Pub Date : 2023-06-01DOI: 10.1353/nib.2023.a909675
María Viola Sánchez
Circumcision and Regrets from the Mother of Three Sons María Viola Sánchez I am a psychologist and a radio talk show host for 25+ years. Both of my parents spoke English as their second language. I was raised by immigrants who demanded that "we speak English because we are Americans." I have four adult children, three sons, and a daughter. I gave birth to my children in the mid-80s. They are very close in age and remain dear friends to this day. While I was a professional with a career when my children were born, I took a leave to work part-time and largely, to be a stay-at-home mother for nearly ten years. I was very involved with all their academic and extracurricular activities. I became a single mother when they were 2, 4, 6, and 7 years old, which served to redouble my parenting efforts to compensate for the absence of their father. My dirty secret is that I circumcised my three sons. I did so out of sheer ignorance. I am ashamed and deeply saddened by my decision at the time of their births. This is a burden that I will live with for the rest of my life. Something that I took away from them and that I can never repair. Here's the justification for my ill-informed decision. My father was circumcised, my two brothers were circumcised, and my then-husband was circumcised. I blindly assumed all males were to be circumcised. Further complicating the circumstances surrounding their births and the decision to circumcise them is the fact that their father is Jewish. He most likely would have given me pushback on not circumcising our sons, even though we had agreed to raise our family as Roman Catholics, my religion. After delivering my sons, I was asked, "Who would you like to circumcise your son?" My reply was, "Who has performed more of these procedures? And please bring my son to me to nurse after you have finished." Not one person, not one family member, not my son's father, any healthcare providers, not my pediatrician, or my OB/GYN asked me, "What are your thoughts about circumcising your son?" Had I been asked that question, I might have pondered the concept that there was a decision to be made, not a procedure that was necessary, as is the case with cutting the umbilical cord. When my infant sons were brought to me to nurse, they were sobbing so violently that they were unable to latch on to my breast. One can only surmise that no numbing agents were applied or anesthesia given, further compounding my burden of responsibility. Imagine their trauma! Over the course of my radio career, I hosted a program for an American non-profit national media organization, and one of my guests, Steven Svoboda, was scheduled to promote his newly founded organization, Attorneys for the Rights of the Child (ARC). Steven has remained a colleague. I've interviewed him a dozen times over the decades to promote ARC's amazing work. Steven is the one that first opened my eyes to the ridiculousness of male circumcision. Subsequently, I now understand that circumcisi
{"title":"Circumcision and Regrets from the Mother of Three Sons","authors":"María Viola Sánchez","doi":"10.1353/nib.2023.a909675","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1353/nib.2023.a909675","url":null,"abstract":"Circumcision and Regrets from the Mother of Three Sons María Viola Sánchez I am a psychologist and a radio talk show host for 25+ years. Both of my parents spoke English as their second language. I was raised by immigrants who demanded that \"we speak English because we are Americans.\" I have four adult children, three sons, and a daughter. I gave birth to my children in the mid-80s. They are very close in age and remain dear friends to this day. While I was a professional with a career when my children were born, I took a leave to work part-time and largely, to be a stay-at-home mother for nearly ten years. I was very involved with all their academic and extracurricular activities. I became a single mother when they were 2, 4, 6, and 7 years old, which served to redouble my parenting efforts to compensate for the absence of their father. My dirty secret is that I circumcised my three sons. I did so out of sheer ignorance. I am ashamed and deeply saddened by my decision at the time of their births. This is a burden that I will live with for the rest of my life. Something that I took away from them and that I can never repair. Here's the justification for my ill-informed decision. My father was circumcised, my two brothers were circumcised, and my then-husband was circumcised. I blindly assumed all males were to be circumcised. Further complicating the circumstances surrounding their births and the decision to circumcise them is the fact that their father is Jewish. He most likely would have given me pushback on not circumcising our sons, even though we had agreed to raise our family as Roman Catholics, my religion. After delivering my sons, I was asked, \"Who would you like to circumcise your son?