My Life with Bosco

In December 2020, my husband and I learned that our eighth child had Trisomy 18. A high-risk physician asked us if we wanted “time to think about what to do,” implying that we might consider abortion. We told her that we loved our child and we would fight for his care. She seemed surprised by our answer and again asked about termination. We sought out new physicians who valued our son's life and never suggested killing him.

I will always remember the day we received that life-threatening diagnosis. Due to inhumane and unscientific COVID restrictions, my husband was not going to be allowed into the appointment with me at the high-risk OBGYN. In the ten days since our initial appointment where we had been told something was wrong, I had done my research and I knew we were getting a Trisomy 18 diagnosis.

There was no way I was going to that appointment alone, so I fought hard and insisted my husband had a right to be there for his son's medical care and for my support. I was finally given an exception that he could wait in his car during the sonogram. Then, if it was bad news, they would let him in the back door to be with me for the diagnosis, but if it wasn't that bad of news, he would have to stay in his car. Unbelievable, but we took what we could get.

The sonogram was long and I asked a lot of questions, even though I know the sonographer cannot diagnose and cannot answer most of my questions. I could clearly see there were lots of abnormalities. When the sonogram was done, the sonographer met my husband, Kody, at the back door and sneaked him into my room. After a while, a doctor we had never met before came in, and asked us what we knew so far.

I told her my suspicions, based on what I had been told and my research, and she confirmed that our son had Trisomy 18. We cried as she listed all of the different abnormalities they had found, our hearts breaking and our heads spinning. Then I asked “Ok, what do we do next?” and she said she could step outside so we could “have some time to think about it,” as if there were anything to think about.

All I could respond in that moment was “This is our baby. We love him and we will fight for him every second that he is alive. Now what do we do next?” She responded “Well, if termination is not an option, we can discuss next steps.”

This is what abortion has done to women's healthcare. Can you imagine being told your precious, beloved child has some abnormalities, and then being asked if you wanted to murder him? That is truly evil and cruel.

When our appointment was over, we were escorted out the back door, so none of the women in the waiting room could see my husband was allowed at my appointment. (This was the case for very high-risk appointments after that as well.) We sat in the front pew and cried. We opened the envelope to read that our beloved baby was a little boy. We looked to the Crucifix and knew we had no right to ask why, when you remember the excruciating death God let His only Son suffer through, for us.

When you look at the Cross, you know you have no right to your children, they belong to God and are just on loan to us for a short time, to raise them up for Heaven. When you look to the Cross, you know you are not in control. When you look to the Cross, you know life is not fair, how arrogant to think it ever would be. But when you look to the Cross, you also know you are not alone. You know that God the Father knows the pain of this journey we were now on. When you look to the Cross, you know Our Lady walked this journey, of watching her innocent Son die an awful death, and giving Him back to His Father. So we prayed for strength, and for grace for the journey, that God would be glorified through our baby. We would do everything we could to help him live, but if God was calling him home early, we accepted that.

We went home to tell our children the news, which was incredibly difficult but also beautiful. Their love for their brother was so pure, innocent, and resolute. We prayed and cried and prayed some more.

Everyone handles grief differently. For us, we wanted to keep life as normal as possible for our children, to show them it's ok to cry, but we can still laugh and have fun, too. We decided to continue with our New Year's Eve plans and have our friends over like we do every year. Friends came and brought lots of food, shoulders to cry on, support, and laughter, too. It was a sad night in many ways, but it was wonderful to have friends here to support us.

As we began this journey, we knew this was a major life event for our children, and a great teaching opportunity. We wanted to teach them that:

God is always in control, not us.

It was always clear to us who valued our son's life, and who wrote him off as simply a “fatal fetal anomaly.” The former would refer to him as our son, would listen to our religious beliefs and offer pro-life care. While we knew our son's condition was severe enough that he likely would not survive long after birth, we hoped and prayed and prepared to baptize him as soon as he was born. Sadly, our beloved son, Bosco Joseph Paul, died during childbirth.

My plea to doctors is to value both lives, support families in choosing life by offering all the diagnostic tests and treatment options available, including palliative care. The lives of both the mother and the child are dignified, and both deserve to be treated equally as patients. Catholic doctors understand this, and they have a responsibility to take that message to colleagues who do not know the importance of affirming life even in the face of severe disability. Patients, and in obstetrics there are always at least two of them, deserve no less.