Paul Lewis Sterilizes the Akha Chapter 3

Paul Lewis Sterilizes the Akha Chapter 3

Missionary Genocide against the Akha

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CHAPTER THREE

AKHA ATTITUDES REGARDING REPRODUCTION

Introduction

Akhas see life as a perpetuation of a great lineage. It all began with Sm Mi O, the first human being (Lewis 1969:36, J. Hanks 1969:7). When Akhas repeat their geneology, they usually begin with this name, considering him to be the progenitor of all. After Sm Mi O they continue repeating the names of all of their male ancestors in a direct line, down to the last male to have died. Repeating their geneology is a sacred thing to Akhas, and is normally done only at the times of rite of passage, or in a crisis situation.

The line continues down through the ensuing generations. It has various branches (depending mainly on one's clan), but all Akhas are a part of it. The ones who have gone on before are honored as ancestors. Nine offerings are made to them each year. Someday the present generation will join them, at which time generations still unborn will honor and feed them in exchange for help and succor.

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Akhas see marriage primarily as a ritually proper means whereby children can be brought into the world as a part of this eternal line. When a child is born, Akhas give it a name which ties it into the lineage (Lewis 1970b:701-707).

The first child in any family is viewed as leading a procession of children, so to speak, which forms a continuation of the 'line' for that particular family. Therefore, the death of a first-born infant is regarded as a threat to the family line, and special precautions must be taken. In addition to all of the usual rituals observed at funeral rites, the infant is dressed in white for burial, and all of the clothing is turned inside out.

Attitude Toward Number and Sex of Children

Number of Children

Traditionally Akhas have wanted lots of children to make sure the 'line' will continue. They are very reluctant, however, to say to others, "I want lots of children." Should the spirits overhear, they might bring about some horrible tragedy. Nor will they usually say, "I do not want any more children," when asked directly about it. The reason is that wanting many children appears to them to be the Akha way, and they do not wish to deviate from that.

In the past, Akhas wanted plenty of children especially for economic and ceremonial reasons:

1) Economic

When a boy is born to an Akha couple, the neighbors say, "Now you'll have meat to eat": a hunter has been added to the family. Similarly, when a girl is born friends often say, "You'll have water to drink now," for it is the job of the girls and women to carry water for the Akha household. Akhas see something of the economic value of children. Although in the early years they are more of an economic liability than an asset, children will look after the livestock, run errands, and help in the fields.

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2) Ceremonial

Traditionally Akha families have wanted to have plenty of sons, since that will insure the continued support of the ancestors through the 'ancestral altar.' It is only the males who can touch the altar and prepare the ancestral offerings which are made nine times a year.

Sex of the Children

When an Akha couple is married, there is a special type of blessing called upon them by one or more 'spirit priests' in the evening of the first day (Lewis 1969:328). One part of this blessing has a line which goes,

May the blessing of five sons adorn your home,

and the pleasure of five daughters bring you joy in

the days to come

At one wedding I attended, I saw that one of the two 'spirit priest' calling down this blessing was a man whose wife had had tubal ligation. I knew that they had not gotten their 'five boys and five girls.' Later I asked him about this in his case, and he said, "Oh, that is just a part of the blessing. We don't mean it literally. It's simply a matter of custom."

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Even though it may be just a 'custom,' I believe it goes deep into the consciousness of the Akhas, most of whom feel that they will have ten children unless they do something to change the standard procedure. There have been several Akha women who have not yet reached menopause who have asked me if they needed sterilization. "I have already had ten children," they sometimes say. Those whose mothers had more than ten children, however, tend to feel that they will follow their mother's pattern.

Akhas say that the ideal thing is to have first a boy, then girls and boys alternately. They do not like all boys, or all girls--especially the latter. They do not want to voice their concern too vocally, however, for fear the 'child-maker' will hear them, and 'take the child away.'

One time I was sitting on the headman's porch talking with some villagers in a village near Ba Jaw, when a woman came by, returning from her fields. After standing at the edge of the group for awhile, she finally blurted out, "Do you have medicine which I could take so that I could get another boy?" I said that I did not, but asked her why she asked. "I have three girls and only one boy now. If I had another boy I would like to have tubal ligation." A fairly forward man who lived in the village spoke right up and said, "Let me have just one night with you--I can give you a son,'" The incident revealed something of their interest in having sons--as well as their delight in joking about sex.

