Grief and Suffering?

So I was looking back on ALL the pictures taken today and there is one general theme in all of them...happiness. My daughter is not suffering from Down Syndrome. She is not afflicted with some disease that is decreasing her quality of life.

Is this a face that is suffering??

The fact that there is a new blood test (which will be available next year if I'm not mistaken) that can tell a woman whether or not her unborn son or daughter has an extra chromosome is a HUGE medical advancement. One I wish I'd had when I was pregnant. I wish I'd had amniotic testing made available to me. Not because I would have aborted, because I wouldn't have, but because I would have been able to prepare for this world, this journey that I'm now traveling.

Materni21 (the new blood test) will be able to tell a family 100% if their unborn child has Trisomy 21, or Down Syndrome. Currently, there is only amniocentesis available for testing, and the false positives produced from this test are still fairly high. Only 1/10 families who receive a positive diagnosis of T21 will choose to keep their child.

There is so much false information being passed around, even in today's day in age. I personally have had commenters telling me that Everleigh won't live to a decent age (fact: people with Ds have a lifespan of 60+ years), or that she'll be retarded (fact: T21 can have an impact on mental ability, but each individual is different), or that she'll never learn to walk or talk (fact: kids w/Ds will learn to walk and talk, but on their own time. Parents who have a child w/Ds need to learn to throw the "typical" timelines away and go by their child's own timeline). 

Everleigh laughs (as you can see up there), she cries, she poops, she sleeps. She pulls hair, she spits up, she breaks hearts, and she brings families together.

She can scream with the best of them LOL

So, the next time you see a person (child, adolescent or adult) with Ds...smile at them. Introduce yourself. Play with them. They are still a person first and foremost. Sure, they have a little bit extra but it's not something contagious. It's something more special. It doesn't make them less of a person, but more.