When I was 17 weeks pregnant, I went to a woman’s clinic. When you're pregnant, there are two “big” tests for doctors to see if there's any abnormalities in the baby. You get the first one around the 11th week, and the second one around the 17th week.
That's why I was at the clinic for the second big test.
My Ob-gyn was like a very happy person. She always smiled. So when I visited
her, she greeted me with a smile and she put cool gel on my belly to do the
ultrasound. That’s when you get to see your baby’s face, arms, fingers and toes,
legs, and the thingy between the legs, if there’s one. By that, I knew I would have
a baby boy. But that day, my second big test, for the first time, she stopped
smiling and she was extremely silent. She picked up the phone and called
someone, and for a couple of minutes, she told me to go downstairs to meet
another doctor. And she didn't look me in the eyes.
“Walk back and forth,” another doctor told me. I was told to move relentlessly.
I did that for quite a while, and my feet were tired. She made me lie down, did
the ultrasound, sighed, and then made me walk again, and then did the ultrasound again. Finally, she told me to go upstairs again. And just by the look of her face,
I knew something was wrong. So I went back to my always-happy but not today
doctor and sat down.
“Uh, it’s a very rare disorder,” she said.
She took out this thick book from the bookshelf and pronounced this word.
Holoprosencephaly, HPE. I’m pretty sure that none of you has heard of this word
until today unless you’re a doctor. She explained it means the fore-brain of the
embryo fails to develop into two hemispheres. And I was like, what? My baby's
brain? What does that even mean?’ She continued. She said, “Most babies don’t
make it to the world. Even if they do, they hold a very slim chance of survival.”
Of course, I cried.
During pregnancy, the diagnosis changed from HPE to Septo-optic dysplasia,
which means, now he gets to live, which is great, but his brain, vision or literally
anything could go wrong anytime. Was it better? Not really. And thank God, that
baby is 3 years old now, healthy as a horse. And I'm still grateful.
Until today, my son has been diagnosed with HPE, Septo-optic dysplasia, and a
heart murmur, and gliding testes. I hate it when I hear things like, “Oh, you should
go to a hospital for more thorough examination.” It's actually the last thing you
want to hear as a mom. As a mom, actually, my baby never gets sick in my ideal
life. Uh, he's always healthy and happy. He can catch a cold once in a while, but
with a good night's sleep, he's well again. That's my ideal world as a mom.
But in real life, these things happen. Bad things, scary things can happen to me,
you and your family. Then what do we do? Well, I try to um bridge the gap
between the ideal world and the real world by first, enjoying every moment of life,
second, accepting things I never want can happen, and still praying that God
would protect us. That way, life is more beautiful and it’s more precious because
you know, you understand how much these things work. Yeah, and that makes
you grateful.
My presentation was a little better than this in my ideal world, but that's okay.
I enjoyed it, and I hope you did, too. Thank you for listening.