Matters of My Heart

janjimks: Matters of Heart: Matters of My Heart
I attended my second granddaughter's high-school graduatiion yesterday in Broomfield, Colorado. It was such a reminder that "time flies on wings of lightening; you cannot call it back!" It slips past without conscience.

Twenty-three years ago we welcomed our seventh child into this world. Cameron was a beautiful, eight-and-a-half-pound baby with a round face and fuzzy strawberry-blonde hair. When the midwife handed him to me, something in his face caused me to have a passing feeling that there was something...

A few hours later the pediatrician stood by my bed and kindly went over the signs that my sweet baby may have Down Syndrome. The eyes...the simian crease...the short fingers and small ears. He said we would not know for sure until we had a genetic screening, but I knew. The Asian doctor smiled. He himself surely had slanted eyes. He showed me his own simian crease. Like anyone, my first thoughts were, "Why me?" "Why me, who had never tasted alcohol, tobacco, or drugs?" "Why me who had never even known anyone with special needs?" "Why me, who has six brilliant, creative children?" Then, "Why NOT me?" "Why not our loving and faithful family?" "Why not?" I called my husband, who had just left the hospital and returned to our children. In his shock, he also searched for an answer. Our children worried and wondered how our lives would change...

We broke the news to family and friends over the next few days, and went on with our busy lives as if nothing had changed. Indeed, it had not. We were determined to have this baby be as "normal" as possible. I had no idea what the next few years would bring for our Cameron. What would it be like when he entered nursery at church, kindergarten? What would his elementary years be like? Junior high? High school? Life after that for this little boy who won the hearts of everyone who held him and looked into his blue eyes?

Here we are twenty three years later with a wagonload of memories that we would not trade for all the "normal" boys born those years ago. We always say Cam makes our lives "interesting," but it's really much more than that. Loving a child with special needs makes me a better person. I am more compassionate, patient, humble, self-aware, courageous, faithful, generous, and happy because twenty-three years ago God sent an angel. He wasn't the baby we ordered--he was so much more.