Downs Pregnancies Up But Downs Births Steady

Well put, Anonimon.

I agree Anonimon. In my case I expect to be pregnant again after my 35 birthday and even if the trisomi blood test indicates a high risk of having a child with Down Syndrome I am not going to have an amnio, since it increases the chance of abortion. It is my child and will raise him/her.

I’m gonna go off the beaten track, a bit, here but I really don’t think that anyone should have a baby if they don’t think it’s a baby they can manage. We have a choice for a reason, and the only person who can discern whether it’s something they can handle is the person faced with that decision. It doesn’t make them bad, weak, selfish or incapable of parenting some other child at some other time, it just makes them realistic and self-aware.

There should be more support for parents of kids with special needs, but there isn’t, and the judgement faced by parents of even typical kids on a day to day basis can be crippling enough. It’s a terrible idea to bring more people into this world who aren’t wholeheartedly wanted and whose parents aren’t equipped to give them everything they need.

mightydoll said: “There should be more support for parents of kids with special needs…”. I can’t help but think that, hmmmm, maybe there would be more support if there were more special needs people around. Instead, it’s easier to just kill them, doncha think?

I don’t think that it’s any fun time raising someone with disabilities. But these are PEOPLE. Next will we be aborting schizophrenics, depressives, autistics, because they make life more difficult? Where does it end?

i really hate this article. and i hate that they are calling it “down’s pregnancy”

i have a daughter with DS, and when i was pregnant with her it was not a “down’s pregnancy” it was just a pregnancy like any other.

my daughter is a joy. i’m honoured to be her mother.
i’m 43 and pregnant again and i will not have any tests done.
my children are my children.
my husband and i make these decisions together just as we make our children together. why do these articles always focus on the women only?

if you aren’t capable of loving your children for exactly how they are, perhaps parenting is not for you. there are no guarantees.
most disabilities happen later in life, anyway. so if you think you free of life’s differences because you can abort what you think is less than perfect, then think again.
life is not in your control and to think you have control over it is naive.
also, to those who don’t think they could handle it, you need to get over yourselves. and don’t sell yourselves so short. we are all capable of more than we think we are. and in all actuality, it’s not that big of a deal.
people with down syndrome are people. no more or less and yes it really is that simple.

I would take mightydoll’s comment to a different level— No one should KEEP or RAISE or PARENT a baby she does not think she can manage. It shouldn’t be a shame to step away from a situation you can’t handle, so long as “stepping away” doesn’t involve stopping someone else’s beating heart. I hate to think of institutions, but respite care, and, yes, adoption (not everyone is looking for the perfect baby) should get more support.

Can anyone seriously argue that a late-term abortion is much different from killing a child? Most proponents of late-term abortion seem to argue that it’s “compassionate”—essentially that the baby is better off dead. Down Syndrome babies often grow up to lead long, happy, fulfilling, and (in some cases) productive lives. The first time I remember knowing someone with DS was when my family shopped at a grocery store where a man with DS bagged groceries. He was very well-like and when he was killed crossing the street to his apartment (a drunk driver ran the redlight at the crosswalk) his memorial was so full, the church had to turn people away. I personally think people with special needs ought to be seen and heard and the people who meet those special needs more valued, and dehumanizing a “fetus” with special needs by using euphemisms to describe the termination of their lives does not help.

Sorry, but I do not believe that abortion = killing a child.

And I DO have a special needs child, as a matter of fact, and I don’t think it’s for everyone. It’s hard work. It’s physically, emotionally and, particularly, financially straining. It’s also rewards and love and pride, those things are NOT mutually exclusive, we cannot brush aside, however, the extra resources required to raise special needs children. In most cases, one parent winds up stepping down or giving up their career, and/or their hobbies. With what usually amounts to less income, parents have to pay higher expenses. People who don’t know (and whose business it isn’t anyway) often decide to blame the mother. It doesn’t require strength to love and be proud of a special needs child, but it absolutely requires strength to move through day to day life with one.

If it came down to it, I absolutely would have my son over again, and I absolutely don’t think our family has the resources for a second special needs child. As it is, my typical child is feeling the strain of one special needs sibling.

The lack of resources for parents of special needs children will NOT be solved by MORE special needs children. That’s patently absurd, when you consider that resources are much higher than they were when, say, my uncle was a child (he was born mentally retarded and died at age 60) even though there are more options to abort.

Plenty of things that come up in life are hard. Some are harder than we think we can handle. But eliminating the problem is not always doable, and sometimes, when it is doable, it’s wrong. We can’t eliminate everyone who brings us inconvenience and even severe hardship. And often the “inconvenience” turns out to be a blessing. A new little life is always good and by the time it has been conceived it’s much too late to be second guessing.

I don’t know about anybody else, but I didn’t get offered an amnio till well after 12 weeks into my pregnancy, that’s why I classified the decision to abort a special needs baby as a late-term abortion. I did get an “abnormal” AFP result in the first trimester of my first pregnancy, but my doc said that test was more or less used to decide whether or not to have the amnio, rather than to decide to abort or not.
Mightydoll, I don’t think people are arguing that MORE special needs children will solve the problem of limited resources per se. The point, in my opinion, is that by furthering the notion that special needs people are better off dead, or never being born, dehumanizes and devalues them, and that if the tendency to abort special needs babies continues, society will be less willing to support special needs families. People do still blame the mother when a special needs child is born—I read more than one nasty piece about Sarah Palin’s decision to keep her special needs baby. One condemned her for not “returning what was no thing back to nothing”. That’s the issue.

You can see how society’s attitude toward a need affects the supply of resources more than the actual need by looking at help for single mothers in the 50s vs. today. There are more children being raised in single parent homes now than in the 50s, but society’s attitude toward these families has changed so that greater resources are available than before. I hope the same will be true for special needs families.

You’re right Jenny, amnios are usually done around 12 weeks; however, 12 weeks would not be considered viable and therefore not late term. Late term is closer to 20 weeks when the baby has a chance at survival outside the mom. Late term abortions are actually not that common at all and generally are done for the sake of the mother. I saw online that it’s about 0.08% of all abortions. The vast majority are done before 12 weeks — before amnio is an option. Less than 8% of abortions are performed after 12 weeks.

Oh, well if it made it into the Google ads it must be true then. Because nobody understands Google analytics or how to take advantage of them. I take it back. Amnios cause late term abortions, that is, unless you miscarry first.