Mother of 6 has 8 MORE kids with fertility treatments

[Darth Wong]

Seriously.

Mother of octuplets has six other children

(CNN) -- The mother of a woman who gave birth on Monday to octuplets said her daughter already has six children at home and was undergoing fertility treatment.

The Los Angeles Times reported on Thursday that Angela Suleman said her daughter had the embryos implanted last year, resulting in the eight births.

"They all happened to take," Suleman told the Times. "I looked at those babies. They are so tiny and so beautiful."

The woman declined to have the number of embryos reduced when she discovered she was carrying multiples, the Times reported. The six older siblings range from ages 7 to 2, according to the newspaper.

Suleman said she was concerned about her daughter's homecoming because her husband, a contract worker, is due to return to Iraq.

In the meantime, the mother, who remains unidentified, appealed for privacy while she recovers from giving birth, medical officials said Thursday.

In her written statement delivered by Dr. Karen Maples of the Kaiser Permanente Bellflower Medical Center in California, the woman who delivered eight babies in five minutes said she would soon make public the details of her "miraculous experience."

"We understand that you are all curious about the arrival of the octuplets, and we appreciate your respect for our family's privacy," she said.

"The babies continue to grow strong every day and make good progress. My family and I are ecstatic about all of their arrivals."

"Needless to say, the eighth was a surprise to us all, but a blessing as well," she added.

The six boys and two girls -- ranging in weight from 1 pound, 8 ounces to 3 pounds, 4 ounces -- are doing well following their Caesarean-section delivery at the Bellflower hospital, doctors said. They were born nine weeks premature.

Dr. Mandhir Gupta, a neonatalist, said all but one of the octuplets are now breathing on their own. That baby might be taken off breathing equipment Friday.

Caring for eight premature babies is a challenge. Duties are being shared by a large team of hospital nurses and doctors for the time being. Two nurses have been assigned to each child, and all the babies are receiving fluids, proteins and vitamins intravenously, Gupta said.

"We feed them. ... We change diapers. ... When they cry, we console them," Gupta said. "When the mom comes and touches the babies, you can definitely see their expression on their faces and body. They are very happy."

The babies, who are being referred to by letters of the alphabet, will remain in the hospital for at least seven more weeks.

Baby H made headlines for its surprise appearance during the delivery, which took months of preparation by a team of doctors, nurses and respiratory therapists.

The mother will not be able to hold her babies for another week, Gupta said. They are still fragile, developing intestines, he said.

Doctors initially thought the mother was pregnant with seven fetuses. She was hospitalized seven weeks ago and ordered to bed rest.

During the seven weeks, a team of 46 physicians, nurses and other staff members prepared for the births. When they started the delivery Monday, they were in for a surprise.

"After the seventh baby was born, we were taking a sigh of relief," Maples said.

"It was a surprise of our life when we in fact discovered there was an eighth baby," she said. "We never had an assignment for baby H nurse or baby H doctor. We just had to go on the fly and figure out what to do."

"Baby G nurse stepped up. We handed off the baby to baby G nurse. She then delivered that last baby to the neonatologist of the baby F."

"It was all wonderful because of the teamwork and the training we did before," Maples said.

So she had six kids already, and she had fertility treatments to have more? This story has "raging right-wing fundie" written all over it. It's too bad there is no practical way to outlaw this kind of irresponsible behaviour.

[Kodiak]

Not to depricate a man's career, but the husband is a "Contract Worker" who's going to Iraq? This really doesn't sound like the sort of occupation capable of supporting a family of SIXTEEN! Why any woman with six kids would get fertility treatments is beyond me, unless she's planning to sell the children to rich, childless couples. Wouldn't the media attention and an Oprah appearance help pay for a lot of the basic necessities? I seem to remember that those septuplets a while back got a lot of free stuff ranging from diapers to college scholarships.

[TrailerParkJawa]

I wonder how much extra this will cost Kaiser. As memeber of Kaiser it frustrates me that scare resources were dedicated to help someone who already had 6 kids have another but ended up with an addtional 8. Its not a blessing, its a giant "oh fuck...we are poor forever moment...but they are probably fundies and don't see it that way.."

On a side note I actually know two people who were the youngest of large familys (8 kids) and they both say its pretty shitty experience. They don't even know who their parents are and received little attention.

[Kanastrous]

It's pure unadulterated selfishness on the mother's part.

And we all collectively have the honor of footing the bill.

[erik_t]

The plot thickens! The family filed for bankruptcy a year and a half ago and now live in the grandparents' house.

Shockingly irresponsible on the part of the fertility clinic. But not to sound like a broken record... the bad press for the fertility clinic, acting via the invisible hand of the free market, will undoubtedly dissuade other clinics from doing this in the future to make a quick buck.

[Admiral Valdemar]

What the world needs now is more children in families barely able to support what they have.

But just over on another forum, I had to deal with someone pandering to the right to have as many kids as you want and to back Republican anti-contraceptive movements. And this guy was a raging liberal too, but seemingly the idea of limited resources getting in the way never crossed his blank mind. Feral kids from broken families here are a problem, and we all know about Africa. So why are these people still doing it? Go forth and multiply, eh?

