Maria Eftimiades, a reporter for People Magazine, wrote in Tuesday’s Washington Post about her very personal story of ending her pregnancy after a Down Syndrome diagnosis.

I have never needed to face such difficult circumstances, as God blessed us with two healthy girls. Because of that and what I write here, I’m sure I’ll be blasted for my insensitivity, my holier-than-thou attitude, my inability to empathize with a difficult decision that has no easy answers.

I plead guilty to a lack of empathy, and I’ve certainly had my share of insensitivity. If I come across as arrogant, I apologize. I’m not sorry for having convictions about the value of human life. However difficult Ms. Eftimiades’ decision may have been, there were a few things that bothered me. She wrote:
While I have no doubt there can be joys and victories in raising a mentally handicapped child, for me and for Mike, it’s a painful journey that we believe is better not taken. To know now that our son would be retarded, perhaps profoundly, gives us the choice of not continuing the pregnancy. We don’t want a life like that for our child, and the added worry that we wouldn’t be around long enough to care for him throughout his life.

. . . I’m quite certain that I made the right choice for the three of us.

---

Books Written By Maria Eftimiades

Sins of the Mother
by Maria Eftimiades, Maria Eftimades
3.64 avg rating — 14 ratings — published 1995
My rating:

Lethal Lolita A true story of sex, scandal and deadly obsession
by Maria Eftimiades
2.93 avg rating — 15 ratings — published 1992 — 2 editions
My rating:

Secrets from the Grave
by Maria Eftimiades
3.17 avg rating — 6 ratings — published 1998
My rating:

Garden of Graves
by Maria Eftimiades
He was a beloved family physician and a ruthless doctor of death who almost got away with murder.
It was a friendly hunting trip– two men kicking back, shooting at clay pigeons on campgrounds near rural Montrose, Pa. Then, a single shot rang out. Moments later, Marty Dillon, a promising young lawyer, was dead of a gunshot wound to the chest. His friend, Dr. Stephen Scher, later tearfully explained that Dillon had been running with a shotgun after a porcupine, and tripped and fell, accidentally killing himself. But what really happened?

Marty Dillon’s violent death was immediately declared an accident by the local coroner in 1976. But as Dillon’s body was lowered into the cold ground, did a damning secret, one that would haunt his friends and family for decades, go with him?
3.00 avg rating — 5 ratings — published 1993 — 2 editions
My rating:

My Name Is Katherine
by Maria Eftimiades, Maria Eftimiades
2.67 avg rating — 3 ratings — published 1993
My rating:

My Name Is Katherine
by Maria Eftimiades, Maria Eftimiades
2.67 avg rating — 3 ratings — published 1993

Sins Of The Mother
by Maria Eftimiades
0.00 avg rating — 0 ratings
My rating:

Lolita
by Maria Efatimiades, Maria Eftimiades
0.00 avg rating — 0 ratings — published 1992

Maria Eftimiades, a journalist for more than a decade, is was the New York City bureau chief for People magazine. Maria Eftimiades has also written five books including Sins of the Mother, The Susan Smith Story and Lethal Lolita, The Amy Fisher Story. Maria Eftimiades has worked as a reporter, columnist and community editor for the New York Times, New York Newsday, Stamford Advocate, Bergen Record and Dallas Morning News. Maria Eftimiades

Books written by Maria Eftimiades

Garden of Graves: The Deadly Passion of the Long Island Serial Killer
by Maria Eftimiades

Lethal Lolita: A True Story of Sex, Scandal and Deadly Obsession
by Maria Eftimiades

My Name Is Katherine: The True Story of Katie Beers, the Little Girl Who Survived an Underground Dungeon of Horror
by Maria Eftimiades , Joe Treen

Secrets from the Grave
by Maria Eftimiades

Sins of the Mother
by Maria Eftimiades