I told my husband that maybe she was the parent of the baby whose diagnosis was Microcephaly and that I felt sorry for her. I was explaining him why microcephaly could be such a big problem for the baby and what would probably be the prognosis for the little one.
After a few minutes , another woman gave us a sheet to fill out - ' GENETIC COUNSELING'. Why the heck do we need a counseling when we didn't ask for it in the first place? I skimmed through the form quickly and tears welled up in my eyes. There was one question that broke my heart. ' Was MTP* advised?'. So there was something wrong with my baby or why else would I be asked to fill out some stupid form.The woman who gave me the form collected it back and asked us to go to the counseling room.
*MTP -Medical Termination Of Pregnancy
In the counseling session , we were asked for our family tree, relationships etc. Specifically if any one of us had a small head running in our family. Once we answered all the questions we were given a diagnosis card- the same one that the other woman had dropped. It turned out that I was the mother of the baby who had microcephaly and not her.
By that time I was trying so hard not to cry. We put on a strong face , took the diagnosis card and entered the scan room.
The apathetic behaviour of the sonographer and the hostile environment of the place were adding up to my anger and stress . It was easy to read the sonographer's thoughts. Clearly she felt that she was wasting her time in scanning a 'subject' that was not going to be born. I promised my baby that I would give birth to him no matter what.Once the scan was over she just left the place without saying anything.
Then came the genetic counselor. He was no different from the rest of the people working there. He explained us what the problem was, what we could expect and what was the best thing to do. He was not adept enough to answer our questions. Rather he was just regurgitating whatever he had prepared for this session.
Heart broken , we left the room. I excused myself to the restroom just to cry out as much as I can. My dreams were crushed; it was as if my wishes and expectations were shattered to pieces. I came out as if I had managed to process the information in a matured way.
Half way through the stairs , my husband stopped and turned to look at me. I was acting strong . Suddenly he broke out into tears. It was a day that I would never forget in my life ; it was the first time that I saw my husband, the strongest man I have ever known in my life , shed tears. Seeing him cry , I couldn't act anymore. That was one of the darkest days of my life.
We were not feeling strong enough to break the news so we hid the truth from our families. We had to decide what to do next. Were we going to abort the baby for whom we had grown so much love?