I recently stumbled across
this article by Elizabeth Lev. I didn't know what the title, "Misdirected Wonder at the Miracle of Life: Rottenness Beyond Denmark", meant, but I remembered her from my semester abroad in Rome as our favorite guest lecturer. I was surprised to find that it was an article on the calculated extermination of people with Downs Syndrome around the world. Denmark, specifically, touts its record and claims that the year 2030 should bring the last birth of a Down Syndrome child in it's country. WHAT?! Why does no one seem to recognize the demonic attempt to eliminate people with an extra 21st gene?
I will let you read the article for yourself as Elizabeth Lev provides very good information of the subject, I will just give you our experience.
Prenatal testing has become accessible and affordable to pretty much everyone. Prenatal testing does have a purpose in our society. There are situations where prenatal testing is necessary to perform medical intervention before the birth of the child. However, how often is this the case? Ms. Lev points out that 92% of fetuses in the UK and US with a Down Syndrome diagnosis are aborted. When I was pregnant with James several doctors tried to push invasive prenatal testing on us, telling us it would affect how we would proceed with the pregnancy. These doctors were not necessarily telling us to have an abortion (one doctor did mention that "option") but they tried to convince us that it would change the way they handled the pregnancy. For instance, if it turned out that James had some fatal genetic anomaly they "would not do a C-section" so as to prevent issues in future pregnancies. WHAT?! Would you like to stop a second and ask me what I want? If my baby was going to die you better believe I would want them to cut me open so I could spend even five seconds with him. And whatever happened to do everything you can for a person instead of resigning them to "fate"?
Why do people with an unborn child suspected of Down Syndrome decide to abort their babies? When we had James we received a beautiful welcome packet from the Down Syndrome Society of Norther Virginia. Among other things we received a book called "Gifts" about how children with Down Syndrome had a positive affect on lives. I came away from that book more depressed than uplifted. A majority of the stories began with the decision making process of aborting or continuing the pregnancy and ended with a short bit on how that child has made the parents and/or family happy. Why did these parents consider abortion? The big two seem to be inconvenience on the lives of parents and fear that the child will live a life of pain.
First, inconvenience. Unfortunately, our culture is in "me" mode. Parenting is a sacrifice and if couples aren't prepared to make the ultimate sacrifice for their children I hope they will think before they procreate. If couples don't live a life of self-sacrificing love in their marriages then it is hard to believe that will pass on to their children.
Second, pain. I will tell you it has been incredibly difficult to watch my son go through four surgeries, to see his pain and not be able to cure it. Thanks be to God we are past that stage and our son is healthy. Even in and through all this pain my son has shown the joy of life. His smile alone brightens anyone's day. We all have pain in our lives and how many of us would rather we never be born? Pain happens, but love conquers pain. I can't begin to tell you the amount of people that stop to marvel at my son. I don't think any of them realize he has Down Syndrome. They tell me they can't get over how happy he is and how he brightens their day. I had a woman chase me down in the grocery store once because she has seen James before in that store and hoped to get another smile from him. He had the entire hair salon cooing at him yesterday. We, as a nation, as a world, are so lucky to have people to show us that life is a gift and that, through the pain, there is no doubt that life is worth living.
With love.
Getting his first sweater may not seem like a big deal, but it sure is for James! Until surgery to close the g-tube site James' drawer was filled with onesies, long sleeve shirts that button around the diaper, and overalls. We had a few regular shirts for messy or casual times and to give us hope that one day James would wear "normal" clothing. But, we had to be careful with our clothing selection so that James could not get his little hand around the tube and do damage or bump into something that might hurt the site. And the clothes had to have buttons so that we could run the tubing between the buttons to provide accessibility and protection. As James got too big for the onesies we had to search high and low for overalls that had snaps. Luckily we found a few pairs, two jean and one tan corduroy for special occasions.