Attitude Toward Sex

Akhas have a proverb which states:

Girls are released to live in the village,

Boys are set forth to play in the village

playground. (Lewis 1970b:783)

This saying means that since both boys and girls have been thrown together in the village, they should enjoy all the sex they want.

As both boys and girls approach puberty, they are told that the only way they can grow up is to have plenty of sex. It becomes a matter of joking both between peers and across generations. A six-year-old boy may come back from the courting ground and be asked by parents or relatives, "Well, how many girls did you have tonight?" His answer may be, "I only had one tonight--but I have two beauties lined up for tomorrow night." They all laugh at this byplay, which reveals something of their concept of sex, and also the way they begin to prepare their children for it at an early age.

The former headman of Saen Chai village (called thus by the Thai, but A baw Tu Seh by the Akhas) told me that the spirit gate of the village is a constant reminder of what being an Akha means. He was referring especially to the wooden male and female figures propped up outside of the gate in the position of coitus. {footnote 1: One Thai author, when writing of his visit to Saen Chai's village, felt that if those figures were set up in that fashion in the streets of Bangkok, the owner would be thrown in jail immediately (Thatnasuwan 1968:45).} The village playground, where the young people court, is very close to the village gate and the wooden fertility symbols. I believe it is significant that the Akha youth leave from that spot to go into the jungle to make love.

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There are certain precautions they take when they do that: the boy must be sure he only goes out with a girl who could become his wife (i.e., he must not have intercourse with a girl of his own clan). The girl, on her part, will do all she can in order to get some bit of clothing or jewelry from the boy (even if she has to steal it), since she realizes that she might become pregnant. If that should happen, she could then produce the bit of clothing or jewelry she got from the boy to prove he was the one who slept with her. The boy who caused the pregnancy must marry her.

Sex is a matter which can be freely talked about in certain instances. For example, peers of the same sex, if they are not in an 'embarrassing relationship' (sha daw-eu) may discuss sexual matters with no problem. {footnote 2: Two men who have been married to the same woman would be in this relationship, for example.} Although they are not technically in the 'embarrassing relationship,' husband and wife generally do not talk about sex freely.

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Attitude Toward Childlessness

Sterility

The inability to have children is very serious to the Akhas, as is the inability to have at least one son. Social norms are reinforced by psychological feelings of inadequacy and guilt, especially when there is no male child.

Akhas believe that the main reason for sterility is adultery on the part of the woman (Lewis 1969:99, 344). The husband has all rights to his wife's sexual and procreative capabilities, and her main function is to provide offspring for his line. If she allows some other man to interfere with that process, the ancestors will be angry, and will 'block the channels' (Lewis 1969:345). Akhas will sometimes perform a ceremony for a woman who has committed adultery, in which they ask the ancestors to forgive her and 'open the channels' (Lewis 1969:345).

There are several things a childless Akha couple can do:

1) Get a divorce and each remarry. This happens especially among the younger couples who have been married only a few years without a pregnancy.

2) The husband may take a 'minor wife' (ma nyi). Sometimes the minor wife will subsequently have one or more children--but of course this does not always happen.

3) The couple can ask a shaman to go into a trance to the spirit world and help them get some children. This procedure has been successful in the case of a household in Ba Jaw village, and I have gotten reports from others who believe it has worked as well.

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4) The couple can live with the problem, which is what a couple in Ba Jaw are doing. They were married when he was seventeen and she twenty-one, in 1958. In mid 1977 they were still hoping for children, even though she had never had a pregnancy. When I first interviewed them in 1974 he had been addicted to opium for eleven years, and she for four years. They both blamed the childless condition for their opium addiction.

'No-son death'

When a father dies and leaves no males in the household, it is known as a 'no-son death' (shm byeh, Lewis 1969:505). This type of death is greatly feared by the Akhas.

When the body of that man is taken out to be buried, the 'ancestral altar' must also be taken out and thrown away in the jungle, since there is no male left to make the appropriate offerings to it. This part of the line has been broken. When the ancestral altar is discarded in the jungle, the person carrying it says something like this, "Well, you did not take care of your line. Now it is cut off. There is no one to make offerings to you."

