A 36-year-old mother of nine, Nina Koistinen, is accused of suffocating her baby girl, Maya Hope Koistinen, who was only 6 days old. Nina admitted to pinching the baby's nose, then she twisted and suffocated and smothered baby Maya because she had too many children. Koistinen told investigators that she was jealous of her husband spending too much time with the baby.
"Nina suffers from bipolar, schizophrenia and depression and we have tried for years and years to manage it," said Nina's husband of 15 years and the baby's father, Brad Koistinen.
The dad found the baby but still refuses to believe that his wife killed the baby on purpose. He is shocked and says that she has never hurt any of their children.
Yet, according to records, Child Protection Services has investigated the family in the past. Months ago, Nina told them she wanted to smother some of her kids and made the statement that she wanted to crash and send her children to heaven. Still, her husband believes her is a fabrication and only happened because she's in such a fragile mental state.
"She's been mixed up before where she thinks I'm God … when she's not on her medication. Things aren't right and she needs serious mental help," said Brad.
What the hell? Apparently, this woman doesn't need to have any more children. She's obviously hit her limit. She has 9 babies and killed one. She made no secret of it. She had previously said she wanted to send her children to heaven. Why did no one take her seriously? Is this something sane people think mentally ill people say in jest?
Her husband says she has bipolar disorder, schizophrenia, and depression and sometimes thinks he's God, yet he continues to procreate with her rather than get her on medication to stabilize her condition. I think he's an asshole.
I don't know a whole lot about schizophrenia and depression but I do have personal knowledge of the bipolar diagnosis. It is a chemical imbalance and when your hormones get out of whack, sometimes with pregnancy, or just the sheer magnitude of the event can trigger a manic episode, possibly even a psychotic one if not already medicated. Has anyone even thought to check if she is suffering from PPD?
There is no excuse for what this mom did, but it might be helpful to understand what motivated her do commit such a heinous act. As far as I am concerned, CPS and her husband Brad are just as responsible for Maya's death as Nina. They may not have physically smothered the baby but they left her in the hands of someone who openly confessed to wanting to kill her children. They ignored the signs.
These kinds of events just serve to stigmatize mental health issues even more. All people who suffer from bipolar and depression and schizophrenia do not kill their babies. If Mr.Koistinen thought she was in such poor mental health, why did he keep knocking her up and putting more pressure on her already stressed mind?
This baby died senselessly. This woman needs to be institutionalized not imprisoned and I think her husband should share the culpability since he was completely aware of the entire situation and did nothing to change it.
Image via Fox
