The Day I knew...

The date was April 11, 2014....it was the day our amazing, sweet Savannah was born.

 She was my first baby to come late, she was born about week later then her due date. She was also my longest birth! Looking back it makes sense that it took so long and that her head was tilted at a funny angle so that she couldn't come out until we could adjust her.

We can attribute it to her low muscle tone.

Looking back it makes sense that they had to immediately cut the cord and couldn't put her on my chest...that she was so very, very quite...that she was purplish in color.

It WAS her low muscle tone. She needed to be warmed and examined before giving her to me.

Looking back it makes sense why they asked for my husband to wait for the pediatrician to come and examine her and why they asked permission to bring big sister Dakota to the nurses station, when he did show up.

That day I knew, after I got an uneasy feeling when the doctor and nurses whispered while examining her and it felt like everyone held their breath over what reaction my husband and I would have to their news...

When the doctor started talking about physical features that combined was not normal...

That day I knew as I looked down at that precious, wide awake, beautiful, quite, blessing of a bundle...

What it felt like to have a child with Down Syndrome.

That diagnosis that so many people fear and dread. That diagnosis that so many people test to try and determine before birth. That diagnosis that so many (90% or more) people kill their unborn child over...over fear of it.

Later in the quite of the room as I looked down at our beautiful little girl...I thought, so this is what it feels like to have a child with DOWN SYNDROME...it's not so terrifying...it's not something to dread. Savannah is our daughter that God entrusted to us and I am at peace with that gift. 

Why?! Because...

I will praise You, for I am FEARFULLY and WONDERFULLY made; marvelous are Your works, and my soul knows very well. Psalm 139:14

Saturday is WORLD Down Syndrome Day...will you help me bring awareness? 

Do you know anyone with Down Syndrome? I would love to hear about them and what your plans are (if any) for Saturday.

For His Glory,

WELCOME TO HOLLAND

A poem about Down Syndrome...

I am often asked to describe the experience of raising a child with a disability - to try to help people who have not shared that unique experience to 

understand it, to imagine how it would feel. It's like this…

When you're going to have a baby, it's like planning a fabulous vacation trip - to Italy. You buy a bunch of guide books and make your wonderful plans. The Coliseum. The Michelangelo David. The gondolas in Venice. You may learn some handy phrases in Italian.

It's all very exciting.

After months of eager anticipation, the day finally arrives. You pack your bags and off you go. Several hours later, the plane lands. The stewardess comes in and says, "Welcome to Holland."

"Holland?!?" you say. "What do you mean Holland?? I signed up for Italy! I'm supposed to be in Italy. All my life I've dreamed of going to Italy."

But there's been a change in the flight plan. They've landed in Holland and there you must stay.

The important thing is that they haven't taken you to a horrible, disgusting, filthy place, full of pestilence, famine and disease. It's just a different place.

So you must go out and buy new guide books. And you must learn a whole new language. And you will meet a whole new group of people you would never have met.

It's just a different place. It's slower-paced than Italy, less flashy than Italy. But after you've been there for a while and you catch your breath, you look around.... 

and you begin to notice that Holland has windmills....

and Holland has tulips. Holland even has Rembrandts.

But everyone you know is busy coming and going from Italy... and they're all bragging about what a wonderful time they had there.

 And for the rest of your life, you will say "Yes, that's

where I was supposed to go. That's what I had planned."

And the pain of that will never, ever, ever, ever go away... because the loss of that dream is a very very significant loss.

But... if you spend your life mourning the fact that you didn't get to Italy, you may never be free to enjoy the very special, the very lovely things ... 

about Holland.

c1987 by Emily Perl Kingsley. All rights reserved.

For HIS Glory,