193: Down Syndrome and Mormonism with Kathryn Soper Part 2

Mormon Stories Podcast

Dr. John Dehlin

Religion & Spirituality

4.5 • 5.7K Ratings

🗓️ 26 September 2010

⏱️ 45 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Kathy Soper is a mother of seven, memoirist, essayist, editor, nonprofit CEO, practicing Mormon, depression survivor, Down syndrome advocate, Greek-blooded American, Maryland-bred Utah transplant, WordTwist addict and BSG groupie. She has edited numerous books, including Dance With Them: 30 Stumbling Mothers Catch Glimpses of Grace and The Mother in Me: anthologies of personal essays and poetry written by mothers about the challenges and joys of mothering. She is the editor of Gifts: Mothers Reflect on How Children With Down Syndrome Enrich Their Lives and Gifts 2: How People with Down Syndrome Enrich the World. Kathy is also the editor-in-chief of Segullah: Writings by Latter-day Saint Women, which is a print journal dedicated to encouraging literary talent and promoting greater faith and understanding among Latter-day Saint women as well as a blog. Kathy’s most recent book, The Year My Son and I Were Born, is a memoir of the transformations Kathy underwent the year after her son Thomas was born with Down Syndrome. Kathy’s website (http://kathrynlynardsoper.com/) says that it’s a story about coming to terms with being human and learning how to deal with hard surprises.

Transcript

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0:00.0	Mormon Stories podcast takes a ton of work and depends solely upon the listener's support.
0:05.0	To keep this program alive, please consider a donation today at MormonStories.org.
0:18.0	Wow, okay, so take us back a little bit to,
0:21.0	hmm, before Thomas was born, I guess.
0:24.0	Was there anything, was there anything noteworthy or unusual about the pregnancy
0:29.0	other than that you already had six kids? Like, that's noteworthy to me. That's like salute worthy for me.
0:36.0	Did it feel like there was anything unusual about it?
0:40.0	Yeah, yeah, in fact, I don't think this had anything to do with him having dumps in Durham.
0:47.0	I think it was because it was my seventh pregnancy, but it was by far my hardest pregnancy.
0:54.0	I was exhausted beyond exhaustion.
0:59.0	You know, that first trimester, a lot of women just get this, this bone deep fatigue.
1:06.0	And I had had that with all of my pregnancies, but with Thomas, it was,
1:11.0	it was just exponentially more where I felt my body just struggling.
1:20.0	It's like I could hear my own body fighting to create this new body and keep myself awake and alive and moving at the same time.
1:34.0	Wow.
1:35.0	And I, in fact, had a really strong impression early on in the pregnancy when I was kind of berating myself for not being able to do anything.
1:47.0	You know, I couldn't even walk up the stairs without pausing to rest several times.
1:52.0	And the thought that just kind of came to me, it was like myself talking to myself.
1:57.0	And the message was, okay, we can grow this baby as long as we don't have to do anything else.
2:06.0	And that's kind of how it was throughout the pregnancy.
2:11.0	I was very limited in my day-to-day functioning.
2:14.0	I wasn't ill.
	...

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