But my blog today — which is very different than that which I typically post — has more to do with whether the penalty fit the crime than whether what transpired under the direction of TE and with the assistance of HN was right or wrong, or for that matter my level of shock and horror at all of it.  I had at one point read something on the internet that suggested that HN had been sentenced, or was going to be sentenced to 13 years in prison.  I remember discussing the article I read with the women in my office.  I asked them whether they thought 13 years were too few or too many.  It turns out there was no factual basis to the article I was reading, as HN will be serving less than a year in a federal penitentiary and additional time under house arrest.  That is quite a difference from 13 years wouldn’t you say?

I had never made a decision myself about whether 13 years was “just” punishment for the crimes alleged and to which she plead guilty.  Some part of me felt that it wasn’t enough time and some part of me felt it was too much time.  So I let it go, as I was more intrigued by the fact that there were still matters under investigation.

But I have no doubt when I say that less than a year in “Club Fed” is not enough time.  As the Judge Battaglia pointed out (for more see an article in the  http://www.abajournal.com/news/article/former_lawyer_gets_1-year_sentence_in_international_baby_selling_scam/ ), HN doesn’t even appear to understand that what she has done was wrong.  Under the circumstances, then doesn’t it make sense to give someone slightly harsher a penalty to help them internalize that which they have done?  Club Fed is rumored not to be such a bad place.  If I recall, Martha Stewart enjoyed learning how to knit while she served her time.  Given that we are talking about the intentional creation and sale of human life, do we really want to send a message to society that less than a year in jail is sufficient punishment for such atrocious conduct?  I recognize that Judge Battaglia was restricted by sentencing guidelines, but even so, he still had the ability to provide for a more severe consequence for this crime.  House arrest is pretty much of a joke isn’t it?  There are days that actually sounds like a pretty sweet deal if you ask me.  I suppose taking the option out of it may make it different.  It is one thing to imagine what its like and another thing to actually live with an ankle bracelet every day.  Query, if you have a pool in your backyard, are you allowed to sunbathe next to it?  Or is that a violation of house arrest? Let’s be clear, however, we can make brownies, watch TV, read books, surf Face Book, and shop on the internet while under house arrest, things we cannot do at Club Fed.

I am not sure, and will most certainly be giving this more thought, but my gut reaction is that I really think this punishment didn’t fit the crime.  As we await the sentencing of the co-conspirators, I am really curious to see if this notion of minimum and maximum sentences, house arrest, and the reality that people like me (albeit me 11 years ago) — desperate to have a child, unknowing (even as an attorney) of the true bounds of the law with respect to things like surrogacy and egg donation — were intentionally preyed upon.  Babies were intentionally created to be sold to people like me.  It’s gross and inhuman.  And I object to the fact that the people who perpetrated these acts get to make brownies in the comfort of their own home, surf Face Book, and shop on Amazon, and perhaps even luxuriate by the pool in their backyard (seriously, is that okay with the ankle bracelet?  Martha was allowed to garden wasn’t she??).  Isn’t house arrest pretty much the same thing as sending your child to their room for a “time out”?

So I am going to make a pledge to devote more of my time to educating people so they don’t fall prey to schemes like these.  And while I do so, I hope that somewhere a fair justice system will prevail in what remains of these cases.

These are the personal thoughts and opinions of this author.

The article was in the October 10th/17th edition of Newsweek, “You got your sperm where?”  The discussion in the article focused on how people are finding sperm donors (SD for short) through the internet (the “virtual” donor).  The article described one donor-recipient match and donation that was initiated through web contact and fulfilled via a donation made in a Starbucks bathroom in NYC.  Major yuck factor to that one.  Seriously, have you been in a Starbucks bathroom recently?  The line outside the bathroom will give you an indication of how actively they are used (hopefully not all for sperm donation purposes), and thus how potentially grimy they are.  I have a pretty high threshold for gross bathrooms and overall I think Starbucks does a good job keeping its bathrooms clean.  However, with the high traffic many of these bathrooms experience, you have to assume that they are crawling with germs.  And if you are trying to have a baby, at least to me, public bathrooms and sperm donation don’t make a great combination.  But to each his or her own, I suppose.

