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A really, really good point was brought up in another topic. It really deserves its very own topic! *wink*

Imagine you are pregnant, and in the third trimester. You find out that continuing the pregnancy might result in your death. You make the choice to continue the pregnancy in order to save the life of the unborn human you carry. Unfortunately you die. Could this be considered suicide? Would the continued life of your newborn make a difference on if it is suicide or not?

A definition might be helpful.


I believe that it isn't suicide, but is a great risk of one's life. I know that I wouldn't do such a thing, but I believe that everyone must make the choice for themself.

I don't think I consider it suicide, but only because the motives are different. Suicide is generally considered an attempt at escape from something (pain, depression, hopelessness etc)
Since I'm pro-choice, I totally believe that a woman should have the right to refuse medical treatment and continue a pregnancy even if it's very likely to result in her death.
However, I think that in some situations doing so would be incredibly selfish.
Like the example I brought up in the other thread. The woman that I heard about had seven children already and had a medical condition that she knew would be fatal if she got pregnant again. She was warned about this after child number 7, but got pregnant anyway and continued the pregnancy. She died during labor and left behind 8 children. As if this wasn't all tragic enough, because of her medical condition her 8th child was born severely disabled and is permanently vegetative. It was her choice of course, but I feel that it was a selfish choice.

My own mother had an unplanned pregnancy when I was 14 and she was about 43. My mom has a heart defect and extremely high blood pressure. She also has clinical depression and at the time was on antidepressants that are contradicted during pregnancy. As if this pregnancy weren't dangerous enough, she was pregnant with twins. My mom is pro-choice, but personally never wanted to have an abortion. The decision making processes over this pregnancy was so hard on her. She knew that her chance of dying due to the pregnancy was very high. She already had a 13 year old daughter and a 7 year old adopted daughter with special needs and behavioral problems. We were not financially prepared for two more family members either. Honestly, I think it would have been very selfish for my mother to continue her pregnancy. Thankfully my mother ended up not having to make such a difficult decision. She had a spontaneous miscarriage.

I wouldn't view that as suicide, if she had known before she became pregnant it would kill her, then yes, I'd call it suicide, or stupidity.

I agree.

My mother grows brain tumors in reaction to one of the pregnancy hormones. When I was 14 or 15, she had a very late, unexpected pregnancy. For her health, her doctors recommended that she get an abortion, which she did. It wasn't easy on her, but everyone felt it was best.

Personally, I don't think I would be brave enough to risk my life to continue a pregnancy. If it turns out that I couldn't safely carry a pregnancy, I would rather just adopt than have biological children (either way, I'd like to adopt a group of older siblings).

You've said everything I'd say. Although personally if I had a pregnancy that was definitely going to kill me, I'd probably not want to continue it.

1.) No, you don't need to have children to survive. Unborn children do need you to survive though. Heaven forbid someone look at this from someone else's point of view rather than always entirely the mother's. Giving one's life so that another might live with no regard for your own safety by definition, is selfless. "Having little or no concern for oneself."

2.) You do have a point, and I agree with you in that. The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few, or one. And, the needs of a spouse/mate/existing children/mother to me, do outweigh those of the unborn child.

3.) I think we have enough on our plates here just debating abortion. Let's leave anti-war sentiment out of this thread, please.

but... in most circumstances, the woman's life is not at risk. however, in abortion, the child's life is ALWAYS at risk. in fact, it ALWAYS dies.

and trite- you can't just "try again", it's not the same life. it would be like justifying murder by saying "well, there are other accountants, another can take it's place" or "there are other children, the mother of the one i killed shouldn't cry, they can just see one of the others and know they still exist".

how is risking ones life in the hopes to save anothers selfish? possibly?

Because in my point of veiw, a fetus/zygote/blastocyte isn't a true 'living being'.
It does not and can not support homeostasis untill quite far into the pregnancy, and sometimes even then it can't.
It has no cognitive thought process etc.
I'd hate to relate it to a parasite, because you'd bring up the fact that a fetus is human, but technically, all it is doing - is the job of a parasite, and you can not say that it is not, due to the fact that an unborn child harms and has the potential to kill the host (mother).

Imo it would be like giving up your life, the future needs of your mate/child/friends/family for something comparative to that of a protista.
I find it selfish that you can pick something that might not even be born alive, that you don't even know anything other then the fact that it's in your uterus and will kill you, over the lives and needs of so many others that already are alive and depend on you.

The circumstances thing about how the fetus 'life' is at risk - well if you understood what I said above, then you should know what I think about this.

No, you can't start over with the 'same fetus', but you can keep your life, become healthy and be able more children and be able to keep your obligations to those that are alive.
There are two scarafices here - one that will hurt everyone around you, and yourself included( it takes your life) and one that takes away something small and not depended on by others.

Don't relate a fetus to a accountant.
I'm pretty sure you just pissed off a lot of accountants - saying they are comparable to a non homeostatic/ non cognitive/ no emotional or physical able entirely dependent group of cells