In Hindsight: A Father’s Reflection on Down Syndrome (Pt. 1)
How Fear, Tests, and Abortion Threaten the Least of These
Several weeks into my wife’s first pregnancy, we took a prenatal screening called the MaterniT21. This test, known as a non-invasive prenatal test (NIPT), works through a simple maternal blood draw that analyzes cell-free fetal DNA. A couple of weeks later, we received results that turned our world upside down: our child had a 60% chance of having Down syndrome.
I’ll admit, I’d never had much interaction with children with disabilities. As a kid, in my immaturity, I often avoided them because I didn’t know what to say or how to act. As I got older, I became less awkward, but I still found myself thinking, “Their parents must have it so hard.” Disability always felt like a world far removed from my own.
But now that world was about to come crashing into mine.
My wife took it the hardest. She cried often. Maybe she wondered if it was her fault—because I know there were moments when I wondered if it was mine. But one of the strangest parts of that season was that I was never quite sure what we were really grieving.
Our family’s belief in the sanctity of life was never up for debate; we knew we would keep this child no matter what. Yet there were days when it felt like another voice was inside me. One day I’d be comforting my wife—cracking jokes, reassuring her that our daughter would be loved just like all the other kids at church—and the next day I’d find myself asking God why He had given us this cup to drink. I was confused and afraid, caught between trust and doubt.
It was that confusion that led me to make a choice I know I will never make again.
After all, the MaterniT21 was only a screening test. These tests don’t diagnose; they simply estimate whether there’s a higher or lower chance of certain genetic conditions. Normally, if a screening comes back high-risk, parents can choose to confirm it with a true diagnostic test like chorionic villus sampling (CVS) or an amniocentesis.
Those tests do diagnose chromosomal conditions with near-100% accuracy, but they’re invasive and carry a small risk of miscarriage—around 0.1% to 0.3% with modern methods, though older estimates were closer to 1–2%.
Plagued by anxiety and desperate for certainty, we chose to move forward with the amniocentesis. It felt like the only way to silence the questions in our minds.
The amniocentesis was quick. They inserted a thin, long needle into my wife’s abdomen and withdrew a small amount of amniotic fluid. We were in and out within 30 minutes without any complications. The baby was fine, and just as we expected, that 60% became a 100% confirmation that our first child was going to have Down syndrome. No more wondering.
And yet, I couldn’t shake the feeling that I had just done something very irresponsible. Because of our need for certainty, we had put our child at risk—no matter how small that risk seemed.
Some may look at this and think I’m blowing it out of proportion. After all, 1–2% is nothing compared to the risks we take every day. But if my family was determined to uphold the sanctity of life regardless of the outcome, was this risk truly necessary? Was the certainty really worth it?
The sad reality is that today people make far worse decisions with far less clarity. In the United States, around 400,000 to 600,000 people live with Down syndrome, yet thousands more never get the chance because they are aborted after a screening merely suggests they might have this condition. Each year, about 5,700 babies with Down syndrome are born, but that number would likely be closer to 9,000 if not for elective abortions following non-diagnostic tests like the MaterniT21.
Behind these numbers lies a quiet atrocity: countless families trade their child’s life for the illusion of comfort and control—discarding little ones who could have brought immeasurable joy and dignity into the world—all because we crave certainty. We want to believe life will be easy, that everything will go according to plan, and that we deserve the perfect child.
Last night, my daughter woke me up for hours, running from her room into the hallway at full speed. When I tried to soothe her, her sensory struggles made her kick me in the face over and over until my wife finally stepped in. When I tell her to sleep, she just laughs, unable to understand.
It’s frustrating at times. It’s not easy. I’m painfully aware of the differences between her and the other kids at church. There are real financial costs to raising a child with a disability—time spent at countless appointments and therapy sessions. There’s no neat, fairy tale ending here.
And yet, the joy she brings into my life runs deeper than I ever imagined—a joy I would trade every day of my old, quieter, childless life to keep.
A smile that lights up the room.
A hug that could melt the hardest heart.
There’s no shame in wanting the norm; God ordered creation to work in patterns and majorities for a reason. But sometimes He calls you outside that norm—and when He does, you trust that His providence holds a glory far greater than your plans. Uncertainty, in His hands, becomes a beautiful thing in its own time.