August 29th was the perfect storm. Up until then, my life had been a sea of emotion, churning doubts about my marriage, the tides of being a stay at home Mommy ebbing between joy and boredom and the great hope of my new son looming on the horizon like a sunrise. It would all come together that day.I had never had a planned C-section and because of fate, I still haven’t. Ryan decided to come a week earlier than the orderly, planned out arrangement we thought we had made with the hospital and our world. Those things never work out (pacts with the Universe). For the first time, my flair for drama failed me. I was not worried about the contractions I was having all morning. I had fallen for that trick too many times. The ruse where you called an annoyed on call Doctor, described your symptoms and they send you to the Hospital to be told you need to drink more water. The one time I vowed to be laid back was the time I was wrong. I was in labor and since I ate a cracker in the waiting room, the main event would have to wait six hours because of the anesthesia and other precautions. This was the calm before the storm.
I guess what I remember the most and I use the term remember ridiculously lightly. This “rememberance” is seared onto my heart like acid burns an image to be printed. I remember how tangible my husband’s joy was. He was about to have his first son! His eyes were shining with a radiance I had never seen before. He was joking around and laughing and filled with a lightness that made me step away from the room like I was in an out-of-body experience and see him as a spectator. He deserved that moment because in a few hours he was going to carry the entire burden of telling everyone we loved that Ryan was born with Down Syndrome. My family (immediate and not) told me in hindsight that he cried so hard when he told them the news. That he sobbed uncontrollably and they were stunned as to how to comfort him because it was so heartbreaking and uncharacteristic. I never saw him that way because in his mind I needed to be protected from his emotion or shunned from it like catty schoolgirls ousting a weaker student. We had already begun the separation emotionally, we just didn’t know it.
On the operating table my predominant thought was that I had just been abducted by aliens. The room was stark and cold and sterile. The lights were shining in my eyes and the Hospital staff would appear above my head with their masks and business-like questions. I was terrified. This is not what I pictured. There was nothing endearing about this scene. Can I get a do-over and just push my little boy out?
When they presented Ryan to me, I recall the absolute exact millisecond our eyes met. I can see it again so clearly. His eyes. They were different. I saw it immediately and just as immediately, my mind said, No. Its funny how that works…denial. If that moment was an action movie sequence, my mind would have been the sexy black leather coat wearing hero that throws his body over yours just as the runaway train is about to tear your head off. My mind dismissed the recognition of those beautiful almond shaped eyes , those cleary distinctive trisomy 21 eyes for me, because it wasn’t fair to spring that on me like that! I had been through hell. I was declared high-risk early on and monitored like a freak of nature. We had so many high resolution ultra sounds. The kind where you can actually see your unborn child’s features clear enough to declare, “He looks like his sisters.”I was stressed tested once a week the entire third semester. Never was there any mention that our beautiful son was going to be born with this disablilty. It wouldn’t have made a difference in keeping him but the emotion that moment was denial. A hostile momentary mental takeover designed to help me cope with what was clear to all the doctors and nurses in the room. Not to mention, I was on an operating table. Not convenient for full on life changing moment revelations.
The doctor told Troy that his son had Down Syndrome in much the same way you would say, “Hold the elevator” or “Are you in line?” I don’t blame that doc for being a cold unfeeling prick. He was just doing what was required and nothing more. He wasn’t as bad as the doctor who told us a few days later that our child would never be a rocket scientist but that there was “one” in his church who seemed to be living a happy life. The worst part is when the people you love and love you back say horrible things and you know they don’t mean to hurt you. You are transformed back to ancient Rome, “Et tu, Brutus?” as the dagger hits your heart.
I call it the perfect storm because every emotion one could possibly feel, stupendous joy, sorrow, rage, bewilderment and helplessness came together and transformed a life story for a family…my family. Each person is affected by and changed by events that we cannot control except by how we let them transform us. I can never be that woman in that delivery room again because I don’t want to be protected from any challenge life has to offer. Looking back, my husband was being what I set him up to be, a knight in shining armor. He wanted to shield me from hurt because my weakness demanded it and he couldn’t do that because it was inevitable, but my heart recognizes how he tried to love me that day. We never became one soul in our marriage but he taught me that great fear draws upon it the very thing you fear like a light luring a firefly. I always feared he would leave me and he did. Sometimes a storm tears away parts of a continent to build a magnificent island.
My son is a phoenix who transformed a life that was stagnant and unfulfilled aside from my daughters. That delivery room was the spark that lit a fire in me and for me. I send great praise and graciousness to the Universe for giving me his life as a gift.
Ryan is joy, sadness, accomplishment and disappointment, and pure love in one human being. I cannot possibly deserve such a wonderful son, but thank you very much for trusting me, God. Your faith in me restores my faith in you.
On the operating table my predominant thought was that I had just been abducted by aliens. The room was stark and cold and sterile. The lights were shining in my eyes and the Hospital staff would appear above my head with their masks and business-like questions. I was terrified. This is not what I pictured. There was nothing endearing about this scene. Can I get a do-over and just push my little boy out?
When they presented Ryan to me, I recall the absolute exact millisecond our eyes met. I can see it again so clearly. His eyes. They were different. I saw it immediately and just as immediately, my mind said, No. Its funny how that works…denial. If that moment was an action movie sequence, my mind would have been the sexy black leather coat wearing hero that throws his body over yours just as the runaway train is about to tear your head off. My mind dismissed the recognition of those beautiful almond shaped eyes , those cleary distinctive trisomy 21 eyes for me, because it wasn’t fair to spring that on me like that! I had been through hell. I was declared high-risk early on and monitored like a freak of nature. We had so many high resolution ultra sounds. The kind where you can actually see your unborn child’s features clear enough to declare, “He looks like his sisters.”I was stressed tested once a week the entire third semester. Never was there any mention that our beautiful son was going to be born with this disablilty. It wouldn’t have made a difference in keeping him but the emotion that moment was denial. A hostile momentary mental takeover designed to help me cope with what was clear to all the doctors and nurses in the room. Not to mention, I was on an operating table. Not convenient for full on life changing moment revelations.
The doctor told Troy that his son had Down Syndrome in much the same way you would say, “Hold the elevator” or “Are you in line?” I don’t blame that doc for being a cold unfeeling prick. He was just doing what was required and nothing more. He wasn’t as bad as the doctor who told us a few days later that our child would never be a rocket scientist but that there was “one” in his church who seemed to be living a happy life. The worst part is when the people you love and love you back say horrible things and you know they don’t mean to hurt you. You are transformed back to ancient Rome, “Et tu, Brutus?” as the dagger hits your heart.
I call it the perfect storm because every emotion one could possibly feel, stupendous joy, sorrow, rage, bewilderment and helplessness came together and transformed a life story for a family…my family. Each person is affected by and changed by events that we cannot control except by how we let them transform us. I can never be that woman in that delivery room again because I don’t want to be protected from any challenge life has to offer. Looking back, my husband was being what I set him up to be, a knight in shining armor. He wanted to shield me from hurt because my weakness demanded it and he couldn’t do that because it was inevitable, but my heart recognizes how he tried to love me that day. We never became one soul in our marriage but he taught me that great fear draws upon it the very thing you fear like a light luring a firefly. I always feared he would leave me and he did. Sometimes a storm tears away parts of a continent to build a magnificent island.
My son is a phoenix who transformed a life that was stagnant and unfulfilled aside from my daughters. That delivery room was the spark that lit a fire in me and for me. I send great praise and graciousness to the Universe for giving me his life as a gift.
wow, that's all I can say. You are amazing
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