When Joel and Ellen Sefransky announced their decision to adopt an Armenian with Down Syndrome, they were met with a common reaction: |
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The Connecticut couple just shrugged and moved on. “Normal” was not a word anyone had used to describe them ― not since they had given birth to their fifth child at the seasoned age of 47, anyway. John had been prenatally diagnosed with Down Syndrome and a heart defect, terrifying their doctors.
“Despite being reminded too often of our option to abort, we told them not to ask again and we are going to have the baby,” Ellen says. “Our son John is the love of our entire family.”
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The positive experience of parenting a son with Down Syndrome made Ellen think deeply. What about other kids like John around the world? Did they all have parents and resources and education and healthcare available to them, like their boy did?
After finding Reece’s Rainbow, Ellen knew for certain that the answer was no.
“I looked at children with Down Syndrome often,” she admits. “I cried and thought how innocent and how unbelievably bad their lives would be compared to my biological son.”
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John had everything: parents who provided for his every need, four doting siblings, school, church, a community that welcomed him. Why couldn’t they offer those things to another child in the same genetic boat? |
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“We are ‘doing it’ for John; why not throw another into the mix?” she thought. |
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So Ellen and Joel found an 11-year-old girl with Down Syndrome in Armenia. Their first question: where was that?
Ellen had never been out of North America before. But with a new passport in hand, she flew to the former Soviet territory that borders Turkey, Georgia, Azerbaijan and Iran. After discussions with the in-country team, it became apparent that the girl would not be a good fit with the Sefransky family. “But we have this boy Davit…”
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Davit was code-named “Christian” on Reece’s Rainbow, a nine-year-old with Down Syndrome. He was very proud of his name (the Armenian equivalent to David) and wanted to keep it.
That was no problem for his new mama.
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“I do feel that I was called to get him,” she says. “I tried to fight the feeling, but it kept coming, and either I was going to stop looking…and say when I die, ‘Yeah God, well, I didn’t feel like it,’ or I was going to commit. I committed.” |
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The Sefranskys brought Davit home in 2018, their two youngest sons immediately becoming best buds.
“I wake to the sound of two boys playing in their bedroom, having fun,” Ellen says. “John and Dav are bonded.”
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Davit, as it turns out, had unexpected athleticism. He had never played ― or even seen ― any sports in Armenia, but he was soon dribbling a basketball down the court, kicking a soccer ball across the field, swimming in a pool, tossing a Frisbee on the lawn and skating down the sidewalk in America.
“He will try anything. There is no fear of looking foolish,” Ellen says. “He doesn’t care a rat’s butt what others think.”
That’s an outlook Ellen has borrowed occasionally, advocating for Davit and John at school and in social situations. Parenting children with special needs has changed her, she admits. It’s not always fun, per se ― like when she attended a girls’ lacrosse tournament in Maryland just hours after getting off the plane from Armenia and wanted to vomit at the materialistic excess she saw in the States.
“I wanted to scream from the top of my lungs, ‘Your daughter doesn’t need another hoodie that will be at the Goodwill in six months, but I know where a child needs shoes, toys, a mom,” she says. “’You can forgo that excess and send $50 to help these voiceless children!’”
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Twelve-year-old Davit, at least, is voiceless no more. |
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“That is why my husband said yes,” Ellen says. “We search our souls for our true joy as humans.”
And they find it in Davit’s chocolate-brown eyes, all too happy to discard “normal” for something far better: family.
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Crystal Kupper is a freelance writer specializing in magazines and special projects. Since earning her journalism degree, she has written for clients such as Zondervan, Focus on the Family and the Salvation Army, among many others. |
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REECE'S RAINBOW | www.reecesrainbow.org |
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