I have always felt sympathetic toward Andrea Yates and now, as a mother of several small children, I have an overwhelming amount of compassion for her. I can't imagine a worse scenario than the one where you come out of a postpartum-induced haze to learn you have murdered all of your children. I stand by my opinion that the kindest thing that could have done for her was to leave her to her delusions. Let her believe she "saved" her children.
Over the summer, I experienced a time where I felt my body and mind were betraying me. I was violently angry, deeply depressed, and extremely volatile. I was behaving in ways that way back, in my rational mind, I knew weren't "right". Something was very, very wrong. There were some days where I wondered what I might do if I made it to the edge. But I didn't know where the edge was and where I was in relation to it.
Brian didn't know what was wrong with me and didn't want to make the situation worse and upset me further by suggesting I see a doctor. I finally came to that conclusion myself after I had a massive, sobbing meltdown at a Bible study surrounded by women I hardly knew. I don't know if there could have been a more out-of-character sign than that.
But Rusty Yates knew. He knew there was something wrong with that poor woman. She'd been treated by doctors and been hospitalized for psychotic episodes relating to postpartum depression. He knew. And because he knew, he is more culpable than she will ever be in the deaths of those children. His job as her husband was to protect her. Instead, he left a psychotic woman alone with his children and she drowned them all. Then, he divorces her.
Now, here we are, all these years later and he's "celebrating" his new baby on Good Morning America. The proud father has also emailed pictures of the new baby to his former wife in the mental institution. "[We talk about] kind of how things are going and we talk about the kids. I mean we talk. It's like she and I knew our children better than anyone, so we'll reminisce a lot about our children," Rusty said.
Is he freakin' kidding me? This takes cruel to a whole new level.
It makes me sick to my stomach that GMA thinks this is newsworthy. He magnaminously "doesn't blame his wife for what happened" adding "she feels a lot of guilt over what happened." Too bad he doesn't feel any guilt over what happened.
I could go on, but I am literally sick to my stomach. Here is the link to the article. The comments are pretty interesting, too.
Rusty Yates is back to business as usual with only a slight delay as his former wife now finally has all the help she needs.
4 comments:
Georgia,
I agree that this is not news, nor should it be. However,...
If Rusty knew about his wife's problems, don't you think other people knew too? Nobody did anything. Besides, what could he have done anyway?
I don't know...I wasn't there. I hate to judge anyone in this situation because I would hate to be in that situation myself.
But, I will say that the picture of this woman chasing her oldest kid around and then dragging him back to the bathtub so she can drown him is beyond comprehension. Wouldn't his screams and kicking and screaming be enough to bring her back to reality? How could she, while she's holding her son under the water, think that she's doing the right thing?
Now I'm sick to my stomach...
JLP
What could he have done? Well, for starters, he could have given her constant help with the children, especially after doctors warned that she needed round the clock supervision. He could have allowed her to stay on her meds, instead of discontinuing them so that she could get pregnant. They could have exercised some family planning.
I think there is plenty that he could have done.
I'm with you all the way on this one, sister. God created marriage as an example of the union between Christ and the church. Jesus loved us so much he laid down his life for us. The Bible says to husbands to love their wives as Jesus loves them. Where in the world was that kind of love with Rusty Yates. He wanted more kids at the expense of his wife's health and sanity. He allowed her to handle the stress of homeschooling and raising five young children while he went off to work. He did not protect her, or love her above himself. Now, he can go on and have another family and not think about it anymore while she sits and has nothing but the knowledge that she murdered her babies. Sick. Now I'm not feeling so well, either.
I have gone to leave comments on this blog and then deleted them. I want to not judge him, but I find myself unable. On one hand, his loss was tragic and I do not know his side of the story. On the other, her break was inevitable and predictable. She was so fragile by each account. Then I want her to take absolute responsibility for the horrific nature of her crime. Then I want him to take responsibility for leaving his children unprotected.
Ultimately, when I feel any remorse for her at all it is, most definitely, because I can see myself feeling like she did. I could see myself becoming that desperate and dettached under those circumstances.
While I do not believe I could watch my babies drown, I could see myself being abusive, neglectful, or just literally running away from it all.
I can't really know because I won't ever be in her position, but she was. I can have empathy for that. I can't forgive those sins, but it was never my place to. Too many people think it was their place to cast stones at both.
Without being anywhere close to what she went through I can feel that suffering in my heart for her and I can't imagine how he could be so buried in scripture and miss that she was to be protected, too.
No body walks away from that kind of neglect unscathed.
Kellie
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