HOUSTON – You may start seeing more friends, family and loved ones of people with Down syndrome sporting a tattoo with three arrows.
It's a global trend among people in the Down syndrome community. The arrows have a lot of symbolism. For example, there’s three of them which represent the third copy of the 21st chromosome that people with Down syndrome have.
For World Down Syndrome Day, an awareness day for the genetic disorder, Jackson Horn’s family got inked.
“He's 7 years old right now, still is very nonverbal,” his dad, Brian Ainsley Horn, explained some of his son’s learning delays.
“I knew Jackson was going to be fine, but it was heartbreaking to see your adult child in tears,” grandmother, Shary Horn, said.
Brian was the one crying at his son Jackson’s birth, because Down syndrome was not what he planned for.
“It was going to be nothing like what I originally thought of when I had my, you know, what I always dreamed of having a son,” Horn said.
But just like the tattoo, the sting lessened in time and Brian beams with pride when talking about how far Jackson has come since his infancy in the NICU to being voted class president of his kindergarten class.
The tattoo represents what every loved one of someone with Down syndrome understands. “The arrowheads symbolize that before you can launch forward you have to be pulled back,” Brian Horn said. “You know that was the whole experience with down syndrome. It is extremely hard at first, but after you get past that point it's an amazing journey.”
The Horn family went to Flying Squid in the Heights for their tattoo.
You can search the hashtag "the lucky few tattoo" on social media to see people around the world jumping on this trend.
