CARRIE McCoy says she tries not to judge people too harshly for ignorance about Down's Syndrome.

It had been a surprise when her daughter, Abigail, now three, was born with the condition and she admits it was overwhelming at first.

"A lot of people first of all say 'sorry'," said Mrs McCoy, who also has a six-year-old son and a daughter aged one. "I think people trying to be well-meaning, so I try not to judge people too harshly because a few years ago I didn't know any better myself.

"I had a mindset when Abigail was born of 'she won't achieve things, she might not live to be very old' - now with experience, I realise that's not the case."

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Mrs McCoy said her experience of health professionals had been mostly positive until she switched to a new GP after the family moved from Glasgow to Cambuslang.

"It was my first appointment and I was actually there to see about my little boy, not about Abigail," said Mrs McCoy, 40. "We'd just moved house and he'd got a bit stressed out by the upheaval, so I went to talk to the GP about it.

"She was an older woman, late 50s, early 60s.

"She said to me something like 'I can see why you're neurotic having a daughter like her in your life', referring to Abigail, and suggested that that's why I was really there. I thought 'you don't really have the right to say that she makes my life difficult'."

Read: Parents reveal how having a daughter with Down's Syndrome has enriched their lives 

The Herald:

Mrs McCoy, who coordinates sports development for schools, said she is sometimes frustrated when her mother-in-law refers to Abigail as a "Down's baby", and that one of the parents at Abigail's nursery had made some "unhelpful comments".

She said: "It was a mother who maybe wasn't that well-educated herself, and just assumed that Abigail wouldn't understand anything, that she was stupid, that there was no point in speaking to her directly.

"It was as if she wasn't a 'real person'.

"I think we just need more awareness in general of what people with special needs can achieve. I think sometimes the focus is too much on what they can't do.

"A lot of people will say to me things like 'my goodness, your daughter's beautiful' - I think that shocks them, that someone with special needs can look pretty."