# No C-section = child abuse



## ClayPot (Mar 19, 2011)

Here is an article about a New Jersey woman who refused to sign consent papers for a c-section (unless the procedure were necessary for her child's safety). The baby was born vaginally without incident. But the hospital authorities accused her of child abuse and her parental rights were revoked for her child. She has not had her child for 5 years! Ironically, she could have gone to get an abortion that same day and it would have been "her right". But if she chooses to make a decision about how she's going to give birth, it's child abuse? Crazy, crazy world.

Baby girl kept away from mother for 5 years refusing to sign C-section form | Mail Online


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## baron (Mar 19, 2011)

This is beyond words.


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## Notthemama1984 (Mar 19, 2011)




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## fishingpipe (Mar 19, 2011)

Surely there's something more to it than this? A history of some kind with the mother? It doesn't say, but you have to wonder. 

If this is all the state is basing its decision on, then it is shocking and appalling. Not just that the state did it, but also that no one has brought this up for five years in the national media.

There's gotta be something...


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## Jack K (Mar 19, 2011)

I wonder if maybe we aren't getting the whole story. Because this sounds very wrong. Child welfare authorities, and the courts, do often act wrongly. But they don't tend to act _this_ wrongly for this long.


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## ClayPot (Mar 19, 2011)

I only know that the story says. Certainly does seem shocking. You would really hope that there would be something else that would cause the state to act this way and we're just not getting the big picture.


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## JennyG (Mar 19, 2011)

I don't know all about it (hadn't heard of this particular case) but I believe there is something deeply, deeply amiss with child protection in Britain. I know there are iron-curtain-type reporting restrictions on everything Social services do in this line. There are beginning to be very disturbing but at last irrepressible breakings out of terrible stories - children snatched from their parents for made-up reasons, and the parents not even allowed to speak up for themselves in court, or to have recourse to any lawyers but those who are already working in close cahoots with the social services.
So yes, I believe this story could be true as it stands. The Councils get funding if they can keep their adoption quotas up. Check out Christopher Booker's regular column in the Sunday Telegraph, (where he also campaigns for sanity over global warming, and other concerns). Or better still, please pray for the families concerned


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## Kim G (Mar 19, 2011)

I've read similar stories, though not where the child is taken for so long. Judges have actually phoned in court orders when women refuse C-sections after being in labor for over 12 hours in the hospital. They said she was putting the baby at risk even though all vital signs were good. Women CAN and HAVE been given C-sections against their will.

One of the reasons I went with a midwife for my pregnancy.


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## JennyG (Mar 19, 2011)

...But NB, please treat that link with caution. There's a lot on the Telegraph's website (as with any newspaper) that you probably wouldn't want to see


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## Scottish Lass (Mar 19, 2011)

jpfrench81 said:


> Here is an article about a New Jersey woman



Pretty sure this is New Jersey "over there" not "over here"--not that the distinction makes it any better...


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## JasonT (Mar 19, 2011)

I'm not saying this did or didn't happen, but seeing what paper the story comes from is enough to make me highly skeptical. The Daily Mail isn't exactly renowned for letting the truth get in the way of a good story.


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## ClayPot (Mar 19, 2011)

So this is New Jersey in the UK not in the USA? That would make sense sense a British paper picked it up. Not that it makes it any better, but at least at clarifies one thing.


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## JennyG (Mar 19, 2011)

JasonT said:


> I'm not saying this did or didn't happen, but seeing what paper the story comes from is enough to make me highly skeptical. The Daily Mail isn't exactly renowned for letting the truth get in the way of a good story.



I knew you must be British as soon as I saw that comment! the Mail does like to whip up righteous indignation. I don't read it myself (she said, hastily) but I often buy it for my stepmother so I see the headlines. 
The wilder shores of anti-Mail sentiment in this country have had me scratching my head sometimes even so. Sometimes, righteous indignation is appropriate - also I've heard people excoriate the paper for dishonesty and worse, who to my knowledge never opened it in their lives.

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jpfrench81 said:


> New Jersey in the UK



would that be the new end of old Jersey??


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## 21st Century Calvinist (Mar 19, 2011)

There isn't in a place in the UK called New Jersey. There is a Jersey, which is one of the Channel Islands and technically not part of the UK. The Daily Mail article shows a photo of St Barnabas Hospital in Livingston, NJ, USA. It is also unlikely that there would be a hospital called St Barnabas in Jersey, Channel Islands. Unusually the Daily Mail article assumes that its readers know that New Jersey is in the USA.
I cannot say whether the article is true, partly true or false.


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## JP Wallace (Mar 19, 2011)

No this is in the USA, as far as I know there is no New Jersey in the UK.


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## Scottish Lass (Mar 19, 2011)

Okay, I defer--I thought maybe it was there was that I didn't see a city listed. So I figured maybe it was a city or regional name there. I also couldn't track it to an American paper, but I'm sure someone can.


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## JP Wallace (Mar 19, 2011)

It speaks of the superior court or supreme court of New Jersey. We don't have regional supreme courts etc. that's not the way the court system works in the UK. The terminology is completely different. County Court>Magistrates>Crown Court>High Court>Court of Appeal>Court of Appeal>Supreme Court.

Not saying it couldn't happen here by the way :-(


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## jogri17 (Mar 19, 2011)

Not to Conservative Christians: LOOK AT THE SOURCE AND DO NOT BELIEVE EVERYTHING YOU READ


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## jwithnell (Mar 19, 2011)

I recall a story here in the US where a mother had a history of safely delivering 11 pound babies -- with another big baby on the way, she refused a C-section precisely because all five or so previous deliveries had been uneventful. The hospital tried to get a court order, but the mother prevailed and had another healthy baby. Where are the "woman's-right-to privacy" folks when this type thing happens?


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## Michael (Mar 19, 2011)

Amazing how a woman might be in trouble with the law for refusing a c-section but if she decides to kill her unborn baby...


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## Montanablue (Mar 19, 2011)

New York Times: Refusing a C-Section, Losing Custody of a Baby - NYTimes.com


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## JennyG (Mar 20, 2011)

Here is today's column in the Sunday Telegraph (Caveat lector, if you visit the site).
The only good thing is that now in spite of all the reporting restrictions, these stories are coming out


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## lynnie (Mar 20, 2011)

I wonder. My sister refused to even have her baby in the hospital although she was at high risk and was warned. Her uterus ruptured, the baby died, and had she gotten to the ER even five minutes later she probably would have bled to death. Her second dead baby out of 10 births, the other baby lived a few weeks and would probably be alive today with a surgery after birth. Such parents refuse to go to doctors, refuse to use medicine, refuse to vaccinate, refuse anything medical. I could tell horror stories from her former church (cult) and their faith healing doctrines but I'm sure you've all heard them already. I struggled for years about this whole subject of parental rights, as have my parents and siblings. Ever see a kid scream for 48 hours with an earache until the eardrum bursts , all the while Mom telling kid to just confess their healing by faith? Ever see a relative who needs medical attention being told they have lying symptoms and by faith they are healed? Ever watch a church cult where several people have dead babies? Believe me, I know how the state feels. I am not saying they have the right to take kids away from such parents, but I understand the other side.


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## Dwimble (Mar 20, 2011)

Definitely MUCH more to the story than the article states. Here's a *much more thorough article about it*.


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## he beholds (Mar 20, 2011)

That's awful.


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