The thing that really got me, aside from the fact that this was taking place in Starbucks, was the lack of thought people were giving to what they are doing.  It’s one thing to go on a blind date with someone you met on an internet dating site.  To conceive a child from an online site — one that is not run by a sperm bank — seems a wee bit more frightening than agreeing to meet your average Tom, Dick or Harry for dinner or drinks.

One of the reasons people seem to be turning to online sources is to avoid the anonymity of sperm banks.  There is a sperm donor registry that is designed to help families created through anonymous donation, match the SD’s with the children conceived from the donations and to help children/adults conceived through sperm donation find their biological father.  The appeal of finding a random guy from whom you will receive donated sperm, and with whom you can establish some kind of non-anonymous but also non-parent-child relationship, is appealing to many people.  I get that.  No problem there.  Except, I don’t know, maybe some legal issues surrounding that lack of parent-child relationship. . . .

Known sperm donation agreements are some of the trickiest agreements a reproductive lawyer can draft.  I am always extremely careful when I draft them.  Why you ask?  Because, even though the goal of the agreement may be to avoid having the SD be liable for child support or retain any parental rights to the child conceived through the donation . . .  courts overturn them with surprising frequency.  All it takes are a couple of birthday cards signed “love Dad” and a court may well determine that, notwithstanding my carefully drafted known sperm donation agreement, the SD does indeed have parental rights, is liable for child support, and the child may even be able to inherit through “donor dad’s” estate.  Did any of us intend for that to happen when we sat down at the table to discuss what they wanted the agreement to accomplish?  No.  My clients usually want to have a friend donate sperm so that they can have a child (alone or with a partner), and have the comfort of knowing who the person is that is donating his genetic material.  All those “what-if” and “what is he like” questions can be answered later by the existence of a specific known SD.

If the SD and the recipient mom don’t want to have a parental relationship — for example two women in a relationship who intend to parent a child together but don’t want to use an anonymous sperm donor, and would like a close friend of theirs to donate his sperm (think along the lines of a well-known singer and her partner and another very well known male singer) — the sperm donation agreement becomes a critical component for recognition of the intended family unit.  The sperm donation agreement establishes what everyone intends to happen, and what everyone intends to be their respective rights and responsibilities in the future.  These intentions are set forth in writing prior to the conception of a child.  Most of the case law in the US that involves third-party assisted reproduction (including known sperm donation) looks to the parties’ intent at the time the child is conceived.  Provided that everyone sticks to the terms of the agreement, usually a good sperm donation agreement will be upheld if ever there are arguments, disagreements, or when and if someone suddenly wants something that was NOT intended when the agreement was drafted.  The thing is that just a few real-life events can cause that sperm donation agreement, and the parties’ intention, to come into question.  A court could decide that while the parties may have written down and signed an agreement that said one thing, their actions reveal a contrary intent.  Actions frequently speak louder than words when it comes to known sperm donation arrangements.

So let’s get back to the people who donated and received the sperm at Starbucks.  Do you think they took the time to consult a reproductive lawyer?  Did they consider what the consequences would be 10 years down the road if suddenly one person decided they wanted a different type of relationship or needed child support?  It didn’t sound like it from the article in Newsweek.  While their intent may have considered the prospective best interests of the child — having a person that the child could one day meet or speak to and thus avoid identity issues that plague many children conceived via anonymous sperm donation (thus giving rise to the donor registry I mentioned) — the reality of what they were doing and the lack of awareness of the long term ramifications are mind boggling.

