Baby... Brother!

In all my excitement to share our pregnancy, I forgot to mention…  It’s a BOY!  How can I be sure of this at just 15 weeks?  Here’s the schpeel…. When Welles was still in the hospital, doctors encouraged us to do genetic testing.  They told us that this testing would let us know if there was something in our genetic make-up that could have caused Welles’ Down syndrome to not be coincidence and increase our chances of having more children with DS.  They said the testing would be extensive enough to tell us if it was Scott’s extra chromosome or mine that caused Welles’ Down syndrome.  Scott and I agreed we would opt. out of this testing because it wasn’t going stop us from having another child and really didn’t matter to us whose chromosome it was.  We weren’t going to blame one or the other. Now I would only like to know for the sake of who-gets-the-credit-for-the-extra-awesomeness!?  Anyways, never did the testing, never looked back.

This pregnancy I was told about a very new test.  It's non-invasive testing where they would take only two vials of MY (not the babies) blood, and let us know if there were and chromosome abnormalities. At first I thought, nah, doesn’t matter. Then I learned that this testing would also reveal the gender (they can see if there are X or Y chromosomes) at just ten weeks!  And then I thought, heck yeah! I mean, how fun to know so early on.  It’s like the "new thing" to wait until birth to find out, but I am not cool enough for that business.  I have no patience.  So I decided to go for the testing which came back a few days later, revealing no chromosome abnormalities and little BOY chromosomes!  I can’t even tell you how fun that phone call was.  My fav nurse, Amy called and gave me the chromosome results.  Then she said “wanna know the gender?!” in an almost giggly voice.  “Heck yeah!” I replied.  “Another little boy!”

Scarlett was convinced she was having a sister, which almost had me convinced.  She was fine with the news of a boy but still talks about “baby girl” from time to time.  She’ll get over it.  Maybe we’ll give her a sister some day ;)

While studies say that your chances of having a child with DS increase after having one, I wasn’t worried about it.  If it was, Welles would have had a buddy for life.  And we would have been even more blessed.  But I am excited for Welles to have a little brother to push him and help his development.  Not to mention, be his best little buddy.

Now, my thoughts on this new, advanced testing…  As fun as it was to know the gender early on, I’m not thrilled about it overall.  Here is the one and only reason why—it will inevitably increase the abortion rate of fetus’s with Down syndrome.  The earlier on people find out, the higher the chance they’ll feel less guilty about ridding of the baby.  Just my two cents.  If only they knew, anit nothin' down about it!