Read Saving Henry for Free Online

was a long shot.
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    A llen and I talked a lot about having another child, weighing all of our options. The only absolute guarantee that our future children wouldn’t have FA was if we adopted or did artificial insemination, using a donated sperm or donated eggs. Or, of course, we could decide to stop having children altogether. At the time, our inherent optimism combined with our determination not to let Fanconi anemia dictate every move, and our deep desire for more children, blinded us to those alternatives.
    I thought a lot about my ability to provide not just a life for a new baby, but a good life, even in the worst of circumstances. Weknew it was a serious decision to have another child who was certain to experience extreme hardship and the potential loss of a sibling. I talked with Allen, perhaps more than he would have liked, about all the fears and uncertainties I felt.
    â€œWhat are we doing? Are we being irresponsible, risking having another child with FA?” I asked him over dinner at Lebanese Taverna, our date-night destination; and again, a few days later, as we drove home from a visit to New York, where we had been shopping for doctors. “I know I want to have more kids, but our life is going to be so hard and I’m scared to bring another child into it. It’s not like this baby is asking to be born,” I said. “We’re going to bring him or her into a family filled with lots of love, to be sure, but also the guarantee of so much hardship with Henry’s illness. I just don’t know if that is the right thing to do.”
    Allen listened, but he didn’t share my concerns.
    â€œLaurie, you don’t have to take all that on right now. Henry is going to be fine. And our next baby is going to be healthy. And lucky. You know how much we love Henry? That’s how much we’re going to love the next one, too,” he responded.
    In the end, I felt strongly that choosing to have another child meant that Allen and I were committing to surviving, even if Henry didn’t, and it wasn’t long before we arrived at our decision: We were going to have another child. Although we hoped our second child would be an HLA match to Henry, our main concern was that he or she would be healthy.
    A few days later, during a walk through the neighborhood with Henry, I confided in my mom. “Allen and I talked about it. We’re going to have another baby after Henry’s heart surgery is over. I really want to have more kids,” I explained. “I don’t want to let Fanconi take that away from me too.”
    â€œLaurie, I’m so happy to hear that,” my mom said. “I want youto have more kids. You should. You were meant to be a mother. You’re a great mother. And any child of yours is one lucky kid.”
    â€œBut I’m scared,” I confessed. “I don’t know what I’ll do if that child has Fanconi, if I could live through that again. Knowing what’s ahead of us, and what Henry faces… it’s so hard.”
    My mom stopped walking and took my hand in hers. “Laurie, you will do whatever you have to do. When you were just a year and a half old, Grandma said to me, ‘That one has something special,’ and you do.”
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    B efore I got pregnant again, I needed to survive Henry’s open-heart surgery. Actually, I needed Henry to survive Henry’s open-heart surgery. I knew that I wouldn’t be able to sleep or eat while I sat in a waiting room worrying about whether Henry would make it through his time on a heart-lung machine and the recovery from his surgery. If I did get pregnant right away, I wanted to make sure our new baby was developing in the healthiest prenatal environment possible. Also, I knew I couldn’t simultaneously handle the trauma of Henry’s heart surgery while waiting for, and processing, prenatal test results that would tell us if our second child also had Fanconi