My husband has a degenerative eye condition, and we were under the impression it was recessive, but when my son was 8 months and I was two months pregnant with #2, we found it was dominant. It was so surprising to the medical team they had us do a second blood sample and a second test, on them. No mistake.

It went from being a 1/4000 chance of my son having it to 1/2. And ½ for baby #2. There is a 75% chance one of my kids will have it, up from the .05% chance that we expected. We are waiting on genetic testing for my son, and will get it

So I get handling the idea of big “what if’s.” And the way I handle it is: Would I really have done anything differently? Would I really have used a donor sperm? There is no type of in vitro test for this (or autism), so it would have been all or nothing. Yes, I’m petrified of my children going blind like their dad, but their dad has a wonderful life, and I wanted to have children with him.

It will be what it will be. I can’t change it now— it was decided when the sperm met the egg. All o can do is love my babies and help them with whatever challenges they face, and stay on top of the progress of treatments and proactive preparations.