Page 1 Page 2 Page 3 Page 4 Page 5 Page 6 Page 7 Page 8 Page 9 Page 10 Page 11 Page 12 Page 13 Page 14 Page 15 Page 16 Page 17 Page 18 Page 19 Page 20 Page 21 Page 22 Page 23 Page 24 Page 25 Page 26 Page 27 Page 28 Page 29 Page 30 Page 31 Page 32 Page 33 Page 34 Page 35 Page 36 Page 37 Page 38 Page 39 Page 40 Page 41 Page 42 Page 43 Page 44 Page 45 Page 46 Page 47 Page 48 Page 49 Page 50 Page 51 Page 52 Page 53 Page 54 Page 55 Page 56 Page 57 Page 58 Page 59 Page 60 Page 61 Page 62 Page 63 Page 64 Page 65 Page 66 Page 67 Page 68 Page 69 Page 70 Page 71 Page 72 Page 73 Page 74 Page 75 Page 76 Page 77 Page 78 Page 79 Page 80 Page 81 Page 82 Page 83 Page 84Plough Quarterly • Autumn 2016 21 ­ professionally – which apparently worked, since the staff later complimented me on how well I had handled it. But something in me was shattered. If my goals demanded tough choices, I had thought, then so be it. Until now, I had not realized just what the price of choice might be, and who might be forced to pay it. As the cold reality of what I had witnessed sank in, I was filled with angry questions. If she was “alone,” where was the man who had abandoned her? Had she been pressured by relatives, friends, or doctors? I was angry for the child who had not been able to defend himself, and angry that it was now too late. If only I had met his mother just days earlier, I told myself, I could have told her about Iris. But what would I have said? I began to rethink my worldview from the ground up. Is encouraging a woman to believe she is tough enough to kill her own child, yet not tough enough to raise it, really standing up for her best interests? Isn’t this actually just another way of putting a woman’s needs last, so that when all is said and done, she is left to bear responsibility for her child’s death? I began to see how many things in our society must be fundamentally wrong if women feel the imperative to make a choice like this. What haunted me most were my patient’s words, “I knew I couldn’t handle that alone.” They prompted me to reflect on how my parents had raised Iris. My mother had always had a husband at her side who would allow her, at times, to be weak and to need his help. Theirs was the kind of relationship my patient clearly lacked. What’s more, my parents had received support from a committed Christian com- munity. Both of them had let go of their Xenia Hausner, Crime Map, 2010 Image used by permission of the artist.