Editor's note. Please send your thoughts to daveandrusko@hotmail.com.

When I read accounts that are so hard-hearted they make my blood run cold, I've learned that it's important to read them carefully and through to the end. A good part of a story such as, "Abortion is never an easy option: Why I aborted my first child" displays such callousness that had I not finished this disturbing account of the abortion of a baby with Down syndrome  I would have missed something important . [You can read the story at www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/you/article.html?in_article_id=513058&in_page_id=1908].

Katherine Mobey aborted her first baby six years ago. The introduction to her account, which ran in the Daily Mail, tells us it was "a traumatic decision that took their marriage to breaking point." It's easy to see why.

Early on she learns from the sonographer that her baby has exomphalos – "a rare condition in which part of the intestine grows outside the body"--which can be corrected by surgery. She is also told her baby may have Down's and further tests are taken. At that point she'd realized "my relationship with my baby had changed."

"Every pregnant woman wants the little person growing inside her to be perfect--but my dreams had turned into a fearful vision. " An understandable reaction.

Then she gets the call from the midwife. "As soon as she told me it was bad news, I broke down," Mobey writes. "The baby was seriously affected by Down's as well as the intestinal complications. We didn't know what its life expectancy would be or what medical treatment it would need, but we did know that we would not be able to cope with a severely disabled child. Going ahead with the pregnancy wasn't even up for discussion. Neil [her husband] stayed strong and made all the necessary arrangements."

At roughly 16 weeks, they couldn't have known their baby would be "severely disabled." What she did know was her "dream" baby had become, for her, a "nightmare." (Later in her story, Mobey tells us, "My third irrational but very real feeling was that my body had been contaminated by having a sickly child in my womb.")

After the abortion, Mobey is told she can hold the baby. "But I couldn't do it--hold the dead and deformed being that had been inside me." By this point it's become increasingly difficult on any reader not predisposed to her "choice" to continue.

Then we have two sentiments that would appear diametrical opposite, but on further reflection perhaps not. 

"On his way back, Neil saw someone taking away the baby in a bundle of tissue down the corridor--presumably to the incinerator." Unsurprisingly, "He often talks about that moment and it is extremely painful for him."

But then there is this:

"Afterwards--and I know this will sound bizarre--we were elated. Mum and Neil were saying, 'Well done,' and relief flooded over me. For Mum, it had meant losing a grandchild, but she was totally supportive of our decision – her priority throughout was me."

Mobey has told us periodically that she has paid a real price for this "unmotherly decision." But it is not until later that she begins to understand just how steep a price Neil had paid.

As is not uncommon in such situations Mobey desperately wants a "replacement baby." It was too soon for her husband but she presses, and they have a baby girl.

She's coped by having another baby on whom she dotes. "Having Honor was the proof my psyche needed that my body isn't contaminated," she confesses.

Meanwhile Mobey's husband is left to his own devices. She realizes he had been "strong" for her but that the emotional bill was coming due. They split, later reconcile but on what appears to be shaky grounds.

Mobey concludes with the usual the abortion "was the right decision" for her ending. But this comes after the admission that "I still cry as though mine were yesterday."

From the account, it appears that Mobey talked herself into believing the worst about her baby and the worst about her and her husband's capacity to be parents of a baby with disabilities.

It apparently never crossed her mind that someone would adopt a baby with Down syndrome, or that her mother's and her husband's "bizarre" reaction--saying "Well done" after the abortion--could well have been their poorly-worded attempt to show solidarity  with a decision she wanted desperately to make but they did not.

Abortion not only kills defenseless babies, it often stifles, when it does not extinguish, relationships strained to the breaking point. That's important to remember when we reach out to post-aborted women.

If we look closely, there may well be others near by hurting every bit as much as her.

Please send any comments to Daveandrusko@hotmail.com.