Too late for Filipina mum of 22

Woman wishes birth control law had taken effect earlier

MANILA: A historic birth control law that has taken effect in the Philippines after years of opposition from the Catholic Church came too late for Rosalie Cabenan, a housewife who has given birth 22 times.

Frail, with a leathery face streaked with wrinkles, 48-year-old Cabenan suffers from untreated gallstones and constant fatigue because her body has never had the time to properly recover from her successive pregnancies.

“We only wanted three children. But they kept coming and coming,” Cabenan said at her ramshackle home in Baseco, a massive slum here, where more than 60,000 people compete for space.

“I was always pregnant and there was no time to take care of myself because I had to keep working to help my husband feed the children. I have tried everything – a stevedore (dock worker), a laundry woman, fishmonger and a vegetable seller.”

Cabenan had her first child when she was just 14. When she nearly died giving birth to her youngest, who is now six, she finally abandoned the demands of the Catholic Church not to use contraceptives.

A devout Catholic who still goes to mass twice a week, Cabenan nevertheless regrets following the church dogma so strictly and said she welcomed the Responsible Parenthood Law.

“I tell women now, please do not be like me. I have too many children, and sometimes I do not know what to do and just cry, especially when they fight,” she said.

The law requires government health centres to hand out free condoms and birth control pills, benefiting tens of millions of the country’s poor who would not otherwise be able to afford or have access to them.

It also mandates that sex education be taught in schools and public health workers receive family planning training, while post-abortion medical care has been made legal for the first time. — AFP