According to the article, one man who is donating sperm through online forums, is asking the recipient to scream “make me pregnant!” or something like it during intercourse.  Let’s agree to not discuss the fact that they weren’t using medical professionals or a home insemination kit.  The statement the recipient is being asked to state in and of itself could be interpreted as an expression of their mutual agreement and intent to parent a child, TOGETHER.  Did the recipient of this sperm intend for this man to be the FATHER of her child?  I don’t believe she did.  Or did she?  Did the SD?

And hey, are we doing background medical checks of any kind?  Does anyone know if the people donating or receiving the sperm are healthy or otherwise able to parent a child?  What if the SD has an infectious disease?  What if the recipient is an ax-murderer?  Odds are they aren’t anything other than people with good and honorable intentions.  But if the law comes down to intent, don’t we owe it to the child to express that intent?

The internet is a wonderful place and it is a frightening place.  We all have heard horror stories stemming from internet match-making.  Let’s not add conception of a human being to those horror stories.  For anyone considering this type of sperm donation, and apparently there are plenty of people doing it, or even those seeking to enter into a known sperm donation with the assistance of medical professionals, do me a favor:  Find a reproductive lawyer or a family lawyer and talk about how you want to protect your family!

Maybe I am over-thinking this. Maybe it’s not different than someone who goes to a bar knowing she is ovulating, with the intent to hook-up with some guy and hope she gets pregnant.  At least the people going to Starbucks theoretically know each other’s real names and have some information about each other, and both know that a child is being conceived. Good intentions and lack of (legal) judgment aren’t a crime.  Then again, apparently Law & Order made an episode about this subject (maybe not involving a Starbucks sperm donor) and I would love to watch it.  I wonder what issues the writers of Law & Order found to address?

And really, I am just totally dumbfounded by this, someone donated his sperm in a Starbucks bathroom?  Wow.  What’s next? A mile-high  club for sperm donors?

The book is “Baby Proof” by Emily Giffin (author of Something Borrowed, recently made into a movie with Kate Hudson).

Written in the first person, the author is struggling through marital problems and decisions about whether or not to have a child.  As she is trying to sort out her own issues, her sister is going through treatment for infertility.  Author Emily Giffin does an amazing job of both describing the issues a person faces when contemplating living a life without having children (and the condemnation that may come with that decision).  And she does an even better job describing what her sister is going through and issues involved with egg donation and the dreaded NOvary, fears about birth mothers, open adoption — heck she even accurately addresses the differences between embryo donation and embryo adoption and the misuse of terminology . . . .  Seriously, you cover that one accurately (as did Ms. Giffin) and I HAVE to put you on the Stork Lawyer’s recommended reading list!!

Baby Proof is a great read and one that very clearly articulates the very complex landscape of third party assisted reproduction and adoption.  I tend to be really harsh and judgmental when it comes to reading other people’s — especially fertile people’s — interpretation of my world (both the part I live on a day-to-day basis and the part I work in) and my hat’s off to Ms. Giffin!  Baby Proof is politically and legally correct down to its core and it is still a fascinating read.

Baby Proof gives us a multi-faceted view of  the myriad of complicated emotional and legal issues faced by infertile couples and singles.  If you are going through infertility don’t be afraid to read this book.  It’s not preachy, critical, judgmental, hurtful, or voyeuristic.  Baby Proof looks at the issues infertile women face every day and with the precision of a plastic surgeon and her scalpel, the author manages to peel apart the very delicate skin (issues) involved when you’re dealing with ovarian reserve issues, third-party assisted reproduction, adoption, as well as the concerns women face as their biological clock ticks away and they lack a partner to help make a baby.

It’s a fun read and manages to be educational at the same time.  I totally was caught off guard.  I thought this was going to be some light chic lit for summer vaca.  Was I ever wrong!  For the first time in a very long time, I wound up thinking and marveling at the ability of someone who doesn’t live my life to totally understand my life.

I may know that she interviewed a reproductive lawyer but I still have to believe that she knows more about this topic than what one can learn from spending an afternoon being educated by someone like me.  I can’t help but think she must have more insight into infertility than just an interview would bring.  I mean she really GETS IT.  I tend to