Get A Good Look at the Baby Who's 1% Survival Odds Meant She Could Have Been Aborted
To hear some abortion advocates explain it, any baby that faces steep survival odds due to pregnancy complications or significant health issues should simply be terminated, as they believe the baby will inevitably incur great costs to the parents, family and society at large prior to their likely early death.
But if that sort of advice had been followed by Ireland’s Fionnuala McArdle, she never would have had the opportunity to experience “the most amazing moment of my life.”
LifeNews reported in March 2016 on the miraculous story of McArdle and her extremely premature infant daughter who was born after only 23 weeks and weighed slightly more than one pound.
The tiny infant girl, named Meabh after a legendary Irish warrior queen, was given a less than one percent chance of survival by the doctors at the Royal Maternity Hospital’s neonatal care unit when she was delivered prematurely.
“When I looked at her and she was so fragile, she really was badly bruised and she just looked so sick, but I just loved her,” McArdle said in an interview. “It was scary because she was so small. She was the size of my hand. It was just (like) ‘how are you here’?”
McArdle also recalled a brief moment in which her fragile daughter was temporarily removed from her incubator about a month after her birth so she could be held. It was a magical moment for the mother.
“It was literally about a minute, if even, because she couldn’t handle it,” McArdle said. “She was still on a ventilator at the time so she was put straight back in. But it was the most amazing minute of my life.”
Like her namesake, the little baby girl proved to be a valiant fighter, overcoming pneumonia as well as four major operations, including one on her open heart and two on her eyes. She was ultimately discharged from the hospital and sent home with her mother after five months.
McArdle was absolutely ecstatic that she was able to bring her beautiful baby girl home with her after five months despite ongoing health concerns, a remarkable moment made all the more miraculous considering that abortions are legal up until the 24th week of a pregnancy in the U.K., and by all accounts most other babies facing the slim odds this one did would likely have been terminated.
The Irish News followed up on the incredible story of little Meabh McArdle in November of last year and reported that the little girl who had been given a less than one percent chance at survival had just celebrated her second birthday in a suburb of Belfast.
That article explained how the mother had suffered three prior miscarriages due to a septate uterus that wouldn’t allow a pregnancy to last longer than 12 weeks, though it was thought that an operation performed in 2015 had solved that issue.
Unfortunately, McArdle began to suffer complications after 22 weeks of pregnancy with Meabh and was ultimately forced to give birth prematurely at 23 weeks to avoid losing yet another precious baby.
“When Meabh was born, doctors asked me did I want to take her in a wee blanket and hold her as she had a zero to one percent chance of survival,” McArdle recalled. “But I wanted her to be incubated straight away and for them to do everything they could to help her survive because if she didn’t survive, neither would I.
“I was told she had nerve damage and would never walk; but when I sang, her little toes wriggled,” she recalled. “I knew she would hear me. It gave me hope and I knew I did the right thing.”
So McArdle spent every day singing and talking to her little baby girl until eventually she had progressed enough that doctors felt comfortable allowing her to finally go home.
“When we were leaving the hospital, I remember the doctor saying to me ‘It’s good to be wrong sometimes,'” McArdle said.
Thank you staff from @nihecommunity for donating to Neonatal Unit in Royal Jubilee Maternity Service for Meabh McArdle & her mum Fionnuala pic.twitter.com/LIeF6ck5ih
— Belfast Trust (@BelfastTrust) February 16, 2017
Meabh still has a struggle ahead of her, as she suffers from chronic lung disease, low muscle tone and must use an artificial feeding tube. But she is still making progress and is actually walking now, something the doctors predicted would never happen even if she managed to survive the steep odds stacked against her.
This little girl’s tremendous story of survival in the face of incredible odds should serve as a check against those on the left who would recommend just ending it all early for mothers and infants in a similar situation, as Meabh literally embodies the ultimate joy of life.
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