Pre-natal or Birth Diagnosis

From the moment you receive the diagnosis that your wonderful little person has Down's syndrome (DS), your life will change. I want to reassure you that whether you have a prenatal or birth diagnosis; whatever you are feeling is ok.  Most parents have been there.

Feelings of:

• Loss - for the baby you thought you were going to have

• Grieving - for the life you thought you were going to have

• Sadness - gut wrenching, total body consuming sadness

• Why has this happened to me?

• Did I do something wrong?

• Fear of the unknown

• Worry for the future

And on top of all that - someone may tell you things that your baby won't be able to do.

** Do NOT listen **

It may take your child longer to reach milestones...it may not...the truth is, nobody knows.

Never under estimate the fight and determination inside our little people. No-one can predict the future of any child. You will be their biggest supporter and fight for them whenever you need to.  I assure you, you will burst with love and pride and celebrate the little things on the way to the bigger things.

Society has made DS a scary thing in the past but it doesn't need to be. We need to re-educate ourselves so that we embrace our children and celebrate their birth like any other: after all, they are more alike than different.

Take a breath....you've got this!

I wanted to include a few anonymous posts from mums to be so that you know you are not alone in your thoughts and feelings. These collection of posts are the reason we have put together this website.

We want you to know that you are not alone.

Here are a couple of pregnancy support groups on Facebook that you can join where you can get some support and advice. I've also added a couple of pages which follow some children who happen to have Down's syndrome. My hope when you have a look at these pages, is that you will see how wonderful and amazing the children are and how their parents are blessed to have them.

The first is Oscar, son to Sarah ("For the love of Oscar" is a brilliant book written by Sarah covering Oscar's birth diagnosis and the following few years. I really recommend you read it. There's a link to it on our books page.) The second are Ollie and Cameron, twins from Scotland. I can't tell you how much these children have lifted my heart. They have made me laugh so much over the years and helped me feel more positive about Harry's future.