How genetic tests can be misleading at times
My alternate gestation was a welcome surprise. when I saw the two pink lines appear on a gestation test soon after my daughter was born, I used to be amazed but prepared to welcome another child into our family.
My first child is medically complex with multiple disabilities. With a new baby, I knew I would have tons to navigate in the coming months.
The first call I made after learning I was pregnant was not to my man but my daughter's geneticist. I wanted to schedule prenatal testing as soon as possible. I was hoping for reassurance that my baby was healthy. However, I wanted time to prepare and put a medical team in situ before birth, something I was not able to do for my daughter, If not.
I scheduled a CVS, an invasive procedure that takes a piece of the placenta, as soon as I could, alongside a series of other tests. When the results came back, they were inconclusive, and I thought my son could have a rare genetic defect also. This news was jarring.
We could not properly care for two medically complex children
Although I wanted this baby, the truth that I would be handling two medically complex children washed over me like a tsunami. I had formerly been driven from the workforce due to a lack of childcare for medically complex children with disabilities.
Financially, it might be insolvable to buy the care of two children with significant requirements. are "> there have been not enough hours within the day to undertake the time-consuming task of getting to the number of appointments that might have been required, alongside the subsequent fights with insurance.
We were already so close to our breaking point and without an adequate social safety net. Bringing another medically complex child with disabilities into our family seemed like an insurmountable task.
I sought another test before deciding what to do with my gestation
My obstetrician told me that I could schedule another test that might give me a more definitive answer, but that I had to wait several weeks until the test could safely be performed.
I had a choice to make.
Despondent, I visited Planned Parenthood so that I could be informed of all my options. I breathed a deep sigh of relief when I learned that although choosing to attend for additional test results would take me right upward to the cutoff for terminating my gestation, I had the time to wait, to collect further information, to think.
I used that point to research resources that may be available to my children, to think through different scenarios, and to return to terms with my very own complex emotions.
Waiting for definitive test results was hard. The weeks between prenatal tests were stressful, filled with tears and sleepless nights. But they are weeks I am thankful to have had. Had the prospect of a secure and legal abortion later in gestation not been available to me, there is a true possibility that I might have chosen to terminate my gestation and that I would no way have gotten to understand my happy, healthy, and handsome son.
Potential abortion laws in several states within us would take away the likelihood for various women to terminate pregnancies after six weeks, which is earlier than when genetic testing is finished.
With the recent news that incorrect prenatal results are stunningly common, I am more convinced than ever that each woman deserves an equivalent opportunity I had to carefully consider their options with their physicians and their wives, to have agency over their bodies and lives.