\" My reply was, \"Who has performed more of these procedures? And please bring my son to me to nurse after you have finished.\" Not one person, not one family member, not my son's father, any healthcare providers, not my pediatrician, or my OB/GYN asked me, \"What are your thoughts about circumcising your son?\" Had I been asked that question, I might have pondered the concept that there was a decision to be made, not a procedure that was necessary, as is the case with cutting the umbilical cord. When my infant sons were brought to me to nurse, they were sobbing so violently that they were unable to latch on to my breast. One can only surmise that no numbing agents were applied or anesthesia given, further compounding my burden of responsibility. Imagine their trauma! Over the course of my radio career, I hosted a program for an American non-profit national media organization, and one of my guests, Steven Svoboda, was scheduled to promote his newly founded organization, Attorneys for the Rights of the Child (ARC). Steven has remained a colleague. I've interviewed him a dozen times over the decades to promote ARC's amazing work. Steven is the one that first opened my eyes to the ridiculousness of male circumcision. Subsequently, I now understand that circumcisi","PeriodicalId":37978,"journal":{"name":"Narrative inquiry in bioethics","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-06-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"135194194","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2023-06-01DOI: 10.1353/nib.2023.a909674
Leenoy Hendizadeh, Paula Goodman-Crews, Jeannette Martin, Eli Weber
Abstract: Discharges against medical advice (AMA) make up a significant number of hospital discharges in the United States, and often involve vulnerable patients who struggle to obtain adequate medical care. Unfortunately, much of the AMA discharge process focuses on absolving the medical center of liability for what happens to these patients once they leave the acute setting. Comparatively little attention is paid to the ethical obligations of the medical team once an informed decision to leave the acute care setting AMA has been made. Via a case narrative, we offer an ethical framework that we believe can help guide an ethically defensible AMA discharge process. By emphasizing our duty to provide the best care possible under the circumstances, we contend, our ethical obligations to promote the patient's best interests can still be met despite their decision to leave the acute setting against medical advice.
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Pub Date : 2023-06-01DOI: 10.1353/nib.2023.a909659
J. Steven Svoboda
When the Political Becomes Personal:Circumcision as a Cause and as a Parental Decision J. Steven Svoboda As I prepared for the arrival of my first child, a son, a central activity that I previously saw as political suddenly also became very personal. I had founded a non-profit organization in 1997 devoted to educating the world that genital cutting of a child, regardless of a child's gender, is unnecessary and harmful. This includes male circumcision. In 2001, as part of my non-profit work I led a team that went to the United Nations in Geneva and for the first time, put the issue of male circumcision as a human rights violation in the United Nations record. At the time, my then wife was pregnant with our first child, a son. (I had the ultrasound photo of my son-to-be on my nightstand while in Geneva.) Now the circumcision question would be posed to me! A few months after the Geneva trip, when it came time in early 2002 for my son's birth on the US territory of Guam, I naturally was never going to agree to the procedure. Nevertheless, I was trying not to inject my own beliefs into the arrival of my first child. My children's mother, while Jewish, is a pediatrician who always had some doubts about the wisdom of circumcision and easily agreed with my desire to keep our son intact. No one in either of our families had any serious problems with our decision. The nurse at the hospital in Guam where my wife worked and gave birth asked me a total of five separate times if I wanted my son to be circumcised. Each time, I answered, "No," without saying more, until the fifth time, when I politely added, "You do know that there is no medical reason for this to be done, right?" The nurse replied in a chirpy voice, "I know." I then asked, "Why do you ask parents about it then?" She replied, "Because they want it sometimes." Well, the odd thing about that is there is no other medically unnecessary procedure on their children for which parents are repeatedly solicited. And if I had agreed even one time, I am sure that my child would have been circumcised [End Page 73] without any follow-up questions to make sure I really wanted this done. Besides, at least in the absence of any medical condition making it necessary (which is essentially never the case), it should not be my decision to make, nor his mother's, but rather the child's whose body it is. The oddest aspect of this whole chain of events may be that I was not given a single shred of information explaining why I should support my son being cut. My son had zero issues after being left intact, and how could it be otherwise? My advice, naturally, to parents expecting boys (or girls, or intersex children, for that matter) is to educate yourself. You will learn, the more you look into these issues, that there are thousands of people around the world, including countless physicians and other experts, who believe childhood circumcision is as outmoded, useless, and as harmful a practice as footbinding. Why not le
