Alana,

I agree with Ralph’s main premise, which is that if your mom had fewer ‘issues’ with the men who became your step-fathers, then you’d have less ‘issues’ with your upbringing and that these issues are affecting your advocacy against sperm donation. I’m not suggesting that your family is any more or less dysfunctional than any other family in the US, but I am thinking that your feelings about your current situation would be different if your ‘sperm donor’ was one of the men that your mom dated, lived with or married. Because he’s not, you get to fantasize or envision alternate possibilities that might not have been or might be.

Let’s do a thought experiment, a bit of envisioning about what might have been… Instead of reflecting on the past and thinking about a future that perhaps your biological father might have given you, think about what the adults in your life, at different phases of your childhood, might have given you.

Sure, your bio-father might have given you stability, right? On the other hand, there are plenty of bio-fathers (and step fathers, and boyfriends of mothers) that skip out..

Perhaps a bio-father, in a solid relationship with a mother (perhaps your mother), would be a better male role models. Right? Or, your mom (or any woman having a child) might choose a difficult man… or a series of difficult men. Chemistry in relationships being what they are, some men are more likeable, better people, more charitable, better role models, better father figures. But your mom and these men build relationships together… And, perhaps you would have had these same issues if she got pregnant with one of them and he was around and he was know to you..

Perhaps you would have received, in another alternate scenario, the love that some people get from a stable man in a good relationship with a stable woman… right? But sometime adults, whether they conceive via the fertility industry or not, aren’t very good at relationships… They’re not fantasy-stable. They’re just people.

While you could focus on your mom’s mistakes, especially her “BIG” mistake to conceive you via assisted fertility, you might also focus on normal teen and twenty-something stuff, like the fact that the adults in your life are imperfect. And that parents make good and bad decisions, about love, about relationships, about where to live, about all sorts of stuff related to themselves and their children.

But please don’t locate all your issues (very normal, young adult issues) with the upbringing you had on your mom’s choice to have a child by donor..

Rather than working tirelessly to affect an industry that helps a lot of people create solid, loving families (and a lot of weak, less than loving families too), it might be helpful to separate out what is sperm-donor related and what might be related to the dynamics of your family.

Think about what you love about your mom and stepdad(s) and about your mom’s personality, and her upbringing and her parents, and her relationship with your first step dad and your second step dad and your third step dad and any other boyfriends she might have had. And think about the pluses and the minuses and the complexity there. And you might find your stuff doesn’t come from being a child conceived by sperm donation, but from a young woman struggling to figure out what she likes and what she doesn’t like about her upbringing.

Best,

Tom

I agree with Ralph’s main premise, which is that if your mom had fewer ‘issues’ with men who became your step-fathers, then you’d lave less ‘issues’ with your upbringing. I’m not suggesting that your family is any more or less dysfunctional than any other family in the US, but I am thinking that your feelings about your current situation would be different if your ‘sperm donor’ was one of the men that your mom dated, lived with or married.

Let’s do a thought experiment, a bit of envisioning about what might have been… In stead of reflecting on the past and thinking about a future that perhaps your biological father might have given you, think about what the adults in your life, at different phases of your childhood, might have given you.

Sure, your bio-father might have given you stability, right? On the other hand, there are plenty of bio fathers (and step fathers, and boyfriends of mothers) that skip out..

Perhaps a bio-father, in a solid relationship with a mother (perhaps your mother), would be a better male role models. Right? Or, your mom (or any woman having a child) might choose a difficult man… Chemistry in relationships being what they are, some men are more likeable, better people, more charitable, better role models. People build relationships together….

Perhaps you would have received, in another alternate scenario, the love that some people get from a stable man in a good relationship with a stable woman… right? But two adults form the grown-up part of a family. And sometime adults, whether they conceive via the fertility industry or not, aren’t very good at relationships…

While you could focus on your mom’s mistakes, especially her “BIG” mistake to conceive you via assisted fertility, you might also focus on normal teen and twenty something stuff, like the fact that your parents are imperfect. That they make good and bad decisions, about love, about relationships, about where to live, about schools their kids attend and about their kids. As get older and move from twenties to thirties, you might start making some of your own decisions about these things and forming your own opinions.

But please don’t locate all your issues (very normal, young adult issues) with the upbringing you had on your mom’s choice to have a child by donor..

Rather than working tirelessly to affect an industry that helps a lot of people create solid, loving families (and a lot of weak, less than loving families too), it might be helpful to separate out what is sperm-donor related and what might be related to the dynamics of your family.

Think about what you love about your mom and stepdad(s) and about your mom’s personality, and her upbringing and her parents, and her relationship with your first step dad and your second step dad and your third step dad and any other boyfriends she might have had. And think about the pluses and the minuses and the complexity there. And you might find

I wouldn’t qualify my family as particularly dysfunctional.
I think it is a faulty structure that comes with unique problems, of which there are *FEW* tools for parents to overcome.

The issues I faced are predictable and formulaic based off of predictable types of human motivations.

I am not unique in this. I am only unique in my ambition to talk about it.

Best to you in the future –

Alana, your disclosure to your mother of you TRUE feelings about the manner of your conception, reminded me of my first conversation with my adoptive mother (when I was about 23), saying that I very much needed to know the identity of my first (genealogical) parents.

She was shocked; distressed (I had to support her emotionally; much reassurance that she would always be my mother; etc). Over the years we would sometimes revisit the subject of my need to know my birth origins; she gradually became less threatened and understanding of my feelings.

It’s a long long story….but many decades later she met my other mother; they subsequently corresponded over the years and I hope each found some peace and comfort from knowing each other.

I know DC mothers and fathers who have a deep understanding of the importance for their children to have a whole sense of identity; and who now comprehend the difficulties that DC has brought to the lives of their children.

I hope your brave efforts (and those of other DC persons) is the beginning of a new understanding throughout the world that all members of the human family need to know and connect with their kin.

Polly should be delighted by that one…