SPEAK
I AM EMMA'S SISTER
Accepting my little sister taught me how to accept the world. by Ruchel Parker
SCOTT KASERMAN
I hesitantly lay on the crowded bed for a family talk, facing both Mom and Dad. My mother looked away as my father spoke. I knew that she had been distant the last few days. I figured she was ill or had morning sickness. My father told us my new little sister wasn't going to be just another sibling. She was a special addition to our family because we were all going to help raise a child with Down Syndrome.
We had had a family talk just a few weeks earlier. My father had announced that another child would join our family in September. I tried not to show my disappointment, but there were already five of us, and I was 14 and not too keen on having to share more of anything.
I didn't know what to tell my friends. Adolescents can be so ignorant when it comes to people with disabilities unless they have been exposed to the disabled. I was never rude to people with mental retardation, but I certainly didn't give them the time of day.
It took some time to get used to a baby in the house again, but I began to notice that my little sister wasn't much different from any other baby. Approximately one in every 800 babies is born with Down Syndrome, according to the National Association for Down Syndrome, and these children can grow up to live relatively normal lives. They can be educated, work, get married and live on their own. I found that Emma would
I wasn't the greatest older sister when Emma entered my life. Some of my friends weren't even aware that my mom had been pregnant or that I had a new baby sister with a hoie in her heart and tubes in her ears. I kept her my little secret. I used to walk into her room and watch her as she slept, wondering what type of person she'd be, how she'd change my life.
Months went by, and I found myself studying more, cheerleading at all the basketball games, attending cheerleading and gymnastics practices, competing in gymnastics meets and staying after school for clubs whatever I could get my hands on. I stayed in denial. It was all just a bad dream.
One day, my mother yelled at me for saying something was retarded. She told me never to use that phrase. I began to notice it in the everyday speech of others, and I realized how degrading and disrespectful it was. I was now responsible for standing up for my little sister, whom I was going to love and support. About 350,000 families
have moderate impairments in her development, and she'd be more likely to have health problems than other babies would. Other than that she would be a normal person.
My growing knowledge about Emma's condition helped me become closer to her, but I still hadn't completely accepted her disability.
To my surprise,my friends didn't care that Emma had Down Syndrome.Because I was so insecure about her disability,I was blind to see that my friends might not be.They loved Emma. Whenever they came over we would ask her questions and giggle over her funny and adorable answers.Would flip her and watch in awe as her limber body jumped into the splits.
By the time I graduated high school, I couldn't imagine a life without Emma. The transition to college was easier than I
in the U.S. are affected by Down Syndrome, according to the Down Syndrome Society. Our family could do this.I could do this.
expected because of my learned openness to different kinds of people.
Emma changed the way I look at everything. She forced me to grow up faster. I view people in a different light, but most of all I'm less judgmental. I've found that the best things about people are the things that make them different from everyone else — most of the time their flaws. Emma's flaw is only one extra chromosome in her DNA.
Because of Emma, I get to experience life from a different angle. It's hard to realize what an effect she has made on me until I analyze how I felt the moment I heard she was entering the world and how I feel when I'm
with her now.She is innocent, and she has let me into her life without a second thought.
Emma is turning 7 this month, and I love every inch of her from her slanted eyes to her love for listening and singing to music, even though every note she belts reveals she is obviously tone deaf. Emma may tug at people in the grocery store and speak in incomplete sentences, but I don't care; she is a healthy child.
Emma is just like any other kid. She wants attention and love. There is no judgment in her heart. She is just happy to be here, and her love is unconditional. That is what everyone needs to see.
09.14.2006 JAYPLAY <19