Octuplet mom got more than $165K in disability
http://www.fresnobee.com ^ | Friday, Feb. 06, 2009 | By SHAYA TAYEFE MOHAJER
Posted on Friday, February 06, 2009 10:51:42 AM by Lucky9teen
LOS ANGELES -- The mother of newborn octuplets and six other children collected more than $165,000 in state disability payments for an on-the-job back injury that she and a doctor said was worsened by pregnancy, according to state documents released Thursday.
Nadya Suleman, 33, became pregnant with all 14 of her children after a 1999 injury during a riot at a state mental hospital where she worked, according to documents disclosed to The Associated Press following a public records request to the state Division of Workers' Compensation.
The octuplets' birth last week and subsequent disclosure that Suleman is a single mother who already has six children - all by in-vitro fertilization - prompted a torrent of criticism and ethical questions about why she would want so many children, why a doctor would implant that many embryos and how she would care for her family.
Suleman was an employee of Metropolitan State Hospital from 1997 until December, when she resigned the position. Records show that for much of that time she was unable to work because of her injuries.
The documents reveal much about the mother's past, including a doctor's claim that she had three miscarriages before she had her first child, the mental anguish she endured from those failed pregnancies and the elation she felt after the first birth.
Suleman was injured at the hospital on Sept. 18, 1999, while helping restrain a patient as about 20 others wreaked havoc at the mental hospital. One of the unruly patients flipped a heavy desk that struck Suleman in the back. The injury caused her pain in her back and lower body and caused disc protrusions in three levels of her lumbar spine.
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