fathers.myfreeforum.org

AussieRyan · Joined: 23 Mar 2009 Posts: 3

G'Day everyone. I am the proud Dad of our awesome 2 year old son Joshua.
He was diagnosed when he was 3 weeks old. I remember the doctor saying... "He has some physical features which we call dismorfic features that could indicate a chromosome problem and we need to run some tests, we think he could have DS(had to wait nearly 2 weeks for results)My wife and I were motionless and zombie like. We went home and cried and cried and cried. We had a 12 week ultrasound transnucal test done and we were told 1 in 15000 chance of Downs so I rang them and angrily accussed them of not doing their job right - so angry, so sad, so confused, so scared but mostly I remember feeling like we had been robbed of the most happiest time of our lives.
Over the next 2 weeks we kept testing ourselves to look at him with non bias eyes to see if we could see it. SEE WHAT - the inaccurate stereotype embedded in the naive part of our brains. All we could see was his beauty and to see him in a non bias dimension was simply not possible.

Now 2years and 1 month later wow how things have progressed. Yeah we still think about it every day, yeah we still get upset occasionally but you just can't grasp it untill you've been through it - love really does concour everything really. Everyday we think of our good fortune that the transnucal test didnt pick anything up. I often think of those 2 weeks we spent waiting and how I would do anything, absolutely anything to change him if he had DS and to my own disbelief now I wouldn't change him for the world. He is nothing short of AWESOME.

In short, to new families with babies with DS. Its not the impossible mountain in front of you, it is a new journey with no set path that you will love. Just like any new child.

Thanks for listening to my rant
Ryan Smile

Ps when I figure out how to post a pic I will

IkeM · Joined: 24 Mar 2009 Posts: 3 Location: Athens, GA

Cheers Ryan.

Happy to hear you are happy.

My 5-year old, Isaac, is tremendous fun.

Do you sign with Joshua? It was a great communication tool for Isaac. We have transitioned to spoken language over the 1.5 years, but signing saved us a lot of frustration early on.

Jeff

AussieRyan · Joined: 23 Mar 2009 Posts: 3

Hi Jeff,
Thanks for the reply.
Yeah my wife and I did a signing class this time last year, it was alot of fun and worthwhile. He knows some key signs like bath, drink, more, eat and a couple of others. He gets excited when he signs, its so good.

We had a bit of an exciting day today, he goes to daycare on Thursdays and they told us that he took three steps on his own. We tried to get him to do it when we got him home but to no evail, maybe tomorrow.

Does Isaac know alot of signs?

Thanks
Ryan

IkeM · Joined: 24 Mar 2009 Posts: 3 Location: Athens, GA

Yeah, Isaac has a pretty good signing vocabulary, but his vocal speech has surpassed it now.

You may have heard of them, but the Signing Times videos are a big hit with us. Isaac still requests them from time to time and dances and signs along.

admin · Posted: Sun Apr 26, 2009 9:22 pm Post subject:

Thanks guys - I agree the first few weeks is pretty traumatic. After that, well yes, life changes but in the last year or two I have done so many cool things with my son I never expected or dreamed of: like,

gone to lots of football matches
gone ski-ing
been climbing
camped at music festivals
been to loads of concerts

Its been a blast. No hospitals ever, mainstream school all the way. And at 14, rather than just sulk and do his own thing like most teenagers we are now such good friends I couldn't imagine life without him. And hey! he even brings me a nice cup of tea in bed to wake me up most mornings ...beat that!