Reconstructing Life Goals After the Birth of a Child With Down Syndrome: Finding Happiness and Growing

Abstract

Parents of children with Down Syndrome (DS; N = 87) wrote about current goals and goals they had before they learned their child would have DS (lost goals) and completed measures of salience of the narrative, subjective well-being (SWB), and stress-related growth. Independent raters scored the narratives on levels of elaboration. We conducted a follow-up study 2 years later (N = 42)) using the SWB and stress-related growth measures. There was an association between investing in current goals and heightened SWB, whereas salience of lost goals related weakly to reduced SWB. However, in the follow-up study, there was an association between investing in lost goals and increased stress-related growth. These results suggest that hopes for the future enhance SWB, whereas over time considering loss relates to increased feelings of personal growth. Growth and well-being may be independent of each other.