Take on the left the kid on the subway platform mom

There are a few things that bother me more than the faux outrage over
the woman who left her baby on the subway platform at Columbus Circle.
Of course it is terrible to leave a 7 month old to fend for themselves
and there are obviously thousands of options that seem more humane to
greater society but I bet if you would allow yourself to see this
situation for what it really is, you'd find that it is not so
atypical.
Firehouses have long been a safe haven for people dropping off kids
who they believe they can no longer care for, adoption is a common and
accepted and women make difficult decisions every day but to think
this situation is so different is letting the situation and probably
the woman's skin color cloud your view
Although you'll find certain people who will claim motherhood (or
fatherhood for that respect) is like having ice-cream for dinner every
night, most people will tell you it is the most difficult, draining
and challenging thing they have ever gone through. Most people who
will get up on their soap-boxes about this will be people who either
have a support system or the means to pay for one in place to help
them raise their child.
I will make an assumption that is probably an unfair, biased
generalization grossly exaggerated based on a generalization but I
assume that the woman who left this child behind is a single mother,
living on modest means, with very little prospect for betterment and
probably made a decision -as ludicrous as it may seem to us- that this
child was better off in the hands of child-services than her own.
She did not drop her off in a ditch, behind a garbage can or even on
some secluded subway station, she dropped her off on one of the
busiest platforms on the MTA line and right in the heart of one of the
wealthier parts of the entire city.

This was possibly a child she did not plan for and the father may very
well have not been around to help raise the little girl. She may have
seen no hope and out of desperation decided this was best or maybe she
just lost it. Maybe she is clinically insane, strung out, high or
drunk; any of which would make me pretty sure she isn't a candidate
for mother of the year.

Should she have left the child on a subway platform?? Of course not.
Did she do it to harm her child...I doubt it. I think it was probably
the most humane way which she thought she could get out from
underneath the pressures of unwanted motherhood and certainly a much
preferred option than other ones you see often (hello hot car dad in
Georgia or drive into the ocean mom)

What bothers me most is that I would bet that there have been times
that most parents have had an inkling of a desire to drop their kid
off and just be done with it. Everybody will claim this is not true
for them but I unless they are the reincarnation of the baby Jesus,
Mother Theresa and Gandhi all rolled into one, they have had a point
in their life that they have had a thought that is not something
they'd ever admit. Anybody who tells you differently isn't being
honest..or at least should be inviting the rest of the world for that
ice cream dinner

Even the most loving and most caring ones have had moments when it all
felt like it was too much..but most of us have a support system,
financial or through family, which can help there. We are also
college educated professionals with a good grasp on impulse control
yet most probably have said or done things they have regretted.
I understand it is easy to pile on this woman and I agree is is not
fit to care for this -or any other- child but at some point you have
to realize that if this was a white woman in the burbs who dropped her
baby off at a firehouse, we would comment her for being brave and
doing what was best for her child, even if we ourselves would never
consider it.

now for that ice cream dinner