I always knew becoming a mom would change my life.
I never knew how.
My son has blue eyes. He has a crazy natural mohawk atop his soft head. He has a smile that goes from one side of his face all the way to the other. And he has Down Syndrome.
Our first child was born Aug. 7, 2010. He came after three days of contractions and a surprise C-section surgery, but I thought that that was as hard as it gets. What followed in the next few weeks was a sort of grieving process for the baby I had been expecting.
My initial joy in Zack’s birth and the survival of getting to know one another, breastfeeding and visitors galore was quickly overshadowed by the news from the hospital pediatrician that our son was showing some of the signs of Down Syndrome. DS is a chromosomal disorder that causes developmental and cognitive delays. There’s no cause and other than a prenatal test we opted out of during my pregnancy, there’s no way to know it’s going to come into your life and hit you like a ton of bricks.
Scott and I didn’t tell anyone at first. We wanted the grandparents to enjoy being grandparents; our friends to be happy. Then exactly one week after Zack’s birth, we got the news.
Anger.
Numbness.
Why me?
Denial.
Fear.
And then one day, I came out of the black hole that very well could have consumed me forever. Every now and then, I still have one of those moments out of the movies, where the action around the main character keeps going on at full-speed but it’s blurry to him or her. He’s in his own world and it’s almost like an out-of-body experience.
I emerge stronger. I work harder. I push further.
And life goes on.
We have weekly meetings with a physical therapist and special instructor from our local Early Intervention program and I’m in contact with other parents through Parent to Parent and a local support group. And I’d be lost without all of the friends and loved ones who really “get it.”
I’ve heard so many times that “special” kids are given to special parents. I’m only special because I have Zack. And it has nothing at all to do with Down Syndrome.
To learn more about DS, visit the National Down Syndrome Society at www.ndss.org.
I blog about my life as a mom of a special needs child at our newspaper’s website at www.mirrormoms.com. 
