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Oh the People You Meet ...
When You're Trying to Conceive
By Jessica Frank
n, I figured all would be perfect. I never questioned that I would be dealt a bad hand twice, so I didn't pursue it. The doctors doubted that we'd experience problems again – they said it was a fluke. Now I regret it.
Anyhow, the lovely person who met us at the desk didn't do counseling on Mondays, but due to the sick doctor, she took us on. She brought us in, expressed her condolences and showed compassion – yes, she had a heart. (Remember that part for later when I talk about Friday's doctor.) This woman showed us page after page of chromosomal analysis that other couples had gone through. She showed us what trisomy 21 looked like (Down syndrome) and showed us what trisomy 13 and 18 looked like. Unfortunately, she didn't have a page dedicated to trisomy 15. It's a rare chromosomal disorder. She hadn't seen it yet. Lucky me; I get to be the first one. I volunteered to have my chromosomal profile added to her collection. Trisomy 15 and my baby girl deserve a page!
She went on to tell us that one of us could be a carrier, but she highly doubted it. Derek's loss and Baby No. 2's loss (can't handle naming her yet) were like apples and oranges – totally unrelated. After that, I asked, "Where do I go to get some fresh fruit?" Laughing, she went on to tell us about the battery of tests that she was planning to run.
We are both of at least partial Jewish descent. Knowing this, the genetic counselor recommended that we have blood drawn to test for nine inherited Jewish diseases including Tay Sachs, Gaucher's and Caravan's to name a few. She also recommended that we go for chromosomal karaotyping, a procedure where they take Andy's chromosomes and mine and match them togethe.
Normal people have 23 sets of chromosomes each. When a baby is conceived, he or she receives one chromosome toward each set from each parent – 23 pairs in all. If for some reason an extra chromosome appears in any transferred set, making three instead of two, you'd have a trisomy baby. The trisomy number reflects which set has an extra chromosome. In our case, it was the No. 15 chromosome which had three instead of two. (Did I mention that I hate the number three as well? Eight and three are now banned from my lottery tickets – gone, dumped and replaced by seven and two!)
Anyway, we went down to the vampires – I mean phlebotomists – and had our eight (see, I told you!) vials of blood drawn for analysis. We'll know in about a month if we are carriers. If so, we need to proceed to in vitro, pre-genetic embryonic diagnosis or sperm or egg donors, or we'll just continue on our adoption path.
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