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Pub Date : 2023-06-01DOI: 10.1353/nib.2023.a909655
James M. DuBois, Ana S. Iltis, Heidi A. Walsh
Editors' Note James M. DuBois, Ana S. Iltis, and Heidi A. Walsh Dionne Deschenne was 30 weeks pregnant with her son when she contracted a serious case of pneumonia, requiring her to have an emergency C-section. Her son spent weeks in the NICU after his premature birth. Deschenne writes, "Under the conditions, I relied on the hospital staff to help me understand the risks, benefits, and necessities of each procedure or test they recommended. We formed a relationship of mutual respect." One day when Deschenne's doctor was making rounds, a nurse asked if she wanted to have her son circumcised while the doctor had time and was available. "The nurse bringing up circumcision was one with whom I had built a relationship of trust over the previous days. I considered her a trusted advisor. I asked her what the benefits would be? What would the risks be? Would my son experience pain? Was operating on such a tiny and ill baby safe?" Authors in this issue of "Narrative Inquiry in Bioethics" pondered similar questions. In the symposium, "Newborn Male Circumcision," we aimed to explore the decision making process of parents when choosing whether to have their infant male children circumcised. Through the symposium, we hoped to gain insights about what information or resources parents lack or would find helpful as they decide. "Overall, even though it was a very difficult decision, I think it was the right one for my son and our family," says Anonymous Two, one of 14 authors who contributed a story. "I don't think it's right for others to judge parents that make the choice to circumcise their sons. I don't think it's an easy choice for most of them—it certainly wasn't an easy choice for me." Twelve stories are included in the symposium; two additional narratives are published in the online supplement. Nine of the 12 parent authors opted to circumcise their infant sons, though the reasons they stated for doing so varied. Most of the parent authors relied on cultural or social beliefs, religious guidance, or a desire for sameness with the infant's father. Parents who didn't circumcise their male infants discuss their convictions about autonomy, bodily rights, and the medical benefits of circumcision versus the harm or pain caused by the procedure. The symposium editor, Heidi A. Walsh, makes the observation that "while shared decision making is not an overarching theme in the stories, the authors demonstrate that circumcision decisions are not straightforward for many parents and discussion with a trusted healthcare provider could have been helpful." The four commentary articles by Lauren L. Baker, Laura M. Carpenter, Shawn D. O'Connor and Claudio J. Kogan offer important insights into the authors' stories. Comatose survivors of cardiac arrest often die after life-sustaining therapy is withdrawn. Family members, acting as surrogate decision makers, are frequently asked to decide whether their loved one should continue to receive ongoing mechanical ventilation or o
迪翁·德谢尼(Dionne Deschenne)在怀孕30周时感染了严重的肺炎，需要紧急剖腹产。她的儿子早产后在新生儿重症监护室呆了几个星期。Deschenne写道:“在这种情况下，我依靠医院的工作人员来帮助我了解他们推荐的每项手术或检查的风险、益处和必要性。我们建立了一种相互尊重的关系。”一天，当德尚的医生在查房时，一位护士问她是否想趁医生有时间和有空的时候给她的儿子做包皮环切手术。“那位提出包皮环切的护士是我在前几天建立起信任关系的人。我认为她是一个值得信赖的顾问。我问她有什么好处?风险是什么?我的儿子会感到痛苦吗?给这么一个生病的小婴儿做手术安全吗?”本期《生命伦理学的叙事探究》的作者也思考了类似的问题。在“新生儿男性包皮环切术”研讨会中，我们旨在探讨父母在选择是否为男婴进行包皮环切手术时的决策过程。通过这次研讨会，我们希望深入了解家长在做决定时缺乏哪些信息或资源，以及哪些信息或资源对他们有帮助。“总的来说，尽管这是一个非常艰难的决定，但我认为这对我的儿子和我们的家庭来说是正确的，”匿名者2说，他是14位为这篇文章撰稿的作者之一。“我认为别人评判那些选择给儿子行割礼的父母是不对的。我认为这对他们中的大多数人来说不是一个容易的选择，对我来说当然也不是一个容易的选择。”专题论文集收录了12个故事;在线增刊中还发表了另外两篇叙述。12位父母作者中有9位选择对他们的婴儿进行割礼，尽管他们这样做的原因各不相同。大多数父母的作者都依赖于文化或社会信仰、宗教指导或与婴儿父亲相同的愿望。没有给男婴做包皮环切手术的父母会讨论他们对自主、身体权利的信念，以及包皮环切手术的医疗益处与手术造成的伤害或痛苦。研讨会编辑海蒂·a·沃尔什(Heidi a . Walsh)观察到，“虽然共同决策不是故事中的首要主题，但作者证明，对于许多父母来说，割礼的决定并不简单，与值得信赖的医疗服务提供者讨论可能会有所帮助。”劳伦·l·贝克、劳拉·m·卡彭特、肖恩·d·奥康纳和克劳迪奥·j·科根的四篇评论文章对作者的故事提供了重要的见解。心脏骤停的昏迷幸存者经常在停止生命维持治疗后死亡。作为替代决策者的家庭成员经常被要求决定他们的亲人是否应该继续接受持续的机械通气或其他维持生命的治疗，考虑到一旦这种治疗被撤销后死亡的高风险。有时，医生和家庭成员不同意什么是在病人的最佳利益，这给家庭和医疗保健提供者造成痛苦。由Rachel Caplan等人撰写的“心脏骤停后的医生家庭冲突:一项定性研究”，检查了24名心脏骤停患者的医疗记录中的主题，这些患者的家人表示，尽管医生建议撤回维持生命的治疗，但他们希望继续为其家庭成员寻求生命支持。在记录在案的家庭成员和医疗服务提供者之间的对话中，家庭成员提到的不想撤销生命支持的四个突出主题出现了，包括对奇迹的信仰，“扮演上帝”的不恰当，与患者共度更多时间的价值，以及医疗服务提供者和家庭成员对患者状况的不同看法。作者总结说，通过仔细倾听、提问和参与谈话，临床医生可以帮助减少冲突、改善沟通，并帮助家属为患者做出最好的决定。本期的案例研究由Leenoy Hendizadeh等人撰写，并作为我们与凯撒医疗机构合作案例研究的一部分提交。
