"It is with great sadness and a absolutely broken heart that I tell you Life Lynn passed away last night," the post read. "Carrie is now rocking her baby girl. I have no explanation of why this happened, but I do know Jesus loves us and someday we will know why. The grief we feel is almost unbearable, please be praying for our family."...
Life was delivered by Caesarean section as Carrie DeKylen was dying.
"That's what she wanted," Nick said earlier this month. "We love the Lord. We're pro-life. We believe that God gave us this baby."
September 22, 2017
"Life Lynn DeKlyen, baby whose mother chose giving birth over chemo, has died."
"The infant's death was announced Thursday on the couple's Facebook page" (Chicago Tribune).
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
Posts
57 comments:
I had a similar case with a happier outcome. The woman had had a melanoma removed two years before and I told her not to get pregnant for five years. She turned up pregnant and the OB and I took the baby at about 32 weeks. She had metastatic melanoma but it all melted away after the pregnancy. She was alive and well 20 years later when I wrote my second book.
This was a worse tumor and the baby was just too early.
Sad and unfortunate outcome, but a courageous decision by the mother.
Very sad. May not have been a wise decision. Most modern women (probably) would have taken the chemo, and had an abortion.
But, at least the Mother and father made the decision and took responsibility for it, and not some government bureaucrat.
Every day this world gives you another way to break your heart.
I am Laslo.
"I have no explanation of why this happened, but I do know Jesus loves us and someday we will know why."
It's nice that they know the mind of Jesus, in this time of personal difficulty it's got to be an extreme comfort to be so simpatico w/ the creator of the universe. But, they say that they'll need to wait until their own death before they can check w/ Jesus re Jesus deciding to take their child to heaven. At least they don't need to die before they know Jesus's thoughts re loving them.
Some years ago a double-blind study was conducted to test the medical efficacy of prayer. The results were not unexpected if ironic.
3rdGradePB_GoodPerson said...
It's nice that they know the mind of Jesus
As the saying goes, 3rdGradePB, Jesus loves you. The rest of us think you're an asshole.
As the saying goes, 3rdGradePB, Jesus loves you. The rest of us think you're an asshole.
LOL!
3rdGradePB_GoodPerson said...
It's nice that they know the mind of Jesus, in this time of personal difficulty it's got to be an extreme comfort to be so simpatico w/ the creator of the universe.
It's sounds so cute at first, like kids talking about Santa Claus, but a truly gigantic ego is required to believe that stuff, which makes it more creepy than cute.
God bless.
This was their sixth child, so she chose to leave her other five children motherless to conform to her very individualistic beliefs. Even the Catholic Church would have been OK with an abortion in a case like this where continuing the pregnancy was certain to kill the mother.
Christ told us not to make a show of our faith.
Well, a very sad story, but the woman had a fatal brain cancer and it must have been advanced at diagnosis. It's not like she had a normal cancer with some chance. I would have done the same thing. This is what she had:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glioblastoma
Terrible diagnosis with a terrible prognosis. This is what a "miracle" long term survivor got:
https://www.cancercompass.com/message-board/message/all,24232,0.htm
Read that and think about it. Then think about those children she had. You are not going to even try to put them through that.
My uncle died of the same thing. He did the surgery, chemo and radiation. It got him about five more months. At best. And some of what he got he lost during medical treatment, so. ...
Sometimes realism is best. I look at it that her pregnancy guided her to the best decision - she already had a bunch of young children. They spent her last months together probably with the least possible disruption for the rest of the kids.
Two members of my family have died of this cancer. I wouldn't choose anything but palliative for it were I to get this cancer.
I find it really odd that people are assuming that one can beat every cancer. One can't.
@Jeff:Christ told us not to make a show of our faith.
Christ did not require anyone to conceal actions motivated by faith.
@Jeff:
You are the light of the world. A city on a hill cannot be hidden. 1Neither do people light a lamp and put it under a basket. Instead, they set it on a lampstand, and it gives light to everyone in the house. 1In the same way, let your light shine before men, that they may see your good deeds and glorify your Father in heaven.
Look it up sometime.
Dum spiro spero
I'm very bothered by Jeff's comment. If a woman has six children, and one of them is drowning, or in a fire, about to be run down by a car, should she abandon the child to its fate because she might leave the other five motherless, and should she be condemned for "her very individualistic beliefs" if she chose to try to save the child and died in the attempt?
Just wow, as the kids say.
I guess if all prayers were answered and we always got what we wanted people would start thinking and believing they were in charge and knew everything. Happy endings are nice but sad endings also serve a purpose.
Gabriel,
If you are certain that you cannot actually save the child, and you throw your life away anyway, does that change your calculus?
I think that Christ's rebuke to the Scribes and Pharisees who made a big show of their piety applies here.
OK, MaxedOutMama says it was actually a glioblastoma. If that's the case, then the stories I read that said she had a very good chance of surviving another 10 or 20 years with treatment are probably wrong. If that's true, I take back my criticism. Glio's are, as MaxedOutMama says, really horrible. My brother in law died of one at 46. They really can't be stopped.
