Show me your face and I will show you mine.

Confession time.

When my daughter was born with Down’s syndrome, I am ashamed to admit that, at first, I wanted to hide her away. I tried to dress her in a way that people wouldn’t notice certain features pertaining to her condition; her slightly thickened neck for instance. A well placed chunky knit cardigan dealt with that! As we struggled to come to terms with her diagnosis, though we loved her with every fibre of our beings, my husband and I spoke privately of a hope that she would have some sort of ‘Down’s syndrome light’ variety. A not too noticeable version of the condition that would be acceptable to others and also, it has to be said, to us. As for thinking about other people, especially older people with the condition, this was not something we wanted to contemplate. In our eyes, they were to be avoided. Feared even. In fact, looking at anyone else with the condition was hard to do back then, though I did try to notice the ones I deemed acceptable – just about. All in the hope that my child would be like them.  Not too bad.

Our eyes were focused, not on our child, but on our prejudice.

Eight years later and laser surgery has removed that prejudice and cleared our vision. Thankfully. Or was it heart surgery? Either way it is gone.

This week, a film made about a man with Down’s syndrome, Jamie and his brother and family, appeared on social media. Radio 4 even did a feature on it. You can watch it here if you like. There was quite a reaction to it in our community. Some, like me, loved it, others including people whose lives I hugely respect, didn’t. Among other important things, they worried about how Down’s syndrome was portrayed in the film, especially to new parents or parents to be who might see it. It was absolutely not their experience and it appeared outdated, a backward step even. Some found it sad.

As the dust has settled I can see why they felt like that. I just don’t agree.

A wise person said to me that the film was like a mirror. Reflecting back so much of our own fears and, I think, our hopes too. Well I’ve been reflecting in that mirror since I saw the film and my wise friend is correct.

I’ve spent the last seven or eight years telling people, sometimes through my blog but in other ways too, that there’s nothing to be afraid of in having a child with Down’s syndrome. I’ve told them about all the things children and adults with Down’s syndrome can do now, achieve, be, aspire to; compared to in the past. And this remains all true and valid. I love how our community celebrates this change in all kinds of ways as more and more is understood about the capabilities and learning potential of people with Down’s syndrome. I hope we never stop making this known where it needs to be known. But it is not the whole picture.

So here’s my next confession…

Through my writing, I’ve told people these things, which I wholeheartedly believe and support, against the backdrop of knowing that my daughter is not like most children with Down’s syndrome. At least not most of the ones I know. She is more like Jamie. She sits how Jamie sits. She sounds how Jamie sounds. She has fewer words than Jamie has, yet she was not born forty years ago in some dark, uneducated era where early intervention for people with Down’s syndrome was largely unheard of.

No. She was born just over eight years ago in 2011.  She’s had far more support and intervention in her young life than Jamie would have had in his – at least outside of his loving family – oh I loved them in the film too! Their faults, their failings but mostly their love for Jamie and each other shone through.

Could we be doing more to help her development? Always. Is she still failed by healthcare systems and Government policies towards disabled people? Yes, frequently so. But that’s not the point here.

What’s true is that she is more like Jamie than most other children I have so far met who have Down’s syndrome. That is not to diminish them or their families in any way; I hope I no-one feels that’s the case for it’s not my intention. It is simply that our experience is one that is far closer to that of Jamie’s family. His face, his life, his behaviours and reactions we recognise in our own daughter. His family in ours. Even in the words they used to speak to or about him. And our lives are not some tragedy to be hidden from view.

Unconventional? Certainly. Challenging? Definitely. More so than I have ever admitted in my writing and that, with hindsight, has perhaps not always been helpful.  Even as I write, we should be elsewhere, joining in with an event that most people have no problem attending, even most of those with a child with Down’s syndrome. We are not most people.

Neither are we always looking for lots of inclusive activities to take her to. Though it’s sad there are not more. Because more often than not, even the inclusive ones are unsuitable for her. That will only change when her ‘face’ becomes an acceptable ‘face’, a face that is accepted as it is now, with all its funny ways and behaviours, noises and responses. It will change when her way of communication, as it is now, not as it might or could be, is accepted and welcomed, if not always understood, by everyone, not just a few people. Some call it her level of communication but that, to me implies critique. What I want most is for her always to be accepted, welcomed and wanted as she is. Not because of any intervention or achievement that might somehow make her a more positive advert for her community, however helpful it may be to her or anyone else. I think most parents want that too.

Hazel brings something different to our family. I saw it in Jamie’s family too. She brings people together, to surround her and each other. She brings a kind of healing, she brings mystery. She brings dependency.

Ah, but we need our children to grow up to be independent don’t we? That is, after all, one of the aims of most parents – to help their child grow up to be fully independent and make their own way in the world.

And yet Hazel has taught me to prefer the idea of a society where we grow more dependent on each other, not less.

The reality is far from that though and I think it’s one of the reasons people reacted with concern to the film. I get that.

I don’t think it’s wrong to hope and strive for a society where dependence on each other is highly valued. If our society was like that, then many of the fears that keep parents of children/adults with Down’s syndrome or other disabilities awake at night would not exist. We could be confident that our loved ones are going to be valued, cared and wanted for who they are, regardless of their level of dependency and regardless of whether we are here to care for them or not.

A mirror should always reflect the truth and perhaps I am guilty of distorting the image of our lives in order to gain the acceptance of parents who might be considering terminating the life of their unborn baby, following a diagnosis of Down’s syndrome. Yet the truth still is that all people with Down’s syndrome, whether they are like Hazel, Jamie or whoever, have beautiful faces and can live beautiful lives, whatever their challenges. Their stories, our stories, all deserve to be told and it is a privilege to be part of a community that is dependent on each other.

Let’s not hide any one of us away.

Adam Pearson A British Actor and Campaigner and who is also diagnosed with a genetic condition said recently “The way to eliminate any kind of misconception or prejudice is to increase the exposure”

Show me your face and I will show you mine.

“Fear makes strangers of people who would be friends.” Shirley Maclaine