Seriously??

Steve, Samantha and I were in Home Depot last week, picking up some painting supplies for the house. Home Depot and Lowes have become our friends. Okay, who am I kidding? They've become Steve's friends. I'll say "we" until the cows come home when it comes to painting and preparing the new house, but actually Steve's doing all of it. I'm really in awe. He's been working so hard on every aspect of buying this house, and I'm sure he's completely mentally drained. And he's got Samantha in the afternoons after school finishes every day, so his hands are doubly full.

Anyway, one of the Home Depot employees, a very sweet and helpful young woman who was fawning all over Samantha, eventually said (as they all do), "Do you mind if I ask..." (as if I could actually say, "yes, I mind") "...does she have Downs?" So I told her she did, and she proceded to tell me that her goddaughter also has Down syndrome. She said that her friend, the girl's mother, has rheumatoid arthritis at only about 30 years old, and had been taking lots of high-dosage meds for the RA, and was told that this could have been the cause of her daughter's Down syndrome. Seriously? Someone in the medical field actually told her this? I can't help wondering (hoping!) that the young woman I was speaking to was just a little confused, and that there isn't another mother of a child with Down syndrome out there that thinks that the meds she took in early pregnancy caused her child's genetic anomally. Or perhaps this woman was confused about what her goddaughter actually had--perhaps it was not Down syndrome. I quickly set the woman straight, not even thinking to ask her if her friend is local and what her last name is. I think I would have felt much better about this if I knew it was someone whose name I was familiar with in the DSANV membership, because then I would know that she probably had correct information. Misconceptions about cause are so frustrating to me. But I know that people who are not exposed to the Ds community just don't know, which is fine. Like the mother of a high school ex-boyfriend, who said, "Oh, I didn't even know Down syndrome still existed..." But she just didn't know. I got a chuckle out of that one. I think that before Samantha was born, I didn't know much more than them, either, but the medical community hopefully is beginning to give better information.

Friday night I had the pleasure of meeting Jeanette from DownRightFaith while she was in town for the Affiliates in Action conference. Please check out her blog for a recap of her very productive visit to DC! We had a wonderful (but very short) time talking over dinner and a drive of the DC monuments by night. We even got stopped by President Obama's motorcade (I've been stopped by enough Presidential motorcades to know this was his, btw...)!

I'll probably be pretty scarcely/sporadically posting on my blog or on Facebook for the next few weeks, until we're settled in after the move (on the 13th). Things are pretty hectic right now.