THREAD: Cherise Doyley was in her 12th hour of contractions at the hospital when a tablet was brought to her bedside.
On the screen was a Zoom call with a judge and several lawyers and doctors.
She was in court, a nurse told her. The reason? For failing to agree to a C-section.
2/ The judge informed her that Florida had filed an emergency petition at the hospital’s behest — not out of concern for Doyley, but in the interest of her unborn child.
The hospital and state attorney’s office wanted to force Doyley to deliver via C-section.
3/ With no lawyer or advocate, Doyley defended herself from her hospital bed for the next 3 hours.
She was aware of doctors’ concerns about uterine rupture, a potentially deadly complication of a vaginal birth, but she said she understood the risk to be less than 2%.
4/ Doyley, a professional doula, explained that she had explicitly asked to avoid a C-section unless it was an emergency.
She’d had the procedure three times before, including one that resulted in a hemorrhage, and hoped to avoid a lengthy recovery while taking care of her kids.
5/ She would soon find that the choice of how she’d give birth wouldn’t be hers.
The judge would decide.
propublica.org/article/florid…
6/ Pregnancy is the only condition where Florida courts have ruled that a mentally competent patient can be forced to undergo unwanted treatment.
It’s rooted in the concept of fetal personhood: that a fetus has equal and, in some cases, more rights than the woman sustaining it.
7/ Florida’s constricting of the rights of pregnant patients is a striking exception for a state that has pushed to enshrine “medical freedom” for those who wish to avoid vaccines or fluoridated water.
8/ We found that Doyley wasn’t the only woman forced by the state to defend their medical decisions while actively in labor.
More than a year beforehand, there had been an eerily similar case.
9/ Like Doyley, Brianna Bennett also had three prior C-sections.
Both women are Black.
And they had both questioned the need for their previous surgeries and arrived prepared to fight for vaginal births.
10/ Bennett said a doctor confronted her about agreeing to a C-section as her labor stretched past 24 hours.
When she refused, worried about recovering while taking care of a baby, 3 other kids, and her disabled mother, the hospital reached out to the state attorney.
11/ “Are any of you gonna help me bathe or shower? Are you gonna help change my pad? Are you gonna help lift the baby out of the bed and put me in the bed because I can't lift my legs?” Bennett asked in frustration during her hearing.
12/ Though she tried to remain calm, she was panicking. Her baby’s heart rate spiked. Then the judge ordered the C-section, and she was wheeled into surgery.
When she awoke, she “cried every single day,” she said.
13/ Legal experts we talked to were alarmed by the precedent set by Doyley and Bennett’s cases, particularly as Florida considers a bill that could pave the way for more court-ordered medical care.
Read our full investigation: propublica.org/article/florid…
14/ Doyley and Bennett signed waivers allowing UF Health in Jacksonville and Tallahassee Memorial Hospital, respectively, to discuss their cases with ProPublica, but the hospitals declined to comment on their cases.
15/ Doyley’s doctors said during her hearing that they did not think she could successfully give birth vaginally and that her condition required intervention.
"Everybody was very concerned about the baby's welfare," the hospital's director of women's services said.
Share this Scrolly Tale with your friends.
A Scrolly Tale is a new way to read Twitter threads with a more visually immersive experience.
Discover more beautiful Scrolly Tales like this.