Passing on genetic conditions

ralphc1

ralphc1

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If you or your family has a history of a detrimental genetic condition, do you risk passing it on by having children?

I went to high school with a couple of girls who had a brother with cerebral palsy. There was a history of the disorder in males on their mother's side of the family. One of the girls decided that she didn't want to take the chance of passing on the condition by having biological children. This was back in the early 1960s.

Thalidomide also caused many birth defects and it appears that some can be passed on to offspring.

Dwarfism seems to cause a lot of problems for those who have it and it may or may not be passed on genetically.

On a Shriner's hospital ad I see a woman with no arms using her feet to comb the hair of a boy with no arms. I assumed it was her child but there was no mention of it.

I think it would weight quite heavily on my mind and would certainly be considered.
 
ralphc1 said:
If you or your family has a history of a detrimental genetic condition, do you risk passing it on by having children?

I went to high school with a couple of girls who had a brother with cerebral palsy. There was a history of the disorder in males on their mother's side of the family. One of the girls decided that she didn't want to take the chance of passing on the condition by having biological children. This was back in the early 1960s.

Thalidomide also caused many birth defects and it appears that some can be passed on to offspring.

Dwarfism seems to cause a lot of problems for those who have it and it may or may not be passed on genetically.

On a Shriner's hospital ad I see a woman with no arms using her feet to comb the hair of a boy with no arms. I assumed it was her child but there was no mention of it.

I think it would weight quite heavily on my mind and would certainly be considered.
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Cerebral Palsy isn't genetic, it's one of those accident of birth things. My older sister has it, and she's the only person on our family history to have it. Sounds like your friend had a really unlucky family.

Edit: Looks like 2% of cases are deemed genetic, I never knew that. Both parents need to be carriers apparently.
 
My wife has EDS and may have passed it on to our kids.

It's likely that we will be able to assuage the symptoms with proper implementation if exercise. It's possible that we may not.

It wasn't really something we considered. She loves life and can manage the pain and you hope for the best.

There is a pretty solid cure for genetic conditions with specific responsible genes coming out atm so it shouldn't be too much of an issue 10-20 yrs from now.
 
irish_thug said:
Cerebral Palsy isn't genetic, it's one of those accident of birth things. My older sister has it, and she's the only person on our family history to have it. Sounds like your friend had a really unlucky family.

Edit: Looks like 2% of cases are deemed genetic, I never knew that. Both parents need to be carriers apparently.
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It doesn't matter if it's actually genetic or not but if you think it you could pass it on.
 
ralphc1 said:
It doesn't matter if it's actually genetic or not but if you think it you could pass it on.
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So it's not about what genetics you identify with, not the ones you actually have? What a time to be alive.
 
Well, on the plus side my kids would would be really, really, really good looking. But there's a chance they'd inherit my poor eye sight and excema.
 
Hemophilia runs in my family. It wasn't actually diagnosed until my parents moved to Canada - prior to that, people would just say "He's a bleeder".

I can't exactly remember how it is passed along, but I don't think my kids would have it as it passed along the X chromosone (mother to son). However, my daughters will carry the hemophilia gene (but not actually have the disease), so her sons have a 50% chance of getting it.

Truth be told, it has never affected me - I played sports, lift weights, did martial arts etc. The one consideration is that before any surgery, I have to receive a clotting factor to prevent excessive bleeding. I didn't know how serious the disease was until I went to a Hemophelia fund raising event. They read out a list of people that passed away that year from clotting related complications, and it was a sobering experience. Some people can't even do day to day activities without the risk of bruising/bleeding.
 
irish_thug said:
So it's not about what genetics you identify with, not the ones you actually have? What a time to be alive.
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It's about what you know at the time. Maybe down the road the information is different.
 
pcptornado said:
Well, on the plus side my kids would would be really, really, really good looking. But there's a chance they'd inherit my poor eye sight and excema.
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Given the two part statement, perhaps you aren't so great looking and it's more part b?
 
My wife has an extra wife blood vessel in her kidney and we watch out for what that could mean for the kids, improper blood filtration and the like. She also may have a clotting factor disorder (prone to clots) that hasn't shown up in the kids.

These as things you freak out about no matter who you are. We lost out first daughter to a fatal mutation and then was told by doctors our son was going to have Down's (misread test results.) You know what I was worrying about after my kids had the all clear? Fucking everything else.

If we had a significant chance of a severe defect, it's something you have to look at, of course.
 
My future children are in for a treat: Eczema, asthma, food allergies, balding...I should adopt lol.
 
Brampton_Boy said:
Hemophilia runs in my family. It wasn't actually diagnosed until my parents moved to Canada - prior to that, people would just say "He's a bleeder".

I can't exactly remember how it is passed along, but I don't think my kids would have it as it passed along the X chromosone (mother to son). However, my daughters will carry the hemophilia gene (but not actually have the disease), so her sons have a 50% chance of getting it.

Truth be told, it has never affected me - I played sports, lift weights, did martial arts etc. The one consideration is that before any surgery, I have to receive a clotting factor to prevent excessive bleeding. I didn't know how serious the disease was until I went to a Hemophelia fund raising event. They read out a list of people that passed away that year from clotting related complications, and it was a sobering experience. Some people can't even do day to day activities without the risk of bruising/bleeding.
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You have english royalty somewhere in your bloodline then.
 
A friend of mines ex has Huntingtons disease which his father died from and her son now has it. Pretty sad and like a 50/50 shot that it'll be passed on to your kids.
 
jefferz said:
You have english royalty somewhere in your bloodline then.
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Or inbreeding....

And unless white royalty was secretly getting some brown sugar love during colonial times, I'm pretty sure I'm just a commoner.
 
Brampton_Boy said:
Or inbreeding....

And unless white royalty was secretly getting some brown sugar love during colonial times, I'm pretty sure I'm just a commoner.
Click to expand...

The English royalty was diddling anything and everything back then.
 
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