Impact

Sometimes things don't seem to affect me as much, but when it comes to my personal story and experiences, things such as words can bring me to my knees in pain. 

The other day a friend posted that she had heard of a couple who found out their child would be born with Ds and had an appointment scheduled to terminate their pregnancy. She asked us parents to chime in on what we would say to someone in the situation we were basically in however many years, months or days ago. 

The waterworks came immediately, I wasn't finished reading the post when my eyes were burning with tears. My heart sunk and my being went back to that deep dark hole I fell into more than three years ago. 

My "now" self wanted to tell my "then" self everything was going to be ok, that I shouldn't feel sad, mad or in horrible dispare, that this baby, this sweet girl was going to show me what her life was all about. I wanted to tell my "then" self that I was being melodramatic, that all those tears, all the yelling, all that being angry with God was literally not necessary, let alone a waste of precious time. 

But I had to stop myself and realize that I had to go through all those feelings and emotions, that only if I had known Jordan Grace herself, I could never be satisfied with knowing what it would be like to have a child with Down syndrome. Because anyone deserves to grieve the child they think they will have. The child that they perceive as their own perfect child. 

I still don't know what to tell my "then" self, the woman that suffers today with these news of diagnosis, or the ones who are yet to come. They call us the lucky few for a reason. I always say we live this amazing secret society, where only the ones who live it can understand, appreciate and rejoice in it. It's unlike anything else I've ever known, it's something that people can share with you but unless you dive in and swim in this pond of beauty, you may never know.

Because in the end, my child, our Jordan Grace, is truly better than who we expected her to be. I think it's safe, although sad to say, that I had very low expectations. Basing it from what the doctor lectured us, she would be incapable of being human I guess, he described someone who would be dependent, someone who needed help to do anything and everything. 

We all talk about it within our community, the way the news is delivered can make you or break you. It certainly broke me. I wasn't expecting to feel the way I did, to think that the hardest decision to make would be to continue on and live this life we were told was horrendous.