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Pub Date : 2023-06-01DOI: 10.1353/nib.2023.a909677
{"title":"Full Collection of Personal Narratives","authors":"","doi":"10.1353/nib.2023.a909677","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1353/nib.2023.a909677","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":37978,"journal":{"name":"Narrative inquiry in bioethics","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-06-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"135194439","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2023-06-01DOI: 10.1353/nib.2023.a909657
Anonymous One
Surprised Divide Anonymous One Anonymous One Not long after our daughter was born, my wife and I were expecting a son. We were busy new parents, so her pregnancy with our second child went by quickly and without a lot of the fuss that a first pregnancy brings. To our surprise, our son was born a few weeks early but aside from a little jaundice he was a happy, healthy baby. My parents were caring for our daughter while we were at the hospital. After my son's birth, we were excited for them to bring our daughter up to the hospital to visit her new baby brother. The hospital photographer came by and took photos of our two kids together and photos of our son swaddled and sleeping soundly in a basket. Other family members stopped by to meet the new baby as well. It was a happy time. Little did we know that a couple of hours later we would be faced with a communication breakdown. My wife and I usually pride ourselves on how well we are able to communicate and plan our future. I grew up heavily Catholic, attending parochial schools through high school graduation. Meanwhile, my wife's family are Unitarian Universalists. You could not have two more polar opposite religions! We are used to having different points of view. We have always talked through many of life's choices and have both had to make compromises in order to have a successful relationship. It was on that happy day of my son's birth that we discovered we forgot to discuss one important topic. As our family was gathered in my wife's hospital room, joyfully celebrating the newest addition, the doctor entered the room to check on my wife and said it was time to do the circumcision if we wanted. Without hesitation, I responded in the affirmative, then the doctor and I looked over at my wife, who was staring at us with saddened, conflicted eyes. I was confused. Didn't she want the same thing for our son that I did? Surprisingly we never discussed this decision, at least not that I remember. I don't recall her ever telling me she was against it. My wife stated that she wasn't prepared to make a decision because she didn't know what our son would want and she was worried about him experiencing pain. She worked hard for 9 months to grow this baby boy, and he was so little. I understood her anguish in the thought of letting someone alter his tiny body. I am circumcised myself. My background provided me guidance and an expectation that this would be happening, so it was a nonissue for me. I never considered a scenario in which my son would not be circumcised. In truth, it felt ridiculous to even contemplate not circumcising him. My words of reassurance that it would be fine and my explanation to my wife that this was just one of the many decisions we would need to make for him and our other child did little to settle her. It was clear that no one (including me) had discussed this with my wife prior to this point, which was unfortunate. The doctor described the process and tried to reassure my wife that
{"title":"Surprised Divide","authors":"Anonymous One","doi":"10.1353/nib.2023.a909657","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1353/nib.2023.a909657","url":null,"abstract":"Surprised Divide Anonymous One Anonymous One Not long after our daughter was born, my wife and I were expecting a son. We were busy new parents, so her pregnancy with our second child went by quickly and without a lot of the fuss that a first pregnancy brings. To our surprise, our son was born a few weeks early but aside from a little jaundice he was a happy, healthy baby. My parents were caring for our daughter while we were at the hospital. After my son's birth, we were excited for them to bring our daughter up to the hospital to visit her new baby brother. The hospital photographer came by and took photos of our two kids together and photos of our son swaddled and sleeping soundly in a basket. Other family members stopped by to meet the new baby as well. It was a happy time. Little did we know that a couple of hours later we would be faced with a communication breakdown. My wife and I usually pride ourselves on how well we are