I Keep Just Shaking My Head!

Today's post is about a story that really upset me.

I don't expect many people will support my view, but here goes anyway. I'm not planning on running for mayor any time soon.

The report cites the case of a 13 year-old American boy suffering from Hodgkin's lymphoma ... a cancer that attacks the lymph system and is considered rare in children.

Doctors say time is running out and they want to try chemotherapy. His mum wants to try a more natural route first. In her words " give us some time to heal our son and if it does not work the door is still open on both ends".

Now here's the catch. The courts are forcing the parents to surrender the child for mandated treatment!

And in response, the mum has taken off, supposedly heading towards Mexico with the child. Dad is stuck at home appealing to his wife to reconsider her action.

What a situation!

How screwed up is it when parents have no say in something as critical, or as controversial, as healing their own son ... and a mother is forced to break the law in order to do what she feels is right?

Of course, she is citing religious grounds. And when I heard that I, like many of you too I expect, felt my shutters go down instinctively too.

But then I thought, with everything I have learnt over the last 35 years, that she was absolutely right! This is her child's life we're talking about, not some government statistic.

If I was told I had cancer and had doctors baying for a chance to pump me full of chemicals ... I would also look to try a natural strategy of healing as my first port of call. I would do this even if my back was against the wall and I knew my time was limited.

Why? Because modern medicine does not have all the answers and just maybe there is a better way. We are so quick to pump people full of chemicals, even when their resistance is already greatly diminished.

I would also spend every waking moment I had getting informed and making contact with people who had beaten cancer going this route. I would talk to doctors and survivors. I would think outside the box. I would try with every fibre of my being to find something that may work. It sounds like this is pretty much what this woman was wanting to do too.

And I can hear you baying for my blood already, saying "but it's a child who has no say". We must protect our children.

Bollocks!

The fact that parents are over-ruled in a situation where a) their course of proposed action is not unreasonable and b) she was still not closing any doors if the natural route was obviously a dead end ... meant she was a mother, not a zealot.

Now we'll never know, because that poor mother, whose own child is dying, won't even have the luxury of going on-line and getting more information. She'll be stressed out and running for her life. And what impact will that have on her child's health?

She was following her instincts. And she was frightened. Her husband figured that out and seems like a gentle soul on the brink.

And she was just asking for some time to get informed and try something that made sense to her. Stranger things have happened.

How dare our society over-ride the reasonable wishes of a parent and presume to play God?

But when this poor kid dies, we'll hear sage men in white coats or grey suits say "I told you so". Where was their emotional investment?

My heart goes out to this woman. I wish her and her child a miracle ... because her hand has been forced and that's exactly what it's going to take now.

By the way, I also support Jack Kervorkian. All governments should stay out of private matters! What could be more private than a terminal patient with all their faculties who's ready to die ... or a mother on the threshold of losing her own child.

Back off Big Brother ... don't you have some sheep to clone somewhere, or a distant galaxy to befoul with space debris or something?

And while I'm in rant mode and going far beyong the usual scope of this blog, I thought I'd comment on something that's going on right here in the UK. We have a government who also professes to care about the rights of children.

Strange then that the creature that killed baby Peter got 10 years in gaol. Ten years!!!! ...The child died from systematic abuse. He had a broken back and ribs.

And this was the perpetrator's second offense. Oh yeah, the first time he raped a two year old child!

And we have a system that looks out for kids!

Surely if you rape a two year old, you don't get a chance to destroy another child's life ... because you are in gaol for the rest of your existence?

But perhaps he had a harsh upbringing and society is to blame.

Yes folks ... after today I really could just howl at the moon. Please tell me I'm not alone on this one.