Gabriel - but in this case, she was certain that she could not save her own life, and there was a decent chance the child could be born and survive. Does that FACT (not hypothesis) change your calculus? Or do you just want to use this tragedy as a billboard for your own convictions?
I don't know what she would have chosen if she had a survivable cancer. Nor do you. Nor do the others commenting on this thread. Respect her dignity if you can. If you can't, that says more about you than it does about her life and death.
Your understanding of Catholic theology is way off, btw.
"she chose to leave her other five children motherless to conform to her very individualistic beliefs."
I read the original story several days ago. That tumor was not survivable. She took a chance and lost.
I doubt ending the pregnancy would change the result.
Red, brown, yellow
Black, white and asshole
They are precious in His sight.
A natural abortion is, unfortunately, Mother Nature's choice and prerogative.
Jeff - my condolences. Yes, that is what she had. I lost my uncle and a cousin-in-law to it. Poor lady did not have a chance no matter what she did.
Michael K. and the Tribune story both make it pretty clear that this poor woman was doomed in any case. I take back my criticism. I should have read the story Ann linked to, rather than relying on my memory of a story I read yesterday. That story was wrong, or I mis-remembered it.
Not exactly the feel good story of the day. Still, the woman acted with courage and nobility, and it's always good to read that such people exist.
And Gabriel, my apologies, I addressed a comment to you that should have been to Jeff. I think you are on target.
I just am very upset that people are blaming this lady. The official "survival" rate for this cancer is about 3-5% at 3 years. But that's coming with severe neurological damage, and it's dependent on tumor type. Medical treatment didn't have anything meaningful to offer this lady, and now people are blaming her for injuring her children. What parent wouldn't go for an 80% chance of saving the baby vs a 3-5% chance of even being breathing after 3 years?
What other choice did this woman have?
On balance, I think her decision was the right one- it was unlikely she would have survived very long with an abortion and the chemotherapy. The tragedy is that her decision didn't have the outcome she wished for.
"The rest of us think you're an asshole."
Bears repeating.
Every day this world gives you another way to break your heart.
But also another way to heal it. Spend some time with my two border collies, and you'll see what I mean.
If you believe you're very likely to die and have only a slight chance to survive a bit longer if you abort your baby, and you believe in the afterlife, it makes sense to do what she did, even if she believed abortion isn't a sin or that it is a forgivable sin. Would you not feel called to be as good a person as you could, especially with respect to a specific challenge put before you, such as, here, the unborn child?
As for her other children, who continue to live and have lost their mother, they have an extremely vivid picture of how much their mother willingly gave for that one child and the strong knowledge of how much their mother loved will remain with them. Suppose she could have stayed a little longer, but she destroyed that one last child? Would that have been giving more to those children?
I don't understand how anyone can criticize whatever decision someone made who was faced with such a situation. We can just thank God we haven't faced such a challenge.
It is called "choice", and that is a good thing. The potential for personal tragedy in childbirth is key to why we have empowered each woman to choose their course. Such choices by their nature are surrounded by the potential for tragedy, but we rarely hear the specifics ratta-tat-tatted across the national data-stream.
What makes me truly sad is how the specifics of this particular one is broadcast mostly because it pulls the easy trigger of including the charged, most mockable name of our times. (I can hear 3rdGradePB_goodPerson seeing the name and cacking it out in triumph "Jeee-Zuss!")
Point, preen and mock. You are doing exactly as our Supreme Elitists intend. Sad.
Seems like an easy decision amidst heartbreaking circumstances. She had no chance of surviving the cancer; one path meant certain death for herself and her baby, and the other path meant certain death for herself but a chance that the baby might live. There was no scenario in which she could sacrifice the baby's life in order to survive to raise her other children, so anyone arguing for that is arguing for a strawman.
Poor family. I hope they can find strength in their faith and their loved ones.
"It's nice that they know the mind of Jesus, in this time of personal difficulty it's got to be an extreme comfort to be so simpatico w/ the creator of the universe."
Damn. PB and Chuck must hang out. Everyone who loved this woman will honor her heroism for the rest of their lives. I'm guessing they'll have strength and faith to burn.
Thinking such as that in Althouse's comments is the anti-religion POV.
Looking at the situation like that leaves zero room for the excerpt I quoted. Althouse's POV is logical and not supernatural, it does not depend on God loving or not loving anyone. According to this POV, there's no reason to wait for the afterlife to have a one-on-one w/ God to figure out what caused these deaths, as w/ all the other (believer and non-believer) people who suffer terrible deaths, just ask a Doc.
The religious POV is, IMHO, that these people can't be certain that God loves them the way they think he does. And, they can't be certain that they will be saved, such that they'll chit chat w/ Jesus. Of course it's understandable for them to grasp at any self-comfort that's available. I'm sure that declaring, w/ certainty, knowledge of God's will does help them. But, they could be wrong. Only God knows. IMHO.
