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Mother Refuses to Abort Baby Doctors Believed 'Incompatible with Life'

  • Amanda Casanova

    Amanda Casanova is a writer living in Dallas, Texas. She has covered news for ChristianHeadlines.com since 2014. She has also contributed to The Houston Chronicle, U.S. News and World Report and…

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  • Updated Apr 10, 2015

A London mother says she is glad she didn’t listen to doctors who advised her to abort her unborn daughter because of a genetic disorder.

Christian News Network reports Michelle Macaulay became pregnant in late 2012 with her second child with her husband. At a 12-week scan, doctors discovered that the baby had a genetic disorder and said the baby was “incompatible with life.”

“They said the baby had a cystic hygroma, where the lymphatic system doesn’t develop properly,” she told the Daily Record.

“To be told by a consultant the baby was incompatible with life was just horrendous because, looking at that screen, there was a life already started,” she said. “It’s just an awful term to call anyone, let alone a baby growing inside of you.”

Macaulay refused the abortion and her baby survived the birth at 36 weeks via C-section. The baby girl was named Carla.

Today, Carla is almost two years old. 

“Carla’s not walking, but she started crawling and pulling herself up in November—-things we were told she would never be able to do,” Macaulay said. “She will develop and then she might plateau for a long time. She can eat normal foods but she can’t feed herself. The physiotherapists are really confident that she will walk and they’ve always been quite positive.

“She’s amazing,” she added. “I’m so glad we didn’t listen to what we were told because we couldn’t imagine life without her.”

In March, parents from around the world asked the United Nations in Geneva to stop using the phrase “incompatible with life.”

“We have undertaken this global campaign because the phrase ‘incompatible with life’ is not a medical diagnosis: it misinforms parents, it pushes families towards abortion, and it denies those families a chance to spend time with their children, to make memories and to heal,” said Every Life Counts spokesman Tracy Harkin.

Publication date: April 10, 2015