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February 21, 2010

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meinsideout

Thank you so much for sharing this post - it touched me on so many levels.

First, you are so brave - I admire your honesty and your inner searching - truly inspiring. You are going to be an amazing mother to your child(ren) - no matter where they come from.

I never pretend to know what someone else is feeling or thinking - and I cannot know here. I can share my experience with DS - and I know that is only half of your equation and I can only guess as to that process - my support and thoughts go out to you.

I get afraid at times that my husband, even though he says (and I believe) that he will love these two as much as his own genetic children, that he will not.

On the other side of the coin, I relate to what you said about having a non-genetically linked child inside of you - there were a few times when I felt weird about #1 - another man's sperm inside of me - and #2 - a child that is genetically half of someone I have never met and that I only have a questionnaire about...

All that being said, the times that I have felt odd or scared or insecure can be counted on both hands - for the most part, I am over the top excited and my husband appears to be as well. We fought hard for this and I truly believe that these two were meant to be our children - whether that is as a result of a belief system that actually exists (god, universe, destiny, etc.) or just because.

((HUGS))

Summer

The thing about infertility is that it makes you rewrite your dreams. First the rewrites are the "little" things--no romantic romp will get you your baby. It's feet in the stirrups with at least 2 other people in the room besides you and your partner. When you have to move to donor eggs/sperm, adoption, etc. the rewrites mean coming up with completely new dreams. Although these new dreams may make you as happy as you would be if your old dreams came true, they are replacing those old dreams. And replacing dreams is a hard, hard thing to do.

It might be interesting for you to know that for me, as a donor egg mom, my transitional object was the pregnancy itself. My connection with my son developed when I felt his movements while he was in utero. Here was this little being not genetically related to me, yet also a part of me. To this day, TK will sometimes make a movement and it makes me think back on those days and wonder if that was the sort of movement he made in utero. Perhaps not the same as feeling a genetic connection, but for me it was a powerful connection all the same.

MMC

I certainly don't know the depth to which this issue must be affecting you, but I can appreciate its impact. It is indeed a unique scenario by which to connect to your future children. The only thing I thought I might add (and it might not be relevant but somehow it came to mind reading your post) is about a conversation my husband and I had shortly after we became pregnant.

After so many years of trying, we were more focused on fertility than anything else that came after - we hadn't thought about parenthood particularly, just the chance to get there. Well, my husband himself is adopted and has never been in touch with his birth family in any way, and one day this observation hit me hard: our child was going to be the first blood relative he had ever met.

Unexpected to me, when I mentioned this he seemed a bit shaken, like he might have been more comfortable with bonding with our impending child when he was NOT conscious of the genetic link to himself, since that's how he'd bonded with everyone in his entire life... by "choice" and not by blood. With this child of ours on its way, I think it required completely rethinking how he'd relate to her. And it's not that he wasn't excited about the idea of meeting his first "blood relative" but he seemed to feel a different pressure for some reason. This has all resolved itself because ultimately, whether it is by genetics or by 'choice', he is getting "his" child either way, and I think he finally let go of his worries when he realized the distinction wasn't relevant to his love for her. The 'transitional object' came to be without him even trying. In fact, I don't think he could have stopped it if he wanted to. And she's not even born yet.

I'm not sure exactly how this relates to you, only that maybe it turns your concerns around to another perspective on things? Your dreams are indeed unscripted, but that's not to say the connection you have to your child won't be exceptionally powerful, just for reasons you haven't thought of yet. :)

Sorry for the rambling comment. Hope that made some sense. :)

After Words

What Summer said. I hesitated in every step of my own (far less arduous) journey because it wasn't the story I wanted to tell. I didn't want to have the Clomid or the Follistim or the IUI or the IVF be a part of my family history.

And on a daily basis, it isn't. I look at my son and I see him--and only very rarely do I remember the effort it took to get him.

I wish you clarity, and I wish you the very best of luck.

Beth

I was going to say something like what Summer and After Words said- that being pregnant has, at least for now, eased or perhaps erased the distinction between this baby inside me and any other baby who might have been available to become ours. I've known this baby since before her first breath. My face will be the first he sees. I think a shared history can offset the unshared genes. Oddly enough, it's this intimacy of knowing before birth that I most looked forward to about having children and why adoption was never more than a distant option.

I'm glad that putting this in writing and thinking it through has brought you clarity. Best of luck with everything.

By the way, I gave you anaward on my blog. I haven't commented as often as I should have, but I visit your blog often and have been following awhile.

Eva

You are in a hard place and you do a good job of articulating that. This is difficult gut wrenching stuff and it takes what it takes to get through but you have all the right stuff: courage, wit and love. xo

Sweet Georgia

It's such a huge step to take, isn't it? I feel it with our choice to use donor eggs and can only imagine what it's like when it's both DE and DS. I'm glad you came to a clearer position after writing your post.

Stephanie

I just recently subscribed to your post and wanted to say that I am hoping for the best for you and I know that whatever choice you make will be the right one for you and your family. I can tell by reading your blog that you put a lot of thought into the things you do. I wish I could be that way sometimes I just don't think about things or I tend to think of the negative only.

the good eggs

So many complex thoughts here.

I know from my own experience these things: I loved my mother because she was a mystery and because she didn't want me. Now that she's dead I understand so much more what it means to mother. Friends' mothers are more of my mother now than my mother ever was...emotionally, in connection.

What's important is that you want your children. My mother didn't want me, so she wasn't really my mother. Other mothers have wanted to mother me, and they have become my mother.

You want your children. You're worried that you won't--and that is an emotion you need to know--but I hope when they come, you want them, and it becomes less about a connection with them and how they are like the donor who is like you. More about how you want them, plain and simple.

jaded

This is so hard. I don't pretend to know what you are dealing with but after I lost my 1st - Emi, I really did not have a freaking clue about our reproductive future was going to look like. Therefore, I entertained every scenario out there, including adoption, embroyo adoption, donor egg, donor sperm, etc. All this was very hard on my husband but easier for me. You see, I worked at an adoption agency for a while and came across so many families that were uniquely made, but families no less. I would process donations that often came accompanied by letters of happy adoptive parents.

Would you consider maybe talking to others whose families are forming in a way that they maybe did not anticipate? Maybe joining an online support group on an in-person support group like Resolve. They discuss so many topics including this one. I hope this is not assvice, but rather some food for thought.

Tireegal

Thank you for this wonderful post - and I'm glad the writing of it helped you gain some clarity. I think we could talk for a long time about our journeys with de/ds - even if they are so very different.
I am a big fan of Winnicott so I was really excited to read your contemplation of the transitional object and how this might be replicated in your situation.
My most favorite part of Winnicott is his discussion of the holding environment. I have always embraced this in the social work that I have practiced with the most disaffected and disconnected people. Not that your baby will be dis anything. But that holding environment, that safe nurturing place that brings equilibrium to the stormiest seas, I think that this is a really important piece too.
So thanks again; I think you're going to be a wonderful mother.
Xoxo

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