You came home from work today, excited to tell me who was there and what you did. You dropped your backpack by the front door and gave me a long hug before washing your hands to eat and change for basketball practice. You are one of the 10%.
60% to 90%* of your peers are terminated in utero because we value the beautiful and strong over the weak and needy. Because we are afraid that you will curtail our freedom; that you will require more from us than we want to give. Because the medical profession tells us to, when we are vulnerable and afraid. They say that your life will be one of unrelenting suffering, and there is only one right solution for it.
They say you and your peers are a drain on society. That economic resources are wasted on you, while taking away from others who can enhance our bottom line.
What does that say about us as a society? We, with the requisite number of chromosomes, determine your fate before we even meet you, before we experience one of your open-hearted hugs or witness your exuberant spirit. How far have we fallen, that we will only welcome you if your test results declare you worthy of our care?
I try to imagine a world where the missing 90% are here, in our homes and our schools, in our churches and work places. How would that change us? Would we become a more compassionate society? A less angry, more joyful one?
Medical advancements have allowed you to survive and thrive, while at the same time working hard to ensure that you won’t be here to experience it. And we accept this twisted reasoning because it would cost us something to question it.
And yet, here you are, fixing yourself lunch in my kitchen—one of the 10% allowed to make your mark on this broken world. You don’t understand what a privilege it is for you to even exist, as you put the peanut butter away and stoop to hug the dog. But I do. Oh, yes, my son, I do.
*https://obgyn.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1002/pd.2910
Andrea Sanborn 
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