Celibacy

Akhas view older men and women who could get married but do not do so with a large degree of contempt. In the case of the mentally retarded, however, there is a feeling of pity only. While Akhas term unmarried men and women as 'holy' (yaw shaw) when it comes to engaging in ceremonies (Lewis 1969:341), they feel that they are not contributing to the family line.

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There was a young man in one village who suffered severely from epilepsy. His parents and friends taunted him, "You can never get a wife. You must never pass this horrible judgment upon you to children. Look at you unfit for anything but to push food into your mouth." It drove him, at the age of twenty, to take his life.

Two cases I observed of men who had no prospects of marriage were both opium addicts. One was twenty-eight years of age, and the other thiry-one. One of them confided to me that he started smoking opium after the girl he hoped to marry ran off with another boy.

Adopting and Selling Children

The main reason Akhas have for adopting children is to have a son to whom they can hand over their ancestral altar (Lewis 1970b:811, J. Hanks 1969:5). When they adopt a child they change his or her name to the patronymic linkage system characteristic of Tibeto-Burman languages, whereby the second syllable in the father's name becomes the first syllable in the name of the child.

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Another reason for adoption is to have more workers. In the case of adopting children simply to become servants in the house, the name is not changed. If a boy is adopted and his name is changed to fit into the father's line, then even though the father dies with no other male offspring, it will not be a 'no-son death.'

Some Akhas sell their children to other Akhas. There was a fourteen-year-old girl living in a household in Ba Jaw village who had been purchased from a man in a nearby village who was in need of money. The girl lived with that family for almost two years, after which her father redeemed her. I do not know how much money was exchanged in that case, but in another case I know that a daughter was sold for $25 (500 baht). The family that purchased her already had five living children (three boys and two girls).

Needy families with many children may place some of them with other families, to work for their keep. When ancestral offerings are made, however, they return to take part. There is no money transaction in such cases.

Members of the Yao tribe purchase children of all ages from Akhas, as well as from other groups (Kandre 1967:599). I have met many such Akhas who are now grown. Some of them can still speak Akha, and continue to have contacts with Akhas, although they are considered to be 'non-Akhas' now.

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Attitude Toward Pregnancy

In Wedlock

If an Akha woman becomes pregnant as a result of intercourse with her husband, she is 'blessed-lucky' (gui lah hui).

If it is her first pregnancy, or if she has only had girls so far, she may try to influence the sex of the child while pregnant by saying repeatedly, "Let it be a boy, let it be a boy."

The pregnant woman and her husband will both have to observe various taboos during the time of pregnancy. They have the constant fear that the pregnancy could turn into 'human rejects' (see below), which would be a terrible tragedy for the couple, the extended family, and the village.

Out of Wedlock

According to Akha custom, if an unmarried girl becomes pregnant, she must become married before the child is born, so that the child will have its place in the eternal Akha lineage, and will be a true human being. If when the child is born she is not married, it will have to be suffocated and buried in much the same way as 'human rejects,' since it is not tied into the lineage, and is thus not a true human being. Akhas fear such a birth very much, for such an infant becomes a powerful 'spirit' (neh), who can bring a great deal of trouble to the village. Also, if the child is born in the girl's father's house, rather than a house of her husband's line, for nine generations the men of her natal family will have shortened lives.

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I was able to investigate three cases of pregnancy out of wedlock which took place during the past four years. The first was the case of a deaf and dumb daughter of the 'village priest' of Ba Jaw village. When she became pregnant they could not learn from her who the father of the child was. There were no Akha men willing to marry her, so the father took her to a Yao village nearby, and said they could have the child if they would care for his daughter during her confinement.

In another case (not in Ba Jaw village) a younger, very attractive girl became pregnant, but she refused to tell anyone who the father of the child was. The villagers felt it must have been a married man and she did not want to name him, since she might be pressured into being his 'minor wife.' Because she was young and attractive, her father was able to find an Akha youth in his village who was willing to marry her. A few months after their marriage a baby was born. There was no problem since the infant had a father, and through the father a 'geneology' (tsui).

The thrid case was an Akha girl who became pregnant from a young, unmarried man in Ba Jaw village. The pregnancy was discovered in the middle of the rice growing season, which is a time when normally there should not be a wedding in an Akha village. In this emergency, however, the couple had to be married. During the wedding, the boy's father had quite a bit to say about how embarrassing it was to have to make the villagers leave their fields at such a busy time.

