How We Managed Our Down Syndrome Son

•LAGOS Doctor, SEYI ROBERTS’ Wife, Dr. ALERO Explains

Dr. Alero Roberts is a Consultant in Public Health. She is also a Senior Lecturer in Maternal and Child Health at the College of Medicine, University of Lagos (CMUL). She is the wife of popular Lagos Doctor and renowned Neurologist, Seyi Roberts. Dr. Alero was at the beginning of her career when her first child, Damola, was born with Down’s Syndrome in 1985. When she found she was struggling to meet the special needs of her son, combined with being on call day and night, she made up her mind to raise the boy the best way she could. When she had to, she put everything on hold to devote time to Damola. Her selflessness has paid off in the fact that today, he is a 5-time gold medal winner in swimming in the Special Olympics!

It all dates back to 1985 when Damola was born to two medical doctors, Dr. and Dr. (Mrs.) Seyi Roberts. As he grew up, his parents discovered he could not walk, talk or do many things like his mates. After diagnosis, Damola was confirmed to be a Down Syndrome patient, meaning he will remain intellectually disabled. To encourage other women and further sensitize people on how Down Syndrome can be managed, Dr. Alero was a guest speaker at the just concluded 2022 Arise Women Conference where she spoke about intellectual disability. She says.

“My name is Dr. Alero Roberts, I was invited to give a talk on intellectual disability. There is a reason why I am called and there is a reason why this is my topic. I am the mother of the only Nigerian man who has 5 gold medals in swimming at international swimming conferences, starting in Athens in 2011, Los Angeles in 2015, Abu Dhabi in 2019. He is training now to go to Berlin next year to carry the flag again! This fact was attested to by the Nigeria Stock Exchange when they came back from Los Angeles in 2015. Adedamola Roberts was born 36 years ago, I had just graduated in Medicine, my husband is also a doctor, a Neurologist, he actually trained in Harvard so this was a child born with intellectual disability, Down’s Syndrome to 2 doctors! His grandfather is also a doctor, the first West African Radio Therapist Oncologist, his aunties on both sides are doctors, uncles on both sides are doctors, who better should God have sent this child than into a family of doctors? In 1985, we could not even diagnose Down’s Syndrome in Nigeria, my husband took one look at him and he knew I was still a baby Doctor, I suspected. My father had no clue, his own is Cancer, Down’s Syndrome is not his forte! So, we took off to the Great Ormond Street Hospital and the diagnosis was made and they asked me, ‘what services do you have in Nigeria for this child? Why not leave him in an institution here? He is your first child, leave him here, go home and start again.’ I should bring a baby to England and return to Nigeria without the baby? Who will I explain that to? I said, ‘Okay, I am coming’, they said, ‘he will never walk or talk, his is quite a severe case of Down Syndrome, and he is likely never to be continent of urine and faeces’, I said, ‘it’s okay’, I had been born again, 2 or 3 months after, this happened and I stood there in my usual, rather arrogant and very rude self, and shook my finger at God, and I said ‘God, you must have a purpose because this does not make sense to me. But having gone through Medical School, you will understand that there are many things that do not make sense if there is no God. How do you explain why some cells suddenly go hay wire and manifest as Malignant Cancer? How does a Zygote choose this one and not that one? Long story short, I brought Damola back, truly, no services were available in Nigeria, but I will tell you what was the good thing and the bad thing.

The family (nuclear and extended) rallied round, my friends divided themselves like the Red Sea, there were those on the left, the goats, and those on the right, the sheep. I moved over to the right, the goats, we saw each other from afar and we waved, some of them try to congratulate me now for Damola’s successes, I am not deceived. Damola started to grow and a cherished aunt of mine, many doctors will recall her name, Dr. Nana Folsscrab of blessed memory. My mother’s cousin, my father’s niece, and she said, ‘Alero, children teach themselves, hurry up and have more children, let him go through life, as if he does not have a disability, train him, discipline him, he will do what he can do and read up all you need to know about Down’s Syndrome,’

I got a lot of advice, good advice and bad advice, but Aunty Nana’s advice was sterling! Needless to say when she was alive, I took that advice, and it got to a stage for him to go to school and God in His infinite mercy, I subjected this to prayer. So, in reference to my prayer, God led me to a school and the proprietress of the school said, ‘I have never heard of this thing before, okay, let’s see how we will do it’. Unknown to me, behind my back, a few parents removed their children from that school, because my child had come to that school. And that proprietress, behind my back, fought Damola’s battle that if it will remain only Damola in the school, she is keeping him in the school. I bless God for her life till tomorrow. He went on to about class four and his siblings came after him, so they were born into an existing situation. They knew nothing else but a family with Damola as the oldest child and they fought his battles. Till tomorrow, they fight his battles. They raise money for Special Olympics because that is what he does now. I got useful advice from Christian brethren, ‘if you can pray and fast, let me take you here, let me take you there, you can just wake up one day and God will just do a miracle and he will be alright’ and I said, ‘thank you, there is nothing wrong with him’. I got very helpful advice, ‘let’s go here, let’s go there.’

But, I stuck with God, I don’t know if there a power greater than God, has anybody met it? Do you know where it is? I know only God. God was present every step of the way! When he got to Primary 4, and the school could honestly no longer keep him, he was becoming disruptive and distracted. God so good, a classmate of mine, who also had a child affected by Autism, had opened a Children’s Developmental Centre in Surulere.

And she says, ‘Alero, it is a bit of an experiment, will you let Damola come? I said ‘okay’. I live in Ikoyi, I was going to Surulere everyday, so I started looking around Surulere, what can I do to keep myself busy so that when I drop him in the morning, I will keep myself busy and pick him up and come home. And I went back to my alma mater, College of Medicine, University of Lagos, and I started a Masters in Public Health, 23 years ago, after staying 14 years at home! And on that journey, I kept telling people, ‘I am not here for an academic career, ‘I am here for my son, so that I don’t get into trouble. That Masters led me to a job in the College of Medicine as a lecturer. They said, ‘if you are not going forward, you have to get out!’ So, I started going forward, I started my residency, I did the first exam, I did the second exam, and anytime the exams were getting too stressful, I will remember that my first job was Damola. Damola was in the CDC, he got into swimming, special olympics, they came and said they want to revive the Nigerian programme and want to take a team to Special Olympics International, I had never heard of it! They picked my son because they looked at his parents and they said , ‘oh, his parents have some money, they will buy him a ticket’. Damola went. That opened my eyes to a whole new area of engagement.

From Ireland, he went to Athens, 4 years later, Los Angeles, 4 years later, Abu Dhabi in 2019, swimming gold all the way! Silver and bronze came after, all from Abu Dhabi. This is me, this is intellectual disability! My entire life and career have been defined by intellectual disability. It is being differently abled because God has given each and every one of us a peculiar skill. Here we are today, ladies, arise and be all that God has called you to be. Thank you.”

-TAYO OYEDIJI

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