Sometimes I wish we would have known about the funky chromosome before Kira got here. Her first year, I thought that I was glad that we didn't know. I figured that my pregnancy would have been so scary if we would have known.
I hate so much how her first couple of days had to be. If we had known beforehand, her birth would have been a welcome relief, I think. We would have met her and seen how beautiful she was and we could have just been joyful. Instead of sad and scared.
I am thankful, though, to not have had to face the indecision. I don't think we would have changed anything. I think we would have been strong enough to face the unknown. But I am thankful to not have had to test that.
Either way, Kira is here now. And we think she rocks.
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I am torn on this. I guess I go back and forth...part of me is glad that we did not know about Dylan's dx, but like you, I regret, so badly, how those first few days played out. Argh. If only we had known then what we know now...
ReplyDeleteAnd yes, Kira ROCKS!! :)
((Hugs))
Kira totally rocks! Wendy, I'm in the same boat. I wish I could go back and make changes, but I can't. Really, I just wish I was more prepared.
ReplyDeleteAnd BTW...I think Lillian rocks too...literally, she is rocking the house everyday. You should see what it looks like at night after she's in bed!
You know, I've been thinking about that a lot. My sister-in-law's little sister has Down Syndrome, which is my main encounter. And of course I've read Expecting Adam, which -- I went to Harvard too -- reminded me of why I didn't want to stay in that atmosphere. If you're surrounded by that kind of people (and that kind of doctors), and you do find out prenatally, you end up with the "good that you found out ahead of time, so when's the abortion?" crowd, and if you don't, you get the "too bad you couldn't have found out sooner so that you could have had an abortion" crowd. Even among people who know of my SIL's sister, there's a lot of the "well, they wouldn't let something like that happen these days." Meh. Response: have you *met* the girl? She's independent, has two jobs -- one counseling people! -- and is one of the friendliest and most exuberant people ever... but they think she'd be better off not having been born. I suppose it's probably better to know ahead of time -- I like your idea of welcoming with joy rather than anxiety -- but only if you're fortunate enough to have a doctor that'll support you through it all...
ReplyDeleteSorry, soapboxy -- don't know where all of that came from!
I go back and forth on this too--I did have a prenatal dx about Miss Banana and while I was more emotionally prepared for her birth and had had time to process, I missed dreaming about my baby and spent more time worrying about "my baby with Ds" during my pregnancy.
ReplyDeleteEverything Happens for a Reason, Wendy. That's my motto. For some people, it's better to know, for others, not.
ReplyDeleteFor me, I would have been a mess. I can just imagine myself on the Internet all day, Googling "Down syndrome pregnancy." NOT GOOD!
I think I was saved by not knowing. And like you said, they're here now. And we wouldn't have it any other way.
I thought I wanted to know, but in the end I'm glad we didn't. We would have been ok with it, but another family member would not have been. That would have been very bad and hard to forgive. I agree about the first days being hard. There were so many conflicting emotions. FYI we had prenatal testing with Goldie, this pg we have not.
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