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Attitude Toward Birth

When there is a normal birth in a village, very little is made of it, since they want to do nothing to attract the attention of spirits at a time when the mother and infant are weak and susceptible to their attacks. There is relief that it is a normal birth, and not 'human rejects.' One difficulty, the actual birth, has been surmounted. Various rituals must now be performed and precautions taken to keep the child alive.

If the child is normal but premature (Lewis 1969:368), usually Akhas do not yet give the infant its official name. If they do not name the child and it dies, as many premature babies do, then it will not be necessary for the villagers to observe 'ceremonial abstinence' (lah-eu) by remaining in the village, abstaining from sexual intercourse, and observing other taboos for twenty-four hours.

Difficult Birth

When a woman has a difficult birth with protracted labor, Akhas may believe that spirits are holding the child back from being born. They often seek to find (usually through a shaman) what spirit is offended and what type of sacrifice is needed to induce the spirit to allow the child to be born.

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Sometimes Akhas believe that a difficult birth is evidence that the couple is guilty of some serious offense, such as adultery, or perhaps the infraction of some ceremonial ritual. In such cases they use various ritual and magical means in order to induce the child to be delivered (Lewis 1969:36-58).

'Human Rejects'

Certain infants are viewed by the Akhas as being 'human rejects' (tsaw caw). This includes twins, a child with an extra thumb or finger, or a child with a missing member or some other deformity. For such a birth to occur is one of the greatest tragedies that can befall an Akha village as a whole, and especially the household where it occurs (Lewis 1969:369-80). It is the judgment of the 'great powers' on the 'guilty pair' for some terrible thing they have done.

When 'human rejects' are born, they must first be suffocated with a mixture of ashes and rice bran. Then they are buried in a remote spot where no one will ever go again. The house in which they were born must be torn down, and the whole village, as well as 'erring parents,' must be purified by means of intricate and costly rituals. The emotional, social, and economic upheaval is tremendous, and has many ramifications for the village and the couple through the years to come.

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The treatment of 'human rejects' is not looked upon by the Akhas as 'infanticide.' They see it simply as a means of getting rid of a tragic circumstance that has struck the couple and village. The 'human reject' is not really human in their eyes, but some kind of spirit in human guise.

During the period of my study in Thailand, there were four 'human reject' births that I heard of, all twins. At one time the family planning field worker was to visit a village where such a birth had just occured. As he approached the village he was told what had happened, and had to pass by to visit other villages first, returning only after the purification ceremonies had been held. If he had so much as set foot in that village before the ceremonies had been completed, and then gone on to other Akha villages, he could have been heavily fined by those Akhas, since he would have been accused of 'bringing the contamination of human rejects' to their villages.

Miscarriage

When an Akha woman has a miscarriage early in a pregnancy, she usually disposes of the fetus secretly, if she can. If the child has developed enough so that she cannot handle it alone, she will have her husband get rid of it. The couple is ashamed of having had a miscarriage, feeling that somehow it was due to some mistake they have made.

Data are difficult to obtain concerning miscarriages, but from various sources (including data concerning women who received sterilization) I believe there is an average of around 0.4 miscarriages per woman who reaches menopause, with a range of from 0-5.

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Stillbirth

When there is a stillbirth in an Akha family, the child is not named (Lewis 1969:368). There is no need to observe ceremonial abstinence in the village or to perform a funeral ceremony, since it is not considered to be a person.

After they have buried such a child (Lewis 1969:501-503), they leave the bamboo section in which they have carried the body to the grave site on top of the grave, along with the metal tool they use to dig the grave. When everything is finished, the ones who buried the body of the unnamed child will say to it, "If anyone asks you who your parents are, tell them your mother is the bamboo section, and your father is the digging tool."

If an Akha couple has had several stillborn babies or infants that die shortly after birth, they may go to a shaman and ask for help. There are some believed to possess magical means that can be used to intercede with the 'child-maker' and thus help them get a living child next time.

Mother Dies in Childbirth

It is a terrible thing to Akhas for a woman to die in childbirth (Lewis 1969:496), especially if the child has not yet been born. They must force the child out of the mother's womb, and bury the two separately. If they do not do this, they fear that a vicious tiger will come to their village and take off much of their livestock.

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In those cases where the child is born alive but the mother dies, most Akha families try to keep the child alive, although the mortality rate is high. They will try to find a wet nurse for the child. Failing that, is they have the money they will buy milk to feed the baby, or else masticate food and place it in the baby's mouth.

