Five-week test for Down syndrome

A jouranlist contacted me today to ask how I felt about the new test for Trisomy 21/Down syndrome, which detects the condition at five weeks gestation.

My off-the-cuff five minute reply:

Dear Jennifer -

As the mother of four wonderful sons with Down syndrome - 1 by birth and 3 by adoption - all I can say is that I find the relentless efforts to detect and exterminate babies with Down syndrome very sad - even as for years I have seen people's growing greed and materialism sad.

Our efforts to create a "perfect" world for ourselves and to guarantee "perfect" children eliminate many beautiful lessons on what it means to be human that parents of children with Down syndrome have discovered - most often accidentally.

Time after time, I have heard parents echo thoughts I have said myself: My son Jonny was a gift I never expected, bringing lessons I never knew I needed to learn. While at first I thought his addition to our family was all about helping him reach his potential, the past 16 years have taught me it's really been about him helping us reach ours.

Jonny, Jesse, Daniel and Justin have 8 siblings, 2 brothers-in-law, 1 sister-in-law, and 12 nieces and nephews, all of whom would be the first to tell you that their own quality of life is better because they have people with Down syndrome in their lives.

So would their classmates and teachers.

Our society skews that outcome by instilling fear into potential parents, who don't know the benefits of not aborting their babies.

btw, one of my adopted children would have been aborted if we hadn't adopted him. Somehow I feel like the world would be a little less if he weren't in it.

And I'm hearing Elton John's song running through my mind:

I hope you don't mind
I hope you don't mind
That I'm putting down in words
How wonderful life is while you're in the world.

See also
New test for Down syndrome: good news or bad?
About that extra chromosone