Dr. Jedidiah's Diary Episode #22: Trisomy 21

Dr. Jedidiah is a psychiatrist who loves traveling, meeting new people, and exploring different cultures. As a single father who lost his wife Demi to drug overdose 10 years ago, he has not been his old perky self for the last decade. During those hard years, he has met hundreds of, thousands of people from various walks of life around all over the world. Meeting new people and listening to their stories outside his office have given him different feelings from the ones through the formal encounter groups or support groups for therapy. These people he has accidentally come across were the paths through which Dr. Jedidiah could look back on his own life, being truly honest with himself. Here is Dr. Jedidiah’s monologue that has left him with some food for thoughts in life….or a fodder to justify his own mistakes in the past.

Episode # 22. Trisomy 21

Maddie’s mom, Kirsten always looked focused, poised, and even donnish to me. She was seen at the same spot in this library that was one of my major hangouts. Putting on a serious face doesn’t necessarily mean that she has no sense of humor at all. She often cracked a joke, which made me laugh so hard. It was only when we talked about Maddie and her school life that I found dark clouds all over Kirsten’s face.

Playful, effervescent, talkative, and so thoughtful. That was how I’d felt every time I saw Maddie. She was her mama’s reason to live and the strongest force to carry on with no one in her family to rely on. As a single mom, Kirsten had to hold a couple of jobs from sunup to midnight to provide her darling daughter with the comfortable (though not good enough to be called the best) living condition. 15 year-old Maddie looks like her life was full of prismatic colors as long as her devoted mom could be as her number one cheerleader. Most people outside her home boundary gave her a weird, and sometimes an inimical stare. One night, as Maddie was tucking in her bed, she asked “Mom, why are people always looking at me? Do I look different from them all?” Instead of giving Maddie the runaround, Kirsten answered in her most honest way. “Yes, you do, honey. You look different, because you are special. You are given one more gift in your body from God.It is called special chromosome 21.” Straightforward, but still sweet enough for her teenaged daughter to feel comfortable in her own skin.

Late at night and over the weekend, Kirsten was always at the local library to search for cure or any possible studies out there in regards to prolonging life span of Down Syndrome patients. She didn’t want to believe what Maddie’s doctor said about her time left as a kid with Down Syndrome. Kirsten asked me if the doctor could be wrong about Maddie’s future. In fact, it had always been the unknown. I wanted to say that Maddie will stay healthy and live a long, happy life with her mom, ….but I wasn’t able to say what I did not know for sure to a desperate mother who had been spending all her breather time outside work and the hours with her daughter in searching for hopeful medical report and discoveries. I hate myself looking the other way each time she grilled me about my honest thoughts. I was just wishing her old briefcase packed with copies of articles and papers about Down Syndrome would give me the answer that would make Kirsten feel secure and relieved. Her worn-out briefcase, which was engraved with “Trisomy 21”, still holds a place in my heart as the saddest memory.

Maddie left for Heaven two months shy of her 18^th birthday. Kirsten seemed to have felt the time was coming for her to say goodbye to her sweet, loving daughter, because Maddie did not ask any questions about her upcoming birthday party. On the night she left, Maddie whispered into her mom’s ear “mom, I am different, because I am special.”

Expressions

    

     1.  donnish: bookish or pedantic

     2.  effervescent: vivacious/ bubbly/ high-spirited

     3.   give someone the runaround: to give unclear, misleading, incomplete, or evasive information, especially in a response to a question or request.

     4.   to feel comfortable in one’s own skin: to have a relaxed confidence in and clear understanding of oneself and one's abilities, especially when presenting oneself to or interacting with other people

     5.  to grill someone about something: to question or interrogate someone intensely and relentlessly (about something)

     6.   Trisomy 21: (source from www.medicine.com) A common chromosome disorder, often called Down syndrome, due to an extra chromosome number 21 (trisomy 21). The chromosome abnormality affects both the physical and intellectual development of the individual.