MALIA, NOAH, Jonah, Isaiah, Nariah, Jeremiah, Mccai and Josiah made their television debut yesterday as the row over their birth continued.
The octuplets, born two weeks ago, were introduced to an expectant world by their mother, Nadya Suleman (33). Guiding the TV cameras through the hospital wards where the babies are likely to remain for several weeks, Ms Suleman placed a hand on each tiny head and said a few words in a sing-song voice.
“Hi, Malia, your eyes are open,” she said to the first. “Hi, Josiah . . . I wish I could stay all day long, but I can’t. Your brothers and sisters at home want to see you . . . I can’t wait until they’re all together. We are not a whole family.” But the size of her family has become an issue in recent days, replacing the celebratory tone that was struck when the births were announced. Ms Suleman, who is a single parent living with her parents, already has six children. All 14 were conceived using in vitro fertilisation with sperm from the same donor.
On Sunday, Suleman’s mother, who is caring for the six older children while Nadya is in hospital with the octuplets, called her daughter’s actions “unconscionable”.
“She already has six beautiful children; why would she do this?” Angela Suleman asked in a video interview with the website RadarOnline.com. “I’m struggling to look after her six. We had to put in bunk beds, feed them in shifts, and there’s children’s clothing piled all over the house.”
As medical ethicists have questioned the role of the clinic that implanted the embryos, others have pointed to the cost of the births and the troubles, financial and medical, that may lie ahead for the family.
Nadya Suleman denied that taxpayers were footing the bill for her children. “I’m not receiving help from the government,” she told NBC. “I’m not trying to expect anything from anybody. I just wanted to do it on my own. Any resources that someone would really, really want to help us, I will accept.
“I will feed them. I will do the best I possibly can,” she continued. “I do believe wholeheartedly that God will provide in his own way.” She denied that she had the octuplets to make money. “That’s funny, how untrue that is,” she said. “Money is necessary to raise children. But it’s paper. To me, it is superfluous in contrast to the importance of my kids.”
She also identified the clinic that had treated her as the West Coast IVF clinic in Beverly Hills. The sperm donor remains anonymous. – (Guardian service)