Invertebrate Stumble: Creating a Story Without Success

"I don't know how to feel about this" I said as I stared at the results.

She sat across from me, her head down and her hand on her stomach protectively.

"I know" she said quietly.

"But we can do this." I continued, my voice rising with excitement.

"We can do this." She repeated with a smile that didn't reach her eyes.

We hugged, then she left. I picked up the results again.

TEST RESULTS: POSITIVE

I don't know how to feel about this. I sat in my office staring at the results of the test. Julie had been so happy when she'd finally gotten pregnant, but now, after one positive test result, all of her joy was gone. She sat across from me, her head down and her hand on her stomach protectively. Our doctors had told us that this was a normal reaction for expectant mothers who got bad news like ours, but it didn't make any sense to me. How could we be so unhappy when this was supposed to be such wonderful news? We could have a child! A little person that would carry our genes and look just like us! Didn't that excite us? The doctors said it was just a stage that many couples go through when they get bad news like ours. Julie's doctor had even said he'd been working with couples who experienced problems like ours for over ten years and still couldn't figure out how to help them cope with the situation. He said we would get through it eventually, but I knew him too well to believe him. He wanted us to be happy and was trying to convince us that we were, but he didn't really believe it himself. He knew what kind of news we'd gotten. He knew what we were going to do next. We were going to terminate the pregnancy because our baby had Down Syndrome and there were two copies of chromosome 21 in our fetus' DNA sequence. The doctors called the condition Trisomy 21 or Downs Syndrome and they told us that only one in every seven hundred babies born with Trisomy 21 lived past birth while only one in fifty-thousand live past eighteen years old. Seventy-eight percent of Trisomy 21 babies died before they turned six months old while seventy percent die before they're five years old. This wasn't news that anyone should respond positively to no matter how hard they tried or how much their doctor wanted them too; yet here I was sitting across from my wife feeling bad about being happy about it even though I knew she wasn't either and neither of us wanted to end the pregnancy more than anything in the world... let alone do it twice in one year like we did last year when Julie suffered from multiple miscarriages after finding out that each of those babies had Trisomy 21 too! It made no sense! None at all! It was as if our brains refused to accept the truth which seemed odd considering both of our parents were geneticists who had worked in research labs together for decades! Learning about genetics seemed to be in my bloodline and I couldn't remember a time when something related to genetics hadn't fascinated me since childhood! My expertise was in analyzing DNA sequences and figuring out how diseases related genetically could effect their victims genetically; therefore learning about genetic disorders like Down Syndrome or Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy or Fragile X Syndrome had always interested me greatly! So how could I not want our baby with Down Syndrome!? How could Julie not want any of our children with Down Syndrome!? Yet here we were looking forward to aborting another baby with Down Syndrome... twice! What's wrong with us!? Why can't we be happy!? Why are we doing this!? Why are we killing our own children!? This wasn't supposed to happen! We weren't supposed to get bad results like these! These tests were perfect! They were state-of-the-art technology developed by experts who studied genetics for decades just like my parents did! Our parents put their names on those test results without hesitation because they believed in those tests just as much as they believed in their work studying genetics everyday! Yet now all their work doesn't matter at all does it!? Now everything is different because their work is flawed!? Because technology isn't perfect after all!? Do genetics really change this rapidly!? Are humans as advanced as we think!? Nothing makes sense anymore... nothing at all! "I don't know how to feel about this" I said as I stared at the results. She sat across from me, her head down and her hand on her stomach protectively. "I know" she said quietly... then she left.