An Irish couple are speaking out after the birth of their healthy baby boy that doctors had pressured them to abort, claiming that he had abnormalities.

Melanie and Damien Sheehan told the Christian Institute in the UK about the ordeal that began with a 20-week scan of the baby. The doctors said that the baby had “severe abnormalities” such as the brain and the spinal cord not being formed.

“They felt that the child wouldn’t survive birth and if it did, it would be so profoundly disabled that, their words were, ‘it would have no quality of life,’” Melanie recalled. “I was put under immense pressure to go ahead with the abortion.”

“I had phone calls to my mobile and my house phone to tell me how many days, weeks that I had left till my 24-week cut-off [to have an abortion],” she continued. “Whenever we went to appointments, the nurse in charge of the consultant would introduce us as ‘the couple who was continuing with the pregnancy against medical advice.’ We were made to feel that we were doing something terribly wrong by wanting to keep our baby.”

Their baby Joshua was born completely healthy.

“The doctors said that Joshua would be incompatible with life, and now he is sixteen weeks old and he’s brilliant,” Damien said. “He’s doing everything that he should be doing. He’s the best thing that’s happened to our family. We couldn’t imagine our family without him now. Just to see the joy and the love that he brings to the house.”