On October 13, 2011, Jacquelyn K. Hendershot was born, and my life was to change forever. After 10 years of infertility and 5 pregnancy losses I was finally a mom. The pregnancy was rough, and I was hospitalized from 26 weeks fighting for my and my daughter’s life. During my high-risk pregnancy, I opted to take the prenatal testing because of my age, and I will never forget that phone call. I was at work when the nurse called to tell me the results which predicted that my baby was high risk for Trisomy 18. I never did any other testing after that one.
As soon as Jackie was delivered, via c-section, she was rushed immediately to the NICU because she was premature at 33 weeks. It wasn’t until the second night that a doctor came into my room and basically stated they suspected she has Down Syndrome, they took blood, and the results would take about a week and just walked out of the room. All of my doctors visited with Jackie in the NICU because everyone was so vested in my care and were so shocked by this diagnosis that no one believed this to be true. But I will never forget the day we were called into the NICU, and all these nurses and doctors surrounded my daughter and at this time the doctor confirmed that Jacquelyn was born with Trisomy 21.
I was more freaked out with being surrounded by everyone than the diagnosis itself and one of the doctors came over to us and said how he felt sorry for us with dealing with infertility for so long and then having a disabled child. From day one I never focused on my daughter’s disability to me she was my baby, my child, my daughter and that is how I was going to raise her as.
Jackie is a happy child and always has been, she is very social, outgoing, compassionate and just loves life. People seem attracted to her spirit and she always ends up the center of attention. Life has been challenging and not easy for my daughter, since birth she has undergone surgical procedures every year of her life. We have been making monthly visits to the Children’s Hospital locations for doctor appointments, therapies, testing and surgical procedures. Trisomy 21 or Down Syndrome is a lifelong disability that affects a person mentally, physically, behaviorally, and health wise with no cure but constant treatments, medications, bloodwork, therapies, schedules, and procedures.
Jackie has had biopsies done to test for Hirsh Brung disease, several ear tubes inserted, several removal surgeries of the ear tubes, tonsils and adenoids removed (twice), an audio brain stem test done, and dental work. Jackie has also been wearing some form of orthotics in her shoes since she started walking and she can only wear good sneakers for support. In 2019 Jackie was hospitalized with pneumonia for 10 days and prior to that there was many middle of the night trips to the ER for croup/strider episodes. We also deal with several sinus infections throughout the year due to her small nose and when she was an infant I was always dealing with her runny nose and rosy cheeks.
Jackie is a very active child, so I need to keep her busy and occupied so she is involved in a variety of activities which include baseball, soccer, swimming, horseback riding, summer camp, bike camp, and cheerleading. Jackie enjoys going for walks with her dog Edy and the two of them play for hours. Jackie is a superstar; she has had her picture in the local papers many times and even was on the local news station when they did a story about her and visiting with Santa Claus. This year Jackie and Edy’s picture was chosen out of thousands that were submitted to be displayed on September 18th on the two adjacent Clear Channel Jumbotron screens in Times Square and be live streamed online. The sky is the limit for my Jacquelyn!