Happy Sad Joy

One of the greatest things about marriage is pregnancy. Pregnancy perfects marriage, I don't know about you but my husband Jerome is this type that doesn't play with a male child, infact his wish was for our first child to be a baby boy but most times, it doesn't actually happen the way we want it so after four baby girls, we prayed and fasted earnestly for our fifth child to be a baby boy.

The confirmation came not as a surprise because everyone prophesied that I was carrying a boy so when we confirmed that it was a baby boy, the atmosphere in our home changed because to my husband, a king was on the way. He has bought couple of baby boy cloths earlier but at the confirmation of Otito because he named him Otitodiluchukwu, my husband got crazy and ended up buying even cloths he will wear at age three.

Jerome stopped me from doing any house chores, he started cooking and washing for me, he massaged me every now and then, infact he started treating me like a baby, he was always awake when I am asleep. You see, my husband is naturally a kind man and he always spoil me with affection but the expectation of a son trippled his love for me. All my life I had always wanted to visit America so when we woke up that morning, he massaged me and guess what?

He looked at me and said; Baby, you are going to deliver him in USA.

It was a dream come true for me the day my medical visa to travel to the USA was issued. Infact, it dawned on me that I would have visited long time ago. My husband bought me a first class ticket because to him, the king ought to be treated with utmost royalty. I arrived USA and immediately checked into the already booked and paid lodge very close to the hospital.

I must give it to the Americans, wow! Everything about America is America, everything was different from the way it was down home and one would truly mistake the United States of America for another planet. The management of the lodge had everything I needed throughout my stay on standby, there was even an in-house medical team. One thing about pregnancy is that it doubles one's apatite but in America; mine was tripled.

My first visit to the hospital were I would give birth was quite different from my second because I had a scan during my second visit, it was a routine check to make sure that my baby was fine but that check would change everything about me forever because the words of the doctor pinned me. The scan showed that our baby wasn't growing normal and it boils down to down syndrome.

Jerome broke down when I notified him about the development and he questioned why God would give us a broken baby. In America, abortion is a legal option in this kind of mess.

The walls holding my happiness crumbled then Jerome's decision to have the pregnancy aborted tormented me but I decided to think over it then prepare myself for it because although I am fully aware of the challenges of raising a child with such condition, truth is that we don't have the resources needed to care for such child down home so deep down in my heart of hearts, Jerome was right.

It took me just two hours to prepare myself to have Otitodiluchukwu terminated. I felt so guilty about it, I mean it was hard for me but somehow we were doing the right thing especially for him because just like the Doctor said, he would never live a normal life and would experience learning difficulties and would rely on others to live and worst of all, he might not even walk.

I didn't sleep all night because I was on the phone with my husband and he assured me that he would head to USA on Friday to be with me because he knew how broken I was but by the dawn of the D day, I was preparing to leave for the hospital when he called me and told me to keep the pregnancy. His words was simple; God has a reason why he sent him. Anyway to cut a long story short, I kept the pregnancy and later had a successful delivery.

Looking at our lovely son today as he had defiled all odds because he is one hundred percent independent, he communicates well irrespective of the normal difficulties associated with his condition. He loves music and above all, he is the best mathematics student in his school.

When people ask me about his condition, I simply do this...

...click the link here