Nausea

I read the first story a few weeks ago. Aside from human interest, there wasn't much that pricked my attention until several paragraphs along. With two older children already and triplets just three years ago, a woman had just given birth by Caesarean section to quadruplets.

And then . . .

"She wanted to run," said her husband, Afredo Anzaldo, 45, who lays carpet for a living.

How the heck can they afford the ones they already have much less four new ones, I wondered. Laying carpet in California must pay a helluva lot better in than I thought or he's working for a high-end company that's paying him plenty.

But then . . .

The 11 family members will be living in a one-bedroom apartment in east Los Angeles. [Magdaleno] said the living room is large, but she isn't sure what the family will do when the babies get bigger.

I thought to myself, Self, how much you want to bet they're illegal aliens.

I'm glad I declined the bet with myself because they are. But, it gets better. And yes, that's sarcasm you detect.

Strangely, although I've found subsequent coverage all written by the same reporter with the LA Times and reprinted in various other papers, each one -- even the LA Times -- omitted certain, selected portions of the entire story that another one didn't.

Sam Quinones, the LAT reporter, writes sympathetically about the plight Angela Magdaleno and her husband Alfredo Anzaldo have faced and face today. And will in the future. Please forgive me if I have none.

While much of the material is the same, it's what one included that another chose not to that paints a fuller picture. The quoted material I'm using below, all with the same LAT byline, comes from the following different sources:

6 + 4 = 1 Tenuous Existence -- LA Times, July 28

Different choices, different lives -- The Seatle Times, July 29

With quadruplets, immigrant couple’s struggles multiply -- Lawrence Journal World, July 29

With quads, couple's struggles multiply -- IndyStar, July 29

~~~~~~~~~~~

U.S. immigrants' stories often are about reinvention and newfound prosperity, about leaving behind poverty and limitations.

That is not Magdaleno's story.

Magdaleno and Anzaldo are illegal immigrants

[snip]

Neither Magdaleno nor her husband speaks English, although she has been in the United States 22 years and he 28. Even her teenage daughters speak mostly Spanish; their English vocabulary is limited.

Yet all of Magdaleno's 10 children are U.S. citizens. The triplets receive subsidized school lunches. All the youngsters have had their health-care bills covered by Medi-Cal, the state and federal health-care program for the poor.

Alfredo Jr. had been hospitalized all his life until recently. He's had three state-funded brain operations, and will require several more as he goes through life, the family says. The couple receive $700 in monthly Social Security payments to help with his medical needs.

Isn't this just a heartwarming story! The common-law couple have been living here illegally for over 20 years, still can't speak English and neither can any of their children. They're all using taxpayer-supported services and receiving Social Security for the three-year-old son, one of the triplets, who's already been hospitalized most of his life and will still have to have "several more" brain operations at taxpayer's expense.

I'm not a monster but dammit, especially since . . .

"I didn't want any more children," said Magdaleno, who used fertility drugs to conceive the triplets but said she did not use them in the case of the quadruplets.

They're illegal, already have two children here that they can't pay for and she uses a fertility drug to have more!

Anzaldo had only daughters, and the couple were getting older. He saw his chance at having a son slipping away.

So now with five (four if you overlook the brain-damaged son who's been hospitalized for most of his life at taxpayer expense) Magdeleno said, "No mas!" But . . .

Magdaleno said she was wearing a birth-control patch to keep from getting pregnant, then took it off when it made her nauseated.

Yeah, Magdaleno. I know the feeling.

I'm feeling a just tad nauseated myself right now.