My grandson has Down syndrome. Here's what the Ridgway abortion decision gets wrong.
My grandson has Down syndrome. He’s tenderhearted, affectionate, hilarious, and content with the simplest things. I honestly can’t imagine life without him, which is why the recent and very public decision by Jesse and Ashley Ridgway to abort their baby after prenatal testing revealed markers associated with Down syndrome left me deeply grieved.
The reasoning was familiar. The child’s life would likely be difficult. They wanted to spare everyone involved from suffering.
As a parent and grandparent, I understand that desire. Every parent wants to protect their child from pain. But this story makes me wonder: when did the possibility of suffering become our measure of whether a life is worth beginning?
I think we should take a closer look at that assumption. It’s become so embedded in our cultural thinking that we rarely stop to question it — and the consequences of leaving it unexamined are far greater than most people realize.
Every child will suffer. That’s not cynicism. It’s reality.
Some children will be teased because of a disability. Others will be mocked because of their appearance. Some will battle anxiety, depression, addiction, betrayal, loneliness, or grief. Some will experience devastating illnesses. Others will bury friends far too soon.
One of the greatest illusions of modern life is the belief that we can engineer suffering out of existence if we make all the right choices. We can’t.
The physically healthy and neurotypical child may one day break a parent’s heart. The child diagnosed with challenges may become the greatest source of joy in a family’s life. The future belongs to God, not us.
And here’s what the cultural logic almost never considers: the suffering that most devastates families is rarely the kind that shows up on a prenatal screening.
We have tests for chromosomal differences, but there’s no test for the teenager who will battle depression so severe it takes their life. No scan reveals the child who will struggle with addiction, the young adult who will disappear into isolation, or the person who will carry wounds so deep they never fully heal.
We can’t screen for heartbreak.
Which means the logic of sparing a child from suffering by ending their life before it begins applies only to the suffering we think we can see coming. The rest — which is most of it — arrives without warning, regardless of what we choose.
The data bears this out in a way our culture hasn’t fully reckoned with. Deaths of despair — suicide, overdose, and deaths driven by hopelessness — have more than doubled in the United States over the past two decades, becoming by 2021 the fifth leading cause of death in the country. Not among people with Down syndrome. Among neurotypical people who, by every measurable standard, had the kind of life we thought was worth protecting. The chromosomes we screen for aren’t what determine whether a person finds life worth living. Hope does. Purpose does. Love does. And none of those show up on a prenatal test.
Meanwhile, a landmark study published in the American Journal of Medical Genetics found that 99% of people with Down syndrome reported being happy with their lives—a finding consistently confirmed by subsequent research, including a 2023 systematic review of quality-of-life studies spanning four decades.
Those statistics don’t erase the real challenges associated with the condition. But they do expose how poorly our cultural assumptions predict the actual experience of living. We rarely stop to ask people with Down syndrome whether they’re glad to be alive. We assume we already know the answer.
But God’s answer is different.
He declares that each of us was “fearfully and wonderfully made” — knit together by Him before birth (Psalm 139:13-14). That declaration doesn’t come with an asterisk for chromosomal differences. The Christian worldview offers something our culture desperately needs: a framework for suffering that neither denies its reality nor treats it as the final word.
It doesn’t promise a pain-free life. It promises a Savior who enters our pain before He asks us to endure it. Scripture teaches that suffering, for the believer, can become a place of profound intimacy with Christ. God brings beauty from ashes. He redeems what seems irredeemable. And He promises that death and sorrow won’t have the final word.
That hope changes everything — including how we evaluate human life.
Because if suffering is the measure of whether a life is worth living, none of us can pass the test. Every one of us will suffer. Every one of us will disappoint and be disappointed. Every one of us will experience loss we didn’t choose and pain we can’t prevent.
Suffering doesn’t disqualify life. It’s part of it.
The question isn’t whether suffering will come. The question is whether there’s hope powerful enough to meet us when it does.
Teasi Cannon is an author, speaker, and host of the True Comfort Podcast. She is a lifelong learner who is passionate about helping others cultivate a sound and enduring devotion to Jesus.
Teasi holds a B.S. in Interdisciplinary Studies from Middle Tennessee State University School of Education and Behavioral Science, an M.A. in Pastoral Counseling from Liberty Theological Seminary, and a certificate in Christian Apologetics from Southern Evangelical Seminary. She is a board member with BeEmboldened, a non-profit that provides support in the prevention of and healing from harmful religious experiences.
Teasi lives south of Nashville, Tennessee with her husband and best friend Bill. They have three amazing children who all grew up far too quickly, a wonderful son- and daughter-in-love, and the most precious grandchildren the world has ever seen. For more about Teasi, check out her website at www.teasicannon.com .
