Hannes was born late evening on September the 11^th 1989 in Flora Clinic, Roodepoort South Africa.  Hannes was our firstborn. Not having any family history of abnormalities or birth defects, and because of our relative young age, Wernia 21 and me 23, nobody thought of doing any tests.

Great was our surprise (or was it shock) when the Pediatrician told us that same evening that he suspect Hannes to be DS.  Six agonizing weeks dragged by while we were waiting for the test results that confirmed… “Hannes was Trisomy 21 DS” in the worst degree.  According to the Doctor he would never be able to walk or talk and would need intense physiotherapy just to be able to have the use of his neck.  The Doctor’s recommendation was that we have Hannes institutionalized a.s.a.p.

Well…. Hannes turned 17 the other day, from the photograph you can see that he looks pretty “normal” he plays all kinds of ball sports, plays Playstation and partakes in most activities that a non-DS child does.  All this with the minimum of physiotherapy, which was in any event more general therapy than anything else!  I have to add that the Doctor was fresh out of Med school in those years.

 

As we progress with Hannes’ website, we will add more of his story (and believe me…what a story!)

 

 

Quite often we, as parents of a DS child, are asked what it felt liked when we first learned that Hannes was DS.  The easiest way to describe the emotion is as follows:

 

Imagine you are 8 years old and amongst a group of children eagerly awaiting your chance with Santa to get your long awaited gift.  As the row shrinks you see all of the happy and smiling faces in front of you returning ecstatically from Santa with their new doll, car, game or any other gift they so longed for.

Wow! Eventually, after what felt like hours it’s finally your turn with Santa, you grab the gift and with trembling fingers you pluck at the wrapping to get to the toy!  Finally all of the wrapping is undone and holding your breath you rip open the lid just to find that your box is EMPTY!

Confused you look around you just to find that everybody else is playing joyfully with his or her toy.  Boxes and wrappings scattered around the playgroup bears the testimony of the accompanied delight.  Once again you look down into an empty box and slowly the reality dawns upon you, your box is really empty!

Everybody else is so caught up in their own ecstasy not even noticing you and your welling sense of loneliness, hurt … deception.

You got your gift, but the box was empty.  It is only much later that you realise how versatile an empty box really is.  The hurt is still there, but you have found many exciting ways to pass your time with your new box, now definitely not empty anymore.