Nadya Suleman, "Octomom"

Nadya became a tabloid flash in the pan instead of a
National sweetheart.  A miscalculation that cost her.

In January of 2009, Nadya Suleman gave birth to 8 babies.  She was an instant celebrity and was given the name, "Octomom."  She was unmarried and used artificial means of pregnancy.  I will discuss these issues more fully at the end of the post.  

Nadya is an Assyrian Iraqi American.  Her heritage is in the ancient and persecuted church in the Middle East.  To read more about that persecuted church, click here for the Barak Obama post.

5 Degrees

Fourth Degree: Denis Beaudoin, purported father of the octuplets, gave an interview with Good Morning America in 2009.  He is an ex-boyfriend of Nadya.  Here he is interviewed by third degree, Chris Cuomo.

Second Degree, Andrew Cuomo is a parishioner to first degree, Archbishop Timothy Dolan.  Here is the CBS piece on Archbishop Dolan for 60 Minutes. 

The absence of a father
There are a couple of issues regarding the absence of a father/husband in this situation that bear discussion.

1. The financial and physical needs of these children are not sufficiently taken care of without a father in their lives.  This might not be the case if Nadya had become the sympathetic celebrity that she had wanted to become.  Her press ended up being a mockery of her life instead of a sympathetic tribute to it.  As a result, Miss Suleman is relying on the state and federal governments for support of her child and help with child care.  This is not responsible parenting.

2. Nadya Suleman was married.  She divorced after attempts to become pregnant did not result in a child.  Her husband, Marco Gutierrez, was against In Vitro Fertilization (IVF), and the couple divorced.  One of the blessings that marriage bestows is the temperance of the spouses of one another.


"No, getting those hair plugs is a bad idea."  

"Maybe we should hold off on doing over the bathroom until our credit card debt is gone."

  

"Perhaps gastric surgery is not the right choice for you.  Let's sit down and figure out how to be a more active family."  

"Let's sleep on this decision."

Nadya was obsessed with becoming a mother, but was going too far with her fertility desires.  Rather than accept her husband's objections, she rejected him!  In any friendship, especially that of spouses, submission to a less radical view helps us make right decisions.  Nadya did not accept her husband's temperate view.

The Immorality of IVF

The Catholic Church is opposed to the practice of In Vitro Fertilization (IVF) for several reasons.  These reasons include

• the divorce of physical love from the creation of new life
• going outside the marriage (using technicians) to create life
• selecting genetic traits such as gender
• taking a man's responsibility for his children away from him
• taking fatherhood away from men
• single parenthood
• pruning of implanted fetuses to reduce the number of babies in the womb
• freezing unused embryos with no plans to implant them
• letting frozen embryos thaw 



The human body cannot have more than 4 babies naturally.
Pregnancies with 5 happen once in a billion!

• creating pregnancies that are beyond human capacity to sustain

Frozen embryo overload

Miss Suleman began her journey down the IVF road without giving the matter full consideration.  Once she had created many embryos and had several pregnancies, she was left with 8 frozen children.  She did not have the funds to have more than one implantation and she did not want to thaw (kill) her remaining babies.  These are the reasons, (bold type above), why she had all 8 implanted and carried all 8 to term.  

Nadya saw the wisdom of the Catholic (which includes the Chaldean Church) view was right after she had disobeyed that view.  That disobedience lead to her divorce, the stressing of her body, the freezing of children whose lives were under constant threat, and their birth into a fatherless family.  

Nadya's situation is extreme, yet not uncommon.