able to communicate and plan our future. I grew up heavily Catholic, attending parochial schools through high school graduation. Meanwhile, my wife's family are Unitarian Universalists. You could not have two more polar opposite religions! We are used to having different points of view. We have always talked through many of life's choices and have both had to make compromises in order to have a successful relationship. It was on that happy day of my son's birth that we discovered we forgot to discuss one important topic. As our family was gathered in my wife's hospital room, joyfully celebrating the newest addition, the doctor entered the room to check on my wife and said it was time to do the circumcision if we wanted. Without hesitation, I responded in the affirmative, then the doctor and I looked over at my wife, who was staring at us with saddened, conflicted eyes. I was confused. Didn't she want the same thing for our son that I did? Surprisingly we never discussed this decision, at least not that I remember. I don't recall her ever telling me she was against it. My wife stated that she wasn't prepared to make a decision because she didn't know what our son would want and she was worried about him experiencing pain. She worked hard for 9 months to grow this baby boy, and he was so little. I understood her anguish in the thought of letting someone alter his tiny body. I am circumcised myself. My background provided me guidance and an expectation that this would be happening, so it was a nonissue for me. I never considered a scenario in which my son would not be circumcised. In truth, it felt ridiculous to even contemplate not circumcising him. My words of reassurance that it would be fine and my explanation to my wife that this was just one of the many decisions we would need to make for him and our other child did little to settle her. It was clear that no one (including me) had discussed this with my wife prior to this point, which was unfortunate. The doctor described the process and tried to reassure my wife that","PeriodicalId":37978,"journal":{"name":"Narrative inquiry in bioethics","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-06-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"135195644","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2023-06-01DOI: 10.1353/nib.2023.a909671
Shawn D. O'Connor
Abstract: Newborn male circumcision has potential benefits and advantages as well as disadvantages and risks. Families will at times have medical questions regarding newborn male circumcision that clinicians must be prepared to answer.
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Pub Date : 2023-06-01DOI: 10.1353/nib.2023.a909668
Molly Sinderbrand
A Brit Milah for Eliezer Herschel ben Yonatan Aryeh Molly Sinderbrand For observant Jews, the choice to circumcise one's son is not a choice. Technically, it is a contractual obligation; the belief is that male circumcision is part of a holy covenant with God. The word for ritual circumcision, brit milah or bris, literally means "covenant [of circumcision]." Circumcision is a physical symbol of a relationship with the divine. It is the commandment that encompasses all other commandments. It is, thankfully, only required of men (women, they say, are naturally closer to divinity). Circumcision is when a baby boy enters the Jewish community, eight days after birth, and when he gets his name. He becomes somebody. To choose otherwise— and some may choose otherwise—is to choose not to be part of the contract, and by extension, not be part of the Jewish community. And a community is one of the most valuable things a person can have. I was not always an observant Jew, though I was raised in a Jewish household. I essentially fell into observance over a period of 10 years, starting with studying ancient Hebrew with a language-loving rabbi in high school and eventually leading to weekly attendance at an orthodox shul, which I joined shortly after first tasting the vegan cholent at kiddush. It was much easier to make friends in [End Page 91] the Jewish community than in my competitive and mildly misogynist graduate program, and frankly, I liked them better. I received kindness and support when I needed it, and gave it back equally, especially around having children. Having children is difficult under any circumstance, but it is especially difficult in social settings where it is seen as abnormal, strange, or even selfish. The Jewish community normalized having children and created a respite from the judgment of the secular world. When I was pregnant at work, I got comments like "It looks like you're having twins!" and "Are you sure you don't have pre-eclampsia? You look awfully large"; at shul, I got pep talks, encouragement, and the traditional "b'sha'a tova"—"may it happen at a good time." Eventually, after having two kids in a two-bedroom rowhome, my husband and I moved to a mostly-Jewish suburb just outside the city. It is the kind of place where everyone says "Gut Shabbes" (a good Sabbath) to each other on Saturdays, but not one in which all the men wear black hats and study Torah all day (though some do). That is, folks live Jewish lives, but interact with the outside world as well. After a few months, it felt like home. This was the context in which I decided—or rather, did not have to decide—to circumcise my son. It was the natural result of the decision to be part of a community that places value (and even membership) on the ritual of circumcision. I made that decision years earlier and have been continuously reaffirming it since. Every day I wake up is a day I decide to be an observant Jew, and I decide to do so in order to be a member of an observ
