Article about being a parent of a child with Down's syndrome in today's Observer

[Tinker]

Found this qute heart-warming

[pixel]

Maybe the style of writing doesn't help put this man in a good light. After all it's probably the first thing he's ever written and he says he was brought up to always appear a 'tough guy' so I think he's done well to even try to convey his feelings. The way I read it he's basically admitting that his original views were wrong and that he's tried to make amends in the only way he knows how.

He didn't automatically reject the baby when he was tiny and stayed with him and comforted him while he had painful tests so he couldn't have been all bad. Some men wouldn't have done that much. We all hear of marriages that have broken up through the strain of having a disabled child and more often than not it's the man who 'can't cope' (or just doesn't want to). He went back to his wife and child when he could easily have washed his hands of them.

Incidently, I was having a conversation with a nurse last week and saying that I didn't have tests for downs when I was pregnant because I wouldn't have terminated anyway. My argument was that your child could just as easily be damaged by accident or illness after it's born and you wouldn't just give it away then. I thought it very sad when the nurse said "you'd be surprised how many do".

Lots of people reject their disabled babies through shock or fear but luckily most of them go on to love them dearly. I think that by describing his early life (expected to be tough,not shown much love)Danny is trying to convey that it was harder for him to accept his son but that he got there in the end simply because he is such a special little boy.

[Merlot]

Maybe this book says more about the writer than it does about his son because it is a piece of cathartic writing?

I have to confess to having struggled with my own emotions and feelings when I began to realise that ds2 had SN's (in fact I still do) and I am ashamed to say that some of my feelings were and sometimes still are very self indulgent . Maybe by writing this book Danny felt that he could exorcise some demons? But I agree his wife's story wouid make very interesting reading...

[jamiesam]

Pixel - you put what I thought into words. At the very least, this man showed that if you don't bond at first, you might do afterwards. In my experience, lots of men don't bond until the baby starts to become 'interesting'. Terribly stereotypical, but small babies are women's territory - feeding etc, and less of role for chaps (esp if older children to entertain). I thought he didn't know how to love a child that wasn't like him. That felt like a brave thing to say. Perhaps I misunderstand.

I don't have SN or DS children, so sorry if I shouldn't be here, but have just read this article and found it very moving.