Very moving article about a woman who had a termination following diagnosis of Trisomy 13

[emkana]

www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2008/nov/01/family-abortion-trisomy-13

It took me back to the days when I was "encouraged" by health professionals to have a termination because ds had dwarfism.

emkana what a lovely boy, how old is he?
i love his hair

emkana your boy is beautiful

how sad.

emkana, your little dude is gorgeous!

emkana, he's beautiful, just looking at him and thinking about your op is just awful! You should take him to meet the people who tried to 'encourage' you to terminate him, and maybe they will be more intelligent about it next time!
Can't read article, looks too sad

am sobbing

I can't actually be articulate enough at the moment to post why, but that article resounds so much with me

anyfucker, I love love love your name, it makes me happy each time I see it

Thanks everyone for being so kind about ds.

It really seems incredible now that a termination was even discussed as an option.

unbelievable! Just heartbreaking! When you look at his beautiful face and his little shoes!
I wasn't being kind about him btw, he is beautiful!

What a brave article.
I must say, I have to shut my ears when people blithely talk about amnio and Cvs - even early scans; as the author pointed out, what else is it all for other than to make sure you don't have an 'imperfect' baby?
I'm ever grateful to the colleague who pointed out to me years ago (after one of those private early scans taken, in retrospect, thoughtlessly), that you don't go shopping for a baby.

em, do you take your ds to the hair dressers or cut it yourself.
its lovely

He's only had it cut about twice, and that was done by me/SIL

um v good job, i tried to cut dds hair, she was fighting against it.
she now has a mullet!

Rofl at Minky clucking over his shoes! Emkana I've seen the pics more than once before but just had to go back and look again - he's so scrumptious!

ok, I just looked at your ds emkana

what a beautiful child

< sobs again >

I read that article on Sat and it really made my throat lumpy - she was amazingly open about her experience.

This country in general recommends abortions in many circumstances that are outside the 'norm'. Disability is one, but also being outside of the social norms - i.e. teenage pregnancy, not in a relationship, poor etc.

If a pregnancy falls in a category outside of the constructed norms, termination seems to be the answer. This is why I have trouble with terminations in general - who is setting these norms?

I'll be honest, I didn't want to do the Down's screening... but DH insisted on it.
In retrospect I guess I was right to have done, if only so that if there was a high risk I could at least read up and talk to people and be prepare for life with a Down's syndrome child.
Because having lost one baby due to m/c and having my beautiful boy (who is healthy and well) I don't think I could ever go through an abortion unless the doctors could convince me that the baby would not survive long.
I guess it is easy for me to say though I don't have a disabled child but reading the posts of people with disabled people, I am in awe of their strength, positive outlooks and love for their children that society would deem useless and see that those children can at least have peaceful if not downright happy lives.
I do feel for those people who do make the decision to terminate, I can't imagine how much pain they must go through in coming to terms with it

That article made me cry. Poor woman.

I stupidly got the triple test (blood test) at 15 weeks to "set my mind at rest" that my baby wouldn't have Down's syndrome or spina bifida (I'm in my early 20s so thought there would be almost no chance...). The tests came back and I was at increased risk of having a baby with Down's.

I cannot tell you how angry and upset I was with myself the day I got that letter (I found out in the post, not from a person). I knew that I would never terminate my baby and there was no way I was going to risk miscarriage with an amniocentesis so I should never have had that blood test.

I eventually let myself forget about the blood tests but I just wish I'd never had them in the first place.

As it turned out my son didn't have Down's syndrome but even if he had I wouldn't have regretted for a minute not getting the amnio.

If I'm lucky enough to get pregnant again I shall have ultrasounds but no other tests.

I also had the triple test 'to set my mind at rest' - I think that must be how they sold it to us.
It's such a wake up call when you don't get the results you're assuming you will.
I didn't even want to have ultrasound when it came to my 3rd live pregnancy (actually the 6th counting M/Cs). I did go along for it, though, and felt as if I was doing it fot the ultrasound technician's benefit rather than mine, as I knew I wouldn't do further invasive tests should anything show up.

Dd's dad insisted on going to Harley Street for testing given both our ages(42 & 49 at the time). He didn't want a disabled child ~ said he knew he wouldn't cope with one(actually, he didn't want another child). I knew though, that it didn't matter what the results were, that I would not terminate, though I never did tell him that(I had agonised over keeping her at 10 weeks because he didn't want a baby).
We are blessed with a perfectly healthy and beautiful Dd.
This lady has gone through hell, I am very sad for her.
Em, your son is very beautiful ~ you are truly blessed.

I read this article with a lump in my throat as a friend recently lost her son at 20 weeks gestation, she wasn't allowed a scan at 12 weeks so it was a huge shock when at her 20 week scan they discovered her son was actually a conjoined twin which hadn't developed properly resulting in a single body and 2 heads. He also had spina bifida. She had to give birth to him knowing there was no hope

What a very sad article.

I refused all extra tests - nuchal fold and triple testing- in all of my pregnancies - because I knew I didn't want to have to make a decision based on bad results.

I did have the 20 week anomaly scans though, and I found them very stressful.

4andnotout, that is terribly sad. God bless your friend and her twins.