Attitude Toward Limiting Pregnancy

Indigenous Methods

In all of my time living and working with Akha people, I have never found among them an indigenous means of consciously limiting pregnancy.

One night when I was in an Akha village, an old woman stopped me in order to thank me for what I was doing to help Akha women find a means of limiting pregnancy. "I'm glad they don't have to go through what I had to go through," she said. I asked her what she meant. She told me how she had taken a concoction that she had purchased from a Northern Thai, which was guaranteed to keep her from ever becoming pregnant again. Evidently it made her violently ill, and may have formed internal adhesions. She still suffered the effects of having taken that 'medicine'. She did not know what was in it, but she remarked that after the Akha women in the area saw her almost die from it, they were afraid to take it.

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Both in Burma and Thailand I had asked many men if they ever used coitus interruptus. They replied that this was forbidden, since it would 'wrong the ancestors.'

Induced Abortion

Many Akhas, in many different contexts, and over a long period of time, have insisted that Akhas do not have any means of inducing abortions. So far there is only one Akha woman I know of who had an induced abortion, but she is married to a Chinese, and is not living in an Akha village.

Although Akhas profess to be very much opposed to induced abortion, insisting that it is 'just not right' (ma jah k'm), I wonder if perhaps some women and girls have found means of inducing abortions, but are reluctant to admit it.

Spacing

Whatever spacing exists between children among the Akhas in Northern Thailand probably is unplanned. I know of some instances where the parents wish they could have spaced children better, so that the birth had occured more conveniently within the agricultural cycle. For example, if a child is born during the rice weeding season, or the rice harvest period, this can significantly cut down on the amount of rice that the family will realize.

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Even though Akhas are not conscious of it, the following factors tend to bring about some spacing between children, and thus cut down somewhat on the fertility of Akha women.

1) Nursing. Akha mothers nurse their children for as long as the child wishes to nurse, and/or the mother has milk. There is evidence that this period of lactation aids in retarding the onset of fecundability (Potter et al. 1965). If the mother becomes pregnant while the child is still nursing, she will seek to wean it, since she fears it will get a stomach ache.

2) Coital abstinence. There are specific times when husband and wife abstain from intercourse. Akha men fear they will become ill if they have intercourse with a menstruating woman. They usually wait several days after the menstrual period ends before sleeping together, which can mean that the couple normally have no intercourse at least eight to ten nights out of each month. "This is often why Akha men take a minor wife--they don't want to have to wait like that," is what several Akha men, of varying ages and backgrounds, have told me.

For five months after a baby has been born, the husband must not have intercourse with his wife (Lewis 1970b:831). If they do have intercourse, and the wife becomes pregnant before that period is past, the couple can be heavily fined by the village priest.

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If a second child is born to the same woman within a year, it is considered a 'human reject' and must be killed. In 1965 in a village in Burma a woman became pregnant before the five month period was up, and was about to give birth to a child which would have been her second child in that 'year.' The village priest simply set ahead the New Year's celebration for the village, so that the child would be born in the next year, thus saving the household and village a great deal of trauma.

There are ceremonial times each year when married couples must abstain from intercourse: the night before an ancestral offering, when someone dies in the village, when 'human rejects' have been born in a village, and when some tragedy has befallen any of the sacred places in the village. (Some men tell me this is breaking down somewhat now.)

After Akha men first return from hunting, trading trips, or other such absences, they do not sleep with their wife for from one to three nights. There seems to be a feeling that they might be bringing some kind of contagion back with them, and want to make sure they are not sick, so that they will not pass it on. The first thought is probably not for the wife, but for the possibility of producing sickly children, or even 'human rejects.'

Another factor which cuts down on the birth rate and tends to induce spacing is migration. A group of men may be away for weeks at a time looking for a new village site. Later while moving to the new location they will not have intercourse, for they feel it is improper to do so when travelling to the new site.

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3) Opium. Those who smoke opium have reduced sex drive, which often cuts down on the amount of coitus. This in turn tends to 'space' children.

I have questioned many Akhas from both sexes on this and they all agree upon this effect. One woman remarked that before her husband became addicted, they had sex every night she was not on her period. Later, when he became addicted they would have it "maybe once a month, maybe less." She hastened to say that this did not bother her, since she had lots of children already.

