I read that,
Today's Guardian relates how doctors in Seattle devised a radical course of surgery and hormone treatments at the request of Ashley's parents to keep the disabled girl small, making her easier to care for and carry. This included a hysterectomy, "excision of the early buds of her breasts, and medication with high doses of oestrogen to limit her growth by prematurely fusing the growth plates of her bones".
My first reaction to this was that 'this is unnatural, therefore it cannot be right, but I need to know more before I judge them.'
Then I read more feedback in Guardian's 'have your say'. I provide the link below.
news blog
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Ethical issues are hard to tackle. No, no, that's not my conclusion. I was thinking, if I were the girl, would I want this. I felt 'this can't be right' because I thought the girl's gender would later be an issue, but then again, gender is something social, something from outside. Since the pillow angel has a 3-month-old baby's brain, she is free from this confinement of male/female. It's her life, she gets to decide, yes, but who has a life at the age of 3 months anyway?
Some taunted the selfishness of the parents, but I think they are only human too. Parents love their children, but they get fatigued too. Being realistic is good, and this is not the case of 'be cruel to be kind'--you can only be cruel to be cruel, kindness does not come out of it. Oops, digression. Perhaps it is the best for the girl's physical maturity to stay close to her 3-month-old brain. This involves a lot of compromises and controversies, certainly, but there is no perfect decision.
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