Daley Ponderings

All hope is found in Jesus Christ.

He has sustained, encouraged and drawn us closer to Him this year. We pray that as you share in our experience either through personal contact with us, or through reading a bit of our story here, that you will be blessed by the Lord, and that He will reveal Himself to you.

I had a revelation today. While we felt very supported back in November, we have recently been more feeling on our own. Certainly, people want to care for us, and probably don't know how to do that. But, I think the bigger issue is that most people we know do not agree with our decisions about how the birth of our first (and second) child happened/will happen. So, that makes it hard for people to know how to talk with us, and they are, as Heather said, "holding their breath until this baby is born, then things will be more relaxed." There is petition circulating around Pittsburgh and elsewhere regarding our case in particular, but in a larger sense, who is responsible for making medical decisions. The petition will be delivered early next week, in hopes of affecting the district attorney's decision for this case. I was going to send it to people, but I am not sure who to send it to, as I think lots of our friends think that the doctor does always know best, and his opinion should outweigh your own in all cases. I think that is a pretty scary place to be, a place where the hospital is in charge and you have no say in what happens to you. Which is basically what is happening in this case. We signed an "informed consent" document, but apparently because doctors have people sign those forms all the time without really explaining things, "informed consent" no longer means anything legally.

As the coroner stated, "a woman in labor" (and apparently her husband by extension) "cannot make decisions rationally" and needs the care practioner to make all decisions for them. I guess that would lead to that all decisions are the medical practitioner's fault. Thus, know we know why the doctors are scared about the malpractice suits, since they have brought upon themselves this conundrum: they know everything, and don't allow patients to take responsibility for any decisions, but yet, the doctors don't want the responsibility either.

So, we are left with the problem, the state can sue whoever they want, parents or provider because everyone is shirking their responsibility to be accountable for their decisions.

If you don't think parents should be able to make decisions regarding their own care, you should think about what the alternative is.

Prayer requests:
Continued prayers for us to trust God's guidance in our lives, and for our faith as we seek Him.
Praise and thanks for the group of families in Pittsburgh who are uniting in support of us and Judy
For legal decisions, both by the district attorney and the Friends of Judy as they try to figure out what is the best course of action.
That we would be able to understand our friends, and that our friends would be able to understand us