It's a little girl. But she partially inherited a gene that could potentially cause her to have learning issues.
So needless to say I'm devastated. I've been crying on and off since we got the news.
We'll of course love her no matter what. But there's just that moment when you realize that your perfect little baby may not be so perfect after all.
The gene she partially inherited is Fragile X, I say partially because what has happened is that she got one totally normal X from my husband but then got a bad X from me, now in most cases if the bad X is going to expand and cause an issue it does it in all the areas where it's present, however in my little girl, in some areas this X has stayed the smaller so a pre-mutation and in other areas it's expanded. So she's what is referred to as mosaic, it's quite rare and there isn't a lot of info on mosaic girls, be that because they don't show symptoms of the disorder or because it doesn't happen often is yet to be seen.
I feel so much guilt for passing this on to my little girl. In some ways I actually feel as if I've already been a bad mother to her.
The silver lining of all this is that in regular full mutation females they only show symptoms 50% of the time, then in the ones that do 50% of them are normal intellectually and only have mild learning disabilities such as a difficulty with math, then the others are somewhere between mild to moderate, so they may need special classes. We meet with the genetic counselor on Friday to find out more but she kinda hinted on the phone that girls in this situation are almost never mentally retarded, as it was only a partial expansion. So we wait to talk to her and then wait to see what happens.
I really don't know what to do with myself, I can't stop crying and worrying that if she does need special help that I won't be able to do a good enough job for her. I realize it's a unrealistic fear as both my husband and his mother have adamantly pointed out that the fact that I even ask the question means that I'll be good.
My husband on the other hand keeps insisting that he's fine with the worst case scenario and so he's just thrilled to be having a daughter. He even went out last night and bought a cake to celebrate naming her.
I am just so scared that she'll be worse than anyone expected and then he'll change his mind or I'll change my mind and it'll end our marriage. Silly I know, but it's a concern.
I think I'm going to start seeing a psychologist so I can get all of these emotions under control before she's born so I won't have to worry about post partum depression.
So that's where things are at, we got the results but we still don't know the answers.
BTW, her name is going to be Margaret (Maggie) Emma, it's both of our great grandmother's names together. Mines was Emma and his was Margaret. We like it. And yes no matter what we'll still love her with all our hearts.
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