Prayers for this family.
It's hard not to picture certain commenters dying in a fire right before the ass cancer takes them. Thank God there is religion to help dispel those thoughts.
She died with great honor.
Leave aside religion if you like.
The fact is that we aren't here to please ourselves, that is a futile and empty thing, evident to anyone.
Part of the problem enabling people like PB is the misleading headline that she traded her life for her baby's and since they both passed, her sacrifice was for nothing. I have a pretty good idea of why the headline writer made that choice.
And she was a mother of five.
That in itself is likewise a great honor, especially in this modern world.
Tim,
I'm fussing a little as a response to the hubris re a human definitively declaring God's approving POV re themselves. Some people are used to qualifiers such as pray/ask/hope/believe for this sorta thing (i.e. declaring God's judgement re themselves). I do also realize that plenty of Christians do make unqualified declarative statements re God's judgement, e.g. "God hates fags."
I'm also acknowledging that it makes sense to consider that these folks are doing what they can to seek comfort, so I do get why they're asserting definitive declarations re God's judgement, even though that's above their paygrade. IMHO.
And she was a mother of five. That in itself is likewise a great honor
Her selflessness and courage was the very model of a warrior.
Her selflessness and courage was the very model of a warrior.
Semper fidelis!
If PB flunked his Stochastic Apititude Test in such a way, I wonder what value system or scientific findings, he could draw on to help him face down such a ghastly situation with such courage and goodness. I don't know if God exists, but belief in God does and it is uniquely helpful in such situations.,.....I like to think I would behave in the same way as this woman, but it's not a decision I would make with serenity and I would be able to offer sparse comfort to those who survived me.
A lot of Marxists considered homosexuality to be an artifact of a decadent capitalist culture. They didn't fare too well in Cuba, the USSR, and Red China. Christianity in the 20th century had a better record of tolerance for gays than did the Marxist societies.
I made the mistake of reading CNN's version of this story, which made it sound like "She chose death over abortion and lost the baby anyway; how irresponsible of her; tsk, tsk" when even from the details they included in their story, it seemed pretty clear that that was not really the choice she faced. She was facing round #2 against one of the most deadly cancers you can have--the kind many of us probably know someone who decided not to bother going through the difficulties of chemo even if they weren't pregnant and didn't receive finger-wagging for it.
"Stochastic Aptitude Test"
Funny. I've never heard that one before but it's a pretty succinct description of life. But aptitude would not be enough for a truly worthwhile life. That requires grace.
As for her other children, who continue to live and have lost their mother, they have an extremely vivid picture of how much their mother M
Some years ago, I had a woman patient who was dying of renal cell cancer. She spent all her time remaining recording a series of tapes for her children who were small at the time.
I have often wondered what they thought in later years listening to those tapes.
I don't know if PB is serious about it being hubris for someone to "definitively declar[e]" that God approves of a particular course of action, or whether he just likes playing the Village Atheist (his smart-ass comment about people who claim that "God hates fags" suggests the latter). If you don't believe there's a God, or if you think God doesn't care what human beings do, then God's approval/disapproval is a non-issue. If, however, you are a Christian, you care very much about what God wants you to do. When you are faced with an important choice, you don't have the option of saying, Oh gee, that's above my paygrade, how would I know? And even if you say that, it's probably a lie: You know perfectly well what you ought to do, you just lack the courage to do it. This woman had the courage to choose.
In the end no one lives forever, but our genes live on in our children. From that standpoint, she took her best shot to enhance her chances at immortality.
Godpop,
You may, like many here, believe that I (as an asshole) will be burning in hell (likely w/ asshole cancer) for eternity. [Not that some of you are overly focused on my asshole (even though you like jabbering about it), and even if you are captivated by my asshole: not that there's anything wrong w/ that.] Among other things, to save myself I should have been more pro-R. They're against abortion. Jesus would be an R.
Congratulations to y'all, you (like the folks who are the focus of this post) know that you're going to heaven!
MAGA!
PB has a real gift for making everything about xim. Each comment xe writes in this thread is accompanied by the clinking sound of xis shovel, digging the hole deeper and deeper. I shouldn't dignify xis performance by remarking on it; but it stands in such marked contrast to the grace and generosity of spirit shown by so many others. A teaching moment, as they say.
Prayers up for this family and especially for a brave and selfless woman.
The way I know that there is no just God is that the cancer happened to this woman and not the architects of Obamacare.
Yep. 3rd grade is appropriate.
And here, ladies and gentlemen, we see, on display, the compassion and understanding of the left.
The irony of believing in nothing is that you believe in something.
Althouse @ 2:13
Well said. We often forget that often the smallest acts and gestures on our part, trivial to us, can have a whole different meaning to our children. Life is a gift.
Big Mike said...
In the end no one lives forever, but our genes live on in our children. From that standpoint, she took her best shot to enhance her chances at immortality.
Aw, man, stop making sense. Romantic palaver about heroism makes for some great virtue signaling, and you're missing out.
Post a Comment