lips and chin are now much better shaped. 124
Clinics do not want you to see the truth ―Q. Will I see the fetus? (Can I if I want to?)
A. No, you will not see the fetus. The final decision is up to the physician.‖ 125
Week 11
At 11 weeks the fetus may already be sucking his thumb. 126 It is now thought that we develop a preference for left or right handedness while still in the womb 127 —
and sometimes fetuses are born with calloused thumbs to prove it! 128 The vocal cords, needed for that famous birth cry, start growing at 11 weeks. 129
Quotable Quote ―As a woman progresses farther into pregnancy, there is more tissue to evacuate.‖ 130
week abortions
Week 12 Already preparing for his future existence in the outside world, the fetus has begun ‗breathing‘ motions. Of course, he still receives all oxygen from you via the umbilical cord. 131
He also swallows a small amount of fluid around him, and this prepares him for drinking and swallowing, a skill he will need to have if he is to survive after birth. 132
The skeleton hardens as bone replaces cartilage, which explains why, after 12 weeks, the fetus cannot longer be disintegrated by suction, and another type of abortion must be performed.
Even at 12 weeks you can see a recognizable form of your baby. It‘s hard to imagine that at less than three inches long all of her organs have formed. She has many months to grow, mature, but she‘s all there. The cutest thing is that her stomach is so tiny — no
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bigger than a grain of rice! 133
What about the rest? ver the remaining 26 weeks, the fetus will:
become better proportioned as her body catches up with her head
continue to develop her organs, senses and brain
plump out with baby fat
prepare her lungs for breathing The remaining 6 months are fascinating in themselves, but I really want you to see that the first trimester fetus is not just ―a bunch of cells‖ or ―tissue.‖ The fetus‘ development is so amazing that even after studying this for four years it still seems incredible to me! For more on your child's physical development see:
Reason #87: Your unborn baby is intelligent
Reason #55: Your unborn child can feel, taste, smell, hear, and see
―In just 12 weeks the fetus goes from blob to baby‖ Reason #10 Your baby exists now, not in the future
Bridging the gap ‘ve come to the conclusion that there are many good people on both sides of the abortion issue. I do not believe for one moment that there are not kind-hearted people on both sides of this issue, and what strikes me as
one of the two main differences between
pro-choice and pro-life is the matter of potential life — whether abortion merely destroys a potential life or an actual life, a potential baby or an actual baby, a potential human or an actual human. We‘ll examine that argument right up next.
If you are wondering what I think the other main issue is, I would say ―it‘s a woman‘s body‖ issue. More on that in Reason #25: Abortion is about a woman‘s body, but…
his is really a sticking point. Take this pro-choice quote, for example, ―An embryo has no rights. Rights do O I T
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not pertain to a potential, only to an actual being.‖ 134
If this person is correct and an embryo is a potential being, then how does she explain the hands and feet frequently found in abortion remains (remember, abortionists have to piece them together to make sure they got it all)? Besides, just think, if you look at pregnancy books, they all describe what‘s inside you as "your baby" not "your potential life." Is every pregnancy book lying? And, speaking of miscarriages, why would one be such an emotional thing if all you lost was just a bit of "potential baby‖?
The way I see it… Abortion destroys a life with
a potential not
a potential life
I think Judith Arcana had it right when she acknowledged, ―I definitely do want to talk about the fact that when you are pregnant, there is a baby growing inside of you.‖
135 And if that baby is growing, which it is from conception onward (that‘s what conception is all about), then doesn‘t an abortion mean you are now not un- pregnant, but the mother of a dead baby? Why do we say, ―I am deciding not to have a child at this time,‖ like nothing is existing yet? When I think of the word Yüklə 4,63 Mb. Dostları ilə paylaş:
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