CNN recently shared the story of a couple in Idaho who traveled to Portland, Oregon, for an abortion after their “wanted” preborn baby was presumed to have Turner syndrome, a non-life threatening condition that affects females. Girls and women with the condition can have a variety of symptoms, but can lead ‘normal’ lives.
Jen and John Adkins told CNN that they want a big family and were excited to give their two-year-old son a sibling when they learned Jen was pregnant. CNN reports the couple was “overjoyed” about the pregnancy but at 12 weeks, their “plans were shattered during a routine ultrasound.”
‘Very likely’ diagnosis of a condition that was not life-threatening
“As soon as that ultrasound technician put that wand on my stomach and I saw the baby on the screen, I knew something was wrong,” Jen said. “I could just tell, ‘that’s a lot of fluid that’s not supposed to be there.’”
They were told that it was “very likely,” said CNN, that their daughter had Turner syndrome, in which one or part of one X chromosome is missing. While there is a high incidence of miscarriage, babies born with Turner syndrome can live a relatively normal life span and a normal life. Mayo Clinic states that Turner syndrome can cause heart abnormalities, kidney issues, and other treatable conditions. It can also cause specific physical features, and ovaries are often missing. Symptoms vary from person to person, with some girls not showing signs or symptoms until later in life.
According to the NHS, while there is no cure for Turner syndrome, girls and women with the condition can “lead a relatively normal and healthy life” with a “slightly reduced” life expectancy of mid-60s to early-70s.
Yet, the couple’s “plans were shattered” by the news that their daughter might have a non-terminal condition.
It’s normal to be heartbroken or angered by your child’s diagnosis – but to say their “plans were shattered” points to the eugenic motives of legalized abortion. This baby was wanted by her parents when she was presumed “healthy” but as soon as there was an indication that she might have a health condition — even a survivable one — she was targeted for abortion. She no longer fit into her parents’ “plans.”
Abortion in the ‘cover of darkness’
Despite the hope that existed for their daughter, the doctors told the couple that it was surprising Jen hadn’t already miscarried and warned her that she likely would at any point. They told her, “The longer you stay pregnant, the more at risk you are of developing complications of your own.”
However, doctors know that every pregnancy carries risks of complications and the further along any pregnancy progresses, the greater the risk of complications becomes because most complications occur later in pregnancy. Are pregnancy complications only worth the risk for babies who are deemed “healthy” or “normal?”
Jen asked the doctor about her options, and she was told that abortion is not legal in Idaho.
“I was sent home to grieve and mourn and call around to see if we could get an [abortion] appointment out of state,” said Jen.
The couple ended up driving to Portland with the help of abortion access funds and money from family.
“For folks like us — you know, we’re regular Americans,” said John. “We don’t have those kinds of readily available liquid funds.”
John said that as they drove to Oregon, they feared they were breaking the law. “We honestly felt like we were fleeing and had to do so under the cover of darkness,” he said. “It was a really, really bizarre feeling … like we’re criminals that have to hide from the state.”
However, there is no law preventing adults from leaving Idaho to procure an abortion.
READ: Wife of GOP Senate candidate opens up about the abortion that ‘wrecked her life’
A ‘kit’ of their baby’s body
The abortion facility in Portland gave the couple “a kit,” said John. Inside was the “product of conception” or the remains of “this child that we wanted.”
CNN reported, “… Jen emerged from the clinic with a box she needed to ship urgently. The clock was ticking; if they missed the FedEx cutoff … they wouldn’t be able to get crucial test results that would affect the future of their family.”
But a member of their family was in that box.
“We wanted absolute certainty that this was a fluke thing … that this wasn’t some genetic condition that we created by our two genes mixing together,” Jen said. “We felt it would be irresponsible of us to try again without trying to get as much information as we could.”
John said, “So my memory is of walking into that first Walgreens and holding a brown paper bag that had our child in it and all the hopes and dreams and everything we wanted. It was just such an ugly, dehumanizing experience that we didn’t need to have. It didn’t need to be that way.”
The dehumanization of an innocent child
What is never mentioned in this story, however, is the dehumanization of this baby girl — which is the dehumanization of everyone who is living with Turner syndrome. Some well-known individuals who have the condition are American Olympic gymnast Missy Marlowe, actress Linda Hunt, and Dr. Catherine Ward Melver, a medical genetics doctor.
CNN doesn’t mention what happened to the body of Jen and John’s daughter after the testing was complete, or what happened to her body during the abortion.
During a D&C abortion, which is committed through 14 weeks of pregnancy, a suction catheter is inserted into the uterus and the baby is suctioned out, torn in pieces in the process. In a D&E abortion, which takes place after 14 weeks throughout the second trimester, a Sopher clamp is used to dismember the baby. First, her limbs are removed and after she has been decapitated, her skull is crushed. If she is still small, she may be delivered in larger pieces or even whole. But the violence carried out against her is inhumane and disturbing.
Yet, CNN wants its readers to give their sympathy to her parents. No one forced the couple to have an abortion or to ship their baby in a box to be tested. They chose this. Their daughter didn’t.
Testing came back showing that the baby girl did indeed have Turner syndrome but indicated that none of the couple’s future daughters would be at an increased risk. They are currently expecting another baby.
Jen said she asked her doctors how her experience would have been different if abortion were legal in Idaho.
“They said, ‘we would have referred you to a private clinic in downtown Boise,’” she recalled. “They would have done all the testing themselves, and it would have been a much more humane and dignified experience, and we would have been able to be around friends and family.”
But an abortion was never going to be a “humane and dignified experience” for their daughter, no matter the facility or the state where it was carried out. Abortion unjustly robs an innocent human being of his or her inherent right to life. This is not humane.
The lawsuit
The Center for Reproductive Rights is currently exploiting the horrific death of this baby girl in a lawsuit aimed at ending Idaho’s pro-life law. The lawsuit asks for the law to be ‘clarified’ regarding medical exceptions, though it is already clear. Abortion is legal in Idaho to save the mother’s life (though induced abortion is never medically necessary) or in cases of rape or incest. It isn’t legal for instances in which the baby receives a diagnosis – or a possible diagnosis – and the parents want a discriminatory, eugenic abortion.
CNN seems eager to build public sympathy for the lawsuit and for Jen and John, who are depicted as “regular Americans” claiming they were forced by an anti-murder law to travel by the “cover of darkness” to have their preborn child killed for being different.
