Do People Know?

I guess when I think about my daughter, I just see my daughter, I mean I know she has Down Syndrome, everyone knows she has Down Syndrome, or do they?  Sometimes I think people have no idea.  I can't tell you how ofter we get stopped and told, "She is so adorable," "Her glasses are so cute." "How old is she?" Then when I say 18 months, you can see the surprise in their faces, "She is so tiny for 18 months."  I usually just say, "yup she's petite, or our little peanut," and leave it at that.  I guess I think about that a lot especially when we are out.  Do they know she has Down Syndrome? Not that it matters. 
I remember last year being in Disney World with her, I felt like noone noticed, noone knew.  Then I would hear little rude comments, because apparently people think when you have a special needs child that you are deaf.  One woman who was pregnant said how cute my daughter was and her husband said "She obviously didn't take care of herself during her pregnancy, there is something wrong with that baby!"  At that moment I think I had an out of body experience.  I went up to them both, and I said to the woman "you are right my baby is cute, but sir you are wrong there is nothing wrong with my daughter, she has Down Syndrome and I did everything I was supposed to do during my pregnancy, nothing I did caused her to have this disorder." The woman apologized for her husband's rude remarks and he didn't say a word, perhaps he was too taken back that I actually said something to him, who knows.
So from that moment on I realized it doesn't matter what anyone thinks of her, her family loves her and that is all that will ever matter.