Sarah Palin — the former governor of Alaska, political commentator, author,
and reality TV star — shot to fame back in 2008 when the late John McCain selected her as his
vice-presidential candidate. After she gained overnight notoriety around the world, the media
soon turned their attention to Palin's family, including her daughter Bristol and ex-husband,
Todd, whom Palin divorced in 2020. But what is there to know about Palin's youngest child, Trig?
According to The Focus, Trig Paxson Van Palin was born on April 18, 2008, in Wasilla, Alaska.
He was born with Down syndrome and is the youngest child of the Palin family,
which includes siblings Track, Bristol, Willow, and Piper. Palin kept her pregnancy with Trig
a secret until her seventh month. Writing in her autobiography, Going Rogue, Palin
revealed that the day she went into labor with her youngest child, she had given a speech in Dallas
before getting on a flight back home to Alaska, where she eventually gave birth 20 hours later.
The former Alaska governor later told The New York Times that she and her husband decided not
to go public about the pregnancy partly because they needed time to absorb the fact that Trig
would be born with Down syndrome. Sarah Palin also said that at the time, she didn't want the
people in her state to worry about her ability to meet her responsibilities as governor — so
Palin said she decided to hide her pregnancy with larger blazers and fashion accessories,
until she felt it was safe to come clean to her family and a few close aides.
What they didn't reveal to many around them was Trig's diagnosis.
In fact, his brother and sisters didn't know that
Trig had Down syndrome until after he was born. As Willow Palin later told ABC News,
"So that was kind of a shock. But we didn't really care. He's still our brother."
Unfortunately, the silence only made it possible for critics to call Palin's story into question.
The Washington Post reported that there were rumors that Trig wasn't Sarah Palin's baby,
but was in fact her older daughter, Bristol's.
There were other reasons people questioned Trig Palin's parentage. As Insider reported,
observers called out holes in Sarah Palin's dramatic birth story, with some even accusing
the politician of faking her pregnancy. However, Palin dismissed the theories and
largely ignored the speculation throughout the 2008 presidential campaign. Palin was interviewed
by ABC News the year after Trig's birth and was asked whether she ever considered having
an abortion when learning of his Down syndrome diagnosis. The former governor told the network:
"I knew that the option was there."
Palin went on to add that, although she understands why people make that choice,
she believes that:
"Every child has purpose. There is destiny
for every child, and it can be good in our world. And that's what I held onto."
In 2010, Trig Palin appeared on the reality TV series Sarah Palin's Alaska,
which ran for one season until 2011 and centered on the Palin family's life in Alaska.
The cameras had stopped rolling when Trig started school in 2016, who was then 8 years old.
By 2018, the former governor opened up to WJLA, saying that Trig was calling the shots at home:
"The most challenging thing is trying not to look too far into the future and being
scared of what perhaps Trig would face. I'm just so thankful that he's got the big
extended family with his big brother and big sisters. He's always gonna be taken care of."
No one expects smooth sailing for Trig and his mom, but it was heartbreaking all the
same to hear that in March 2021, Palin told People that she and some of her children,
including 12-year-old Trig, had contracted COVID-19. In the statement,
Palin revealed that, after testing positive, she immediately went into isolation, writing,
"I then observed symptoms in my son Trig, who curiously is the most
enthusiastic mask-wearer, and after our numerous negative tests over the year,
he tested positive. Children with special needs are vulnerable to COVID ramifications."
Luckily, Trig and the rest of the Palin family seem to have recovered from the virus just fine.
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