i recently, i’ve been able to spend some time with a person who had down syndrome. A few things i’ve noticed. First, some numbers. One in 800 births results in down syndrome. So there are many people with this. More detailed birth results? The average risk of having a child with trisomy 21 is 1/750 live births. Mothers in their early twenties have a risk of 1/1,500 and women over 35 have a risk factor of 1/70, which jumps to 1/25 for women 45 or older.
Read wikipedia for details on the chromosome problems that cause it. Now back to the girl Nimi.
Nimi, this particular girl knows two (2) languages. I think is pretty impressive. Her main caretaker says she is losing one of the languages, I asked if it was possible Alzheimers disease. As for her dual languages, you cannot know this easily, it’s very difficult to only in certain situations, will she speak one of the languages? languages. And yes, even her family member cannot really force her to just start speaking the other language. But in certain conditions, she will speak the other language just fine.
Today the caretaker told me some peculiars. The girl, or woman, she is 52 years old, she will take her trash out of her room daily. Taking the trash out of of her room, without being told, is impressive to me. She has learned behaviors that she does every day and will not forget them. But they need to be repeated, like all of us. Her room is very organized and shee likes it that way, she will help clean up the table after dinner. In general, she likes order in her life. Don’t we all? She (her name is Nimi) will feed the dogs if told to do so. She will not feed the dogs unless someone directs her to do so.
Even somewhat simple task requires someone to watch her, it depends on the task. The woman, Nimi, will drift off and not finish some tasks. Nimi will constantly, about 15 times a day, as if her cousin is coming over. Her cousin has not visited in several weeks, but every day, Nimi asks about her cousin possibly visiting, and she really wants this and can not be told that this will not happen. So in a hour, she asks again. And more asks, throughout the day. I am a visitor and am not with her often yet she is friendly to me most always. As her caretaker says, Nimi is in her own world. And with explanations, she can often make her own decisions. Nimi appears often to enjoy life, making herself laugh, perhaps enjoying life more so than a normal person.? She will sometimes cry and get upset about her father being gone (her father is deceased). Obviously she knows what it is to be loved and to love, and is mindful of relationships.
i’m sure you’ve seen homeless people talking to themselves right ? This particular down syndrome lady will also start talking to herself , particularly when she is left out of conversation. It just seems something that is part of being human.That we will talk even to ourselves if there’s no other choice.
Nimi the down syndrome adult, she will notice things but she will not make eye contact and focus on them sometimes. For whatever reason, her brain is often completely fine with the blurry peripheral picture. Often only uses peripheral to look at something with her peripheral vision, and that’s enough for her to know what’s going on. And maybe start laughing at a situation, or you know, understand that there is something going on that she needs to move away from or whatever. And she never makes eye contact , in some of those instances. I don’t think this is something trained that she has a trained behavior ; I think this is just the way her mind works. Something about focus, focusing on things for down syndrome people is is a little bit different than everyone else. We want to focus on things. Normal people want to see these things better. But the down syndrome, people don’t seem to always need to do that. Perhaps because it just takes more energy, maybe it’s a little tiresome. I don’t know what it is. For sure there’s mysteries here
.
spending the time with this person definitely has changed my mind, i have a different perception of average down syndrome person.
copyright 2026 Rod Deluhery
crypto_voyage 