The Wrong Idea

With every pregnancy comes a preconceived idea of the child that will be. We may not even realize how powerful and ingrained that idea is, unless it is challenged. The idea is firmly grounded in the perfected combination of the mother and father. A wanted pregnancy is a pregnancy of hope.



A prenatal diagnosis of Down syndrome changes all that. Though nothing inside me was different than the day before I heard the news, everything in my mind was altered. The possibility of perfection was shattered, and I was left contemplating that even the best outcome would be subpar to a “normal” child. I hesitantly opened the yellow folder filled with xeroxed faded sheets describing what the future might look like.



Anal atresia, a flat face, heart defects, small low set ears... the flush of shame rushed through me. How could I have created this anomaly? I read a little more... and was clobbered with the worst of it, intellectual disability. My child would not be smart like me. In fact, according to the fact sheet, my baby would likely be a standard deviation or so down from the lowest point of normal human cognition.



I stuffed the papers back into the folder and closed it up. Then I put it high up on a shelf far away from me. I would not look at it again. I could not look at it again. “Que sera, sera,” I said to myself through my tears. And for the rest of my pregnancy I lived in fear of this ugly imperfect child growing inside of me.



What if I had been delivered this news early in my pregnancy, long before I could feel the baby fluttering, and long before the world could see that I was carrying? What if I had been told that my other children and my marriage would suffer because of this coming child? What if the doctor I trusted with my most womanly self had suggested that I could end this and do it over again with the odds stacked in my favor? What if the wrong idea had convinced me to take my daughter’s life?



I wish that every single woman facing this difficult decision could have a glimpse of her future. Not just of her child but of who she will become because of that child. It is a terrible thing to have knowledge without experience, fear without hope, vision without clarity. It is a terrible thing to have to make a life altering decision based on an idea, maybe even the wrong idea.