Roux and Tran (1954:156) tell of a twenty-five year old Akha man they met in Laos whose wife had left him because of his opium addiction, remarking that he was a husband "in title only." The young man was worried about how he was going to get another wife. I have seen tis happen many times among the Akhas in both Burma and Thailand.

4) Divorce. A relatively high rate of divorce in a population will cut down on coital frequency, and thus will have a tendency to 'space' children (Kunstadter 1970:420, Reyna 1975:72). In Ba Jaw village at the time of my 1974 study, there were forty-six men and women currently married. Of these, twenty-nine (63%) had never been divorced. Thirteen had been divorced once, and four had been divorced twice (a total of 37% for the [n?]ever divorced). It should be pointed out that one man, at that time unmarried, had been divorced five times.

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There is one time when there must be no divorce. That is when the wife is pregnant. She is then 'under another,' referring to the fact that her pregnancy makes it imperative that she remain under the control of her husband. Once the child is born she may divorce the husband, although the child must stay with him. This tends to cut down on the amount of divorce when there are pregnancies, since usually the mothers do not want to leave their children.

Often divorce is a means of screening out the sterile in the population (Orent 1975:88). If there has been no pregnancy in the first two or three years of the marriage, it is common either for the girl to 'run away' (the female version of divorce), or for the man to 'send her away' (the male version of divorce). They both tend to remarry rather quickly, however, especially if they are young. Even so divorce comes at a time of relatively high fertility, so the woman is taken out of the potential gene pool temporarily. {footnote 3: It is interesting to note that the one sterile couple in Ba Jaw village has not divorced. They have each been married only the one time.}

5) Widowhood. When a woman's husband dies, very little time ordinarily intervenes before a remarriage, especially if she has not reached the age of thirty-five or forty. In Ba Jaw there are ten widows, but only two of them have not yet reached menopause (one is thirty-eight, the other forty), and they both remained unmarried by choice. Both women had sons living with them, so that the ancestral offerings could be made.

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According to Akha tradition, when a woman's husband dies, she must not return to live in her father's home. (She can visit up to three nights and then must leave). This helps induce widows to find a new relationship rather quickly. They may settle for becoming 'minor wives,' a status normally disliked, but one which at least gives them a place to live. Older women usually remain in the extended family, although in Ba Jaw when a step-mother was widowed, her step-sons told her to leave. She got remarried in a week, and lives in a village not far from Ba Jaw.

Akha Reaction to the Limitation of Pregnancies

When Akhas first contacted me asking for help in limiting their family sizes, I had not as yet heard from those who were opposed to such intervention. While developing a family planning program to assist those Akhas in need, I have tried to find those who might be opposed to such contraceptive practice to see both who they were and what their reasons were for opposing it.

I met very few opponents to contraception, which surprised me, since I thought Akhas would see it as going contrary to everything they felt a woman should be and do in the continuation of the 'line.' There were a few elders in some of the villages who talked women out of coming for sterilization. Their argument was, "It is un-Akha to play with one's fate in this way." Others said, "It just can't be right for us Akhas to do this. The ancestors never did anything like that, did they?" Yet, another time when I brought up this statement to the elders in one village, their response was, "The ancestors never had to face the shortages and problems we are now facing." I have found that in some cases objections were voiced as public formalities. Later some of the complainers came to me in private and asked for special help for their families.

When Yaju's wife was sterilized many years ago, she was told by other Akhas that her family would have short lives for four generations. She says that since Akhas have now seen so many Thai, Lahu, and Akha women who have had the operation with no ill effects, they are apparently no longer worried about it.

Conclusion

As has been seen, there are many things which encourage Akhas to have children. Moreover, a high percentage of them marry young, and if widowed or divorced, tend to remarry after a very short time. Therefore their capability for producing children, if not hindered by any other factor, tends to be high.

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At the present time many of them seem to be interested in using some means of control which will keep the number of children born down from what it used to be. One Akha man (a widower) mentioned to me that he had had eight children, but that if he had had contraceptive help, he would have stopped at three or four. While one small segment of the population (usually those who no longer can have children) is opposing contraception, those actually in the process of having more pregnancies than they want are seeking help. The ideal of 'do not hinder the line' is put aside in the practical situation of not being able to care adequately for the children they now have.