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On November 19, 1997, the McCaughey septuplets were born in Carlisle, Iowa, and the debate on infertility treatments was renewed.
During their earliest interviews with the media, the parents, Bobbi and Kenny McCaughey, expressed radiant joy and geniune apprehension about their reproductive feat. The country watched as Bobbi tearfully described their shared conviction that they should bear the full weight of their blessing, regardless of their fears. They knew their experience was an oddity that was being met with mixed opinions around the world.
Had the parents, a small-town couple of moderate income with one child already, gone too far in their quest for family? Was theirs the right decision to avoid selective reduction (read about their decision and a few medical opinions at GazetteOnline's specially-dedicated site) when their doctors discovered seven fetuses early in the pregnancy? Were their doctors overzealous in their treatment of the couple with Pergonal, or benignly neglectful in their counseling?
While the average, child-bearing population debated the issues surrounding the extraordinary family of three that grew to ten members overnight, the apparently growing numbers of women and men seeking solutions to infertility watched with vicarious joy and anticipation for the couple. Knowing that the statistical odds of conceiving and successfully giving birth to so many babies at once are very low, many couples diagnosed with primary or secondary infertility are using the same techniques and drugs that created the McCaughey family, many hoping to bring a single child into their lives.
This medical roulette game is played daily by thousands of individuals who feel they've been somehow left out of the normal reproductive cycle of life. As they watch their friends and family bearing children, often seemingly without effort, infertile individuals experience their own sense of oddity. An emotional cloud of isolation often propels these individuals toward seeking solace through professional counseling or support groups of relating infertile couples.
There is a growing mobilization of couples affected by infertility, and the parallel of pregnancy loss, to share with others the increasing body of literature that stems from a rapidly advancing medical technology. People who have never been students of medicine are going to their physicians armed with suggestions for diagnostics and treatment. They are becoming expert at manipulating the increasingly complex business of health insurance and healthcare, in an effort to see their dreams come true. This group effort of information-sharing and the attention through the media towards families like the McCaughey's has helped to make other couples' feeling of oddity seem more commonplace.
For now, the McCaughey family is once again avoiding the spotlight that their "miracle" created. While there will probably be the usual annual media pilgrimage to their home, assuring us all is well with their brood, Bobbi and Kenny McCaughey will spend the rest of the time doing what every parent does - fretting over runny noses, wondering how to keep up with little growing feet, and continuing to pray for blessings. They are, no doubt, settling into something of a routine, albeit unimaginable to most of us. Statistically, they may continue to be an oddity; but to infertile people around the world, they are a success story.
© Tracy Morris
