Our Baby Will Be Different

After our T18 diagnosis, I wrote some text that I planned to read to our younger children to help them better understand and prepare for some things about Verity that would be different. I sent the text to a friend of ours, Adam Turner, who is a very gifted freelance artist to see if by chance he would be able to put together some sketches for me. He heartily agreed; however, he got very, very ill over the holidays with a severe virus that wiped him out for over a month. I didn't want to bother him, assuming he would have his own work piling up, and simply printed off my own pages and put together a little card stock booklet to read to my kiddos.

Well. The very day that Verity was born, a package arrived on our doorstep, quickly intercepted by our 16yo daughter who had received word from Adam that something was in the mail for us. Two mornings later, as we gathered our family together for a photo session, our daughter presented us with two copies (out of a total of 25) from this box that Adam ordered to be sent to us. It's my book!! I promptly burst into tears...good thing I hadn't put on my mascara for the day!

With the extra copies, I am so excited to be able to bless other families who are going through a similar journey to ours: finding themselves expecting a baby who will be "different" and trying to explain and prepare older siblings.

I offered to mail free copies while supplies lasted to families in the Trisomy Parent group, and the response has been so heartwarming. Almost all of our extra copies are spoken for, with a clamor for a "boy version" of the book--ours, of course, uses female pronouns since we knew Verity was a girl. I've contacted Adam to see if we can make this happen. I even received an offer from one of the moms to translate the text into Spanish!

As was mentioned several times, the available literature for families in these situations is extremely limited. Would you join me in praying about getting this published on a wider scale so we can bless and encourage even more families?