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Pub Date : 2023-06-01DOI: 10.1353/nib.2023.a909656
Heidi A. Walsh
Abstract: This symposium includes twelve personal narratives from parents about making the decision whether to circumcise their infant male children. The authors of the narratives include five fathers and seven mothers. Nine of the 12 parent authors opted to circumcise their infant sons, though the reasons they stated for doing so varied. Most of the parent authors relied on cultural or social beliefs, religious guidance, or a desire for sameness with the infant's father. Parents who didn't circumcise their male infants discuss their convictions about autonomy, bodily rights, and the medical benefits of circumcision versus the harm or pain caused by the procedure. The symposium includes four expert commentaries on the narratives that are informed and enriched by the commentators' expertise in pediatric bioethics, healthcare ethics, gender studies, Jewish law and tradition, and the medical and surgical techniques of circumcision.
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Pub Date : 2023-06-01DOI: 10.1353/nib.2023.a909667
Dionne Deschenne
Declining Circumcision for My Premature Newborn Dionne Deschenne In 1993, I was pregnant with my first of three sons and was busy preparing for his arrival. Unlike most parents, who focus much of their time on decorating the nursery and buying supplies, I was researching the medical decisions that I would need to make in the moments and weeks following his birth. Having worked in a hospital while a pre-medicine student, I had heard the cries of babies undergoing tests and procedures shortly after birth and knew I needed to be clear on the necessity of those tests and procedures if I was going to consent to them for my baby. My husband was in the Navy and out to sea for six months, so I took a few college courses to pass the time. One was a philosophy course on ethics, and I chose the bioethics of infant male circumcision as the focal point of my coursework that quarter. This allowed me to work through my findings in a racially, religiously, and age-diverse classroom under the guidance of a skilled professor. I was shocked to learn that even the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) at that time acknowledged that there were no known medical benefits that resulted from circumcision. How, I wondered, could parents allow their newborns to undergo such a harrowing experience for no reason? As the months passed and the birth of our first son grew nearer, I had everything ready—all of the decisions made, the doctors prepared, and the hospital selected. All of that preparation went out the proverbial window when I contracted pneumonia at 30 weeks. I was admitted to the Naval Hospital and treated for a week before being airlifted to a nearby Army Hospital when my condition worsened. After a few days there, the doctor came in very early one morning to wake me. Our son's heart rate was slowing, and we were at risk of losing him. They needed to immediately perform an emergency Cesarean section to preserve his life. I was terrified, knowing the potential myriad adverse effects his pre-term birth could cause. We were rushed into the OR and within seconds I had an epidural in my back. Moments later, my perfect, tiny but silent baby was whisked from the room to be attended to by a highly skilled and immensely respected NICU team. My husband followed to keep a watchful eye on our son while I was taken to Recovery. A few hours later, I was allowed to join my husband and son in the NICU. Our baby was beautiful, but so tiny that my husband could hold him in one hand. He weighed four pounds and had an enormous needle in the top of his head. The nurse explained to me that the IV needle was in the best location for administering the IV fluids and medications that our baby needed. His pre-term birth had introduced the need for several tests and treatments I had not anticipated. This was immensely distressing for me as someone who wanted to research and understand so that I could make well-informed and ethical decisions. Keep in mind that this was in the days before smart
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