[Solauren]

This boggles the fraking mind.

Fertility treatments when you already have 6 children?

I'm sorry, this isn't a right-wing fundie nutjob. The woman is clearly addicated to having children.

And there are laws that could be passed that could have prevented this;
#1 Limit the number of implantations a fertility clinc can do at a time (to say 3)
#2 Ban Fertility treatments for anyone with more then 4 children

And those are the 'no one should object' ones. You could also


People might scream over it ;
#3 Put laws in place where in if you are in bankruptcy, any new children you have are taken by the court until you can prove you are economically viable. This would not apply to children you were pregnant with before you declared bankruptcy. Please note; I'm not advocating forcing abortion.

#4 Put laws in place to limit the number of children you can have, based on your income + work hours (i.e free time). Subregulations / guidelines would have to be put in place to handle multi-non-treatment births

#5 Put a maximum cap on child-aid. (On a side note, I wonder how much money they'll collect for having 14 kids)


Also, couldn't this be considered Emotional abuse on the part of the parents? There is now way they can realistically give the proper emotional and mental support to 14 children, even living with Grandma. Even if the father was around full time (and he's about to go over-seas for who knows how long), that's still 5 kids per parental figure. (I'm absolutely amazed the family from John + Kate + 8 is as well adjusts and stable as they appear to be. Kate is freaking Super-mom as far as I'm concerned).

Hell, you could call it physical abuse too. How are they going to realistically feed those kids? Provide them with enough space and privacy? Properly Cloth them?

This just, well, bobbles the fraking mind!




Oh, not related to regulation and so forth;

Another thing that pisses me off; This woman goes and has 8 babies due to fertility, doesn't reduce, and now 16 nurses are devoted to caring for her kids? That's got to put a strain on hospital resources (let alone just the maternity ward).

Like I said.... fraking mind!

[Count Chocula]

The birth weights on the kids were extremely low, as to be expected when you try to put 10 gallons in a 5-gallon...errr, hat. The youngest boy was only 1-1/2 pounds, and in Dr. Gupta's words "he's very feisty." Yah, I guess he'd have to be to keep the other 7 kids off his umbilical cord.

As far as the family's and clinic's irresponsibility goes, it just boggles the mind. I wonder how big the grandparents' home is, and how much of the child-rearing burden they will have to assume.

EDIT: It says a lot about today's medical technology and personnel that all eight kids survived. When I was born in the late 1960s, it's doubtful all of them would have lived even if a woman had managed to get knocked up with octuplets back then. No in vitro fertilization when Johnson was president, IIRC.

[The Duchess of Zeon]

Contract workers in Iraq do get huge amounts of hazard pay, all of which is presumably being dumped straight into caring for these children to the point where they lost their home anyway (though it was probably a huge McMansion with a monthly payment to the bank to live in it being much larger than their income could actually handle). Probably the fertility treatments were already paid for at the time they lost the house, since this stuff takes a very long time to set up.

[Lonestar]

Not to depricate a man's career, but the husband is a "Contract Worker" who's going to Iraq?

The mother is a single mother. The husband mentoned in the article is the 14-kids mother's Father.

EDIT: Duchess, that isn't the father of the kids, it's the GRANDFATHER.

It's a SINGLE MOTHER with 14 kids.

[Admiral Valdemar]

A single mother with fourteen kids?

A SINGLE mother with FOURTEEN kids?!

[Illuminatus Primus]

This is one of the reasons that you have to cut off your kids eventually. Especially if they're dysfunctional. Otherwise they'll find so fucked up way to anchor to you forever. Whereas if they don't think you'll keep them on your dole, they won't think they can breed with impunity.

[Lonestar]

A single mother with fourteen kids?

A SINGLE mother with FOURTEEN kids?!

The article in the OP ambigiously words it, but I had heard she was a single mother on the radio and the article Howeder linked to said "There has been no word on the identity of the father." The same article also unambigiously states that it's the GRANDFATHER who is a contract worker in Iraq.

[Enigma]

Yeah the father probably works at McDonalds. As for the OP, I find it very reckless for her to try to conceive a child when she already had 6.

[SirNitram]

Even in a magical, pixie-dust powered post-scarcity economy, this would be wildly irresponsible. Yes, it's a huge waste of resources by people who obviously cannot afford it. But there's another horrible angle. You know how conservatives masturbate in public about the importance of having a mother and father? Pity they think the mere physical presense is enough.. As opposed to having time in a 24 hour day to pay enough attention to your kids.

I predict that these kids will have mountains of psychological issues.

[Kanastrous]

I'm putting my money on cerebral palsy. It seems to be linked to membership in these grotesque litters.

[Aaron]

Yeah the father probably works at McDonalds. As for the OP, I find it very reckless for her to try to conceive a child when she already had 6.

I doubt that, whoever paid for this and is continuing to pay for her bills either has some serious money or has a really great health care plan. This shit is very expensive, IIRC my sister in law in Boston would have been charged 10K an attempt if her hubby didn't have insurance.

I'm with everyone else on the reposnibilty issue. Fourteen children is insane, which is what she's going to be in a few years when they start talking.

[Solauren]

I'm willing to bet there is no 'daddy', just a sperm donor.

I didn't know she was a single mother. That just make's things worse!

This woman from the article, should not be allowed to keep any of her kids, period.

[LadyTevar]

*brain breaks*

Ok... I dont' know how it happened, but whomever got her those fertility drugs/embryos needs to be brought up on malpractice.

[Kodiak]

Not to depricate a man's career, but the husband is a "Contract Worker" who's going to Iraq?

The mother is a single mother. The husband mentoned in the article is the 14-kids mother's Father.

EDIT: Duchess, that isn't the father of the kids, it's the GRANDFATHER.

It's a SINGLE MOTHER with 14 kids.

*twitch*

HO.LY. FUCK. You have SIX KIDS, are SINGLE, and get a FERTILITY TREATMENT? I'm with the opinion that this woman is addicted to kids. The fact that her father is heading back "to his native Iraq suggests they aren't our garden-variety fundies, but loons come in all denominations. How selfish can this girl/woman be, to put her parents through this? I think I'm gonna be ill. My wife and I thought we were pushing it having our 1st child three months AFTER I had a full-time job. 14 kids on a welfare salary is beyond the pale.

[Knife]

I've been following this on the local radio network here locally. The 'marital status' of the woman is not known which pretty much screams single without just saying so. The guy going to Iraq is grandpa, though I give him credit for doing so to support his daughters irresponsibility, I also wonder about the ethics of such if the guys gets the bad end of an IED just so his daughter can continue with this insane lifestyle choice.

Also, according to the news reports I've heard (radio, remember) standard procedure in this implantation is between two and four emybryo's and this lady got eight. Something about this whole story just reeks, if a doctor and/or institute doubled if not put four times as many embryo's inside this women than any other medical procedure would, it is medical malpractice.

At this point, I'm bracing myself for some sort of red neck, fundie right medical clinic who want's to populate the earth with true believers or some such nonsense, just because I can't figure out how this clusterfuck could come about in any other way. Sure the mom seems to be a certified nutcase for being a supposed single mom of 14, plus the ethics of implanting eight embryo's into her when standard procedure is two to four. Something isn't right here.

[erik_t]

One starts to wonder about how childrearing is recognized as a basic human right by the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Unlike the rights to free speech, assembly, due process, and all that jazz, having a child intrinsically involves a non-consenting second (really, third) party. The parents are granted rights over the child, who in this decision of course has none. It seems strange to me to declare that these human rights are therefore of the same level of black-and-white as, say, habeas corpus.

It does not seem like a huge stretch to me to say that these children are being denied the basic human right to come into the world to a family who can, by the standards of their surrounding society, support them and help them come to maturity.

[The Duchess of Zeon]

Interesting question related to an issue being discussed in SLAM at the moment. If the father is native to Iraq like it says, is it possible that they're Muslims and she is 'married' as the second wife of a man through a religious ceremony, who is currently hiding out of fear of prosecution for polygamy? Because really the fact that this would cost in excess of $10,000.00 on top of the six kids she's already had is seriously not making sense here, there's just no way for a single mother with six children to have access to that kind of money, I don't think even her parents could probably afford to care for her and six kids even with a contractor's job in Iraq and still have 10k left over for fertility treatments. Islam doesn't ban fertility treatments and does like Christianity favour very large families.

[Alyrium Denryle]

Jesus H fucking Christ. This selfish irresponsible cunt, having fertility treatments in order that she may have 8 more fucking kids on top of the 6 (I wonder how many dads?) she already has? And she is bankrupt? What the fuck? This is why we need a fucking cap and trade system on fucking children. Each person gets 1. Couples have 2, you can pay other people for their offspring vouchers. This brings the birth rate just below the replacement level of 2.1

We can combine this with a Childless Couple tax credit. People that dont have kids and dont sell off their vouchers get a tax rebate. Joy of sweet joys!

[Mr Bean]

I've been following this on the local radio network here locally. The 'marital status' of the woman is not known which pretty much screams single without just saying so. The guy going to Iraq is grandpa, though I give him credit for doing so to support his daughters irresponsibility, I also wonder about the ethics of such if the guys gets the bad end of an IED just so his daughter can continue with this insane lifestyle choice.

First off, there's a good end of an IED?
Second it this is true, that this woman has fourteen kids and is a single parent, where exactly is child services. Not to take the kids away mind you. Perhaps she's some sort of Uber Parent and she can take care of all fourteen kids. Lets assume that(For the sake of argument), so why has child services not step in to just you know check up on these kids? I know people in child services back West and they say anytime one of these crazy sized births happens she hears about it from friends or family or from someone else in the departments friends or family or they run across it themselves. And she told me such mega-births automatically get a a file created if the person is local(Same county/city) because chances are they are going to have to be called in at some point even if it's nothing more than the parents(Or parent in this case) next extra help doing things like filling out six applications for kinder garden might cause the school's will raise an eyebrow when once person registers multiple kids in case the kids in question are illegal immigrants being registered along regular students and by getting them registered under fake names for school is one step closer to getting your own fraudulent social security card.