A Q&A With Myself About The Role God Played In My Daughters Bonus Chromosome

I feel it is important to share my feelings because A. It is therapy for me and B. I want to be a voice for other parents facing a similar situation. I want them to hear voices like mine louder than they hear the voices of some medical professionals who wrongly think the world would be better without kids like ours.

As I mentioned in a letter that I published on this blog before my daughter was born, I do not think that Down Syndrome is something that God gives someone. This is why I prayed that my daughter would be healed and born without it. However, now that she is here, this had raised another question for me and it took me awhile to get to an answer.

Q. If Down Syndrome is not from God, does that mean my daughter is not from God?
A. No, since the fall of man, we all fall short of what God intended for us. Adaline is no exception. She may have an extra chromosome that will require her to have heart surgery and that may keep her from reaching milestones when her peers do, but we all face something less than what God intended for us. Some of us will be prone to cancers, some of us will be prone to addictions, some of us will love gossip and an the list goes on.

I often here the phrase that someone is who God made them to be and now I feel that that phrase is inaccurate. No one on earth will be who God made them to be (except for Jesus). God will use everyone (even Joran VanDerSloot) to play an irreplaceable role on the earth though. I have stopped saying that someone is who God made them to be and replaced it with "They are exactly who the world needs them to be".