Baby Jade

As if the deaths of sons and daughters who were allegedly engaged in illegal activities involving drugs were not enough, a mother decided recently to wrap her newborn in plastic and throw her in a trash can. The baby was still alive when found by those who heard some skirmish in the trash, they thought it was a cat. When they opened the plastic which wrapped something moving, they discovered 'Baby Jade'. From the video footage I saw, those who witnessed the incident all screamed at the background to take the baby to the hospital right away, their voices distraught. One witness who was interviewed said that even after days the incident happened, she could not shake off the image of the baby from her mind, and she started choking in tears.

'Baby Jade' is now in the hospital, in a coma, the prognosis for her is not hopeful. They suspect that her brain is swollen as she was deprived of oxygen while wrapped inside the plastic bag, and that she has sepsis brought by her long exposure to the trash where she was thrown into. The local government where she was found is paying for all her hospital expenses, and help from other donors are starting to pour in.

I had Ana about two years after getting married. For a while, my husband and I thought we would not have a child so we 'took in' Philip, one of my husband's nephews. We were told by the old that a mother's instinct is awakened when she is afforded the chance to take care of a child. At the same time, my doctor worked us both up, my husband told to stop his drinking. We did as we were told, and soon enough I was pregnant with Ana. We were ecstatic. We knew our lives would never be the same again, although we also brought Ana into our difficult world. Nonetheless, we survived. 

We thought we would not have Aidan, as it was only after seven years that I was again blessed to have him. It was an extremely complicated pregnancy, but I fought for both our lives. Again, we survived.

Lately, I asked Ana, who is now pushing 23, when she planned to have a baby. She laughed me off and said, not in the immediate future. I asked her because I missed having babies in the house. And more importantly, I am starting to envy my friends who already have grandkids. They speak of their experience as 'grannies' with so much joy that I wonder what it would really be like if and when I become one. Ana and I love children. Always when we found something crazy-cute videos of babies and their antics on social media, we share them to one another. The kids of my colleagues are close to me, I am always happy to see them in the office when they arrive from school. I have staked claim to the children of Gina, my sister from another mother, and have them in my heart everyday.

So I cannot comprehend why a woman would simply throw a baby away, moreso in a manner so inhuman. Was it perhaps she was mentally ill? Or under the influence of drugs? Or did she not have the means to raise the child? I think of so many justifications for her because I do not want to be angry at her, whoever she is. I pity her, actually. Because she let go of the chance to be a mother: the emotions that overcome one in the privilege of helping God create a miracle; and the unending pride of raising a human being, like linking one loop of a chain to another for hope and the future. I guess she did not see it that way. But I am disappointed that she threw her baby away like trash. I would have wanted one to take care of, again. I ask God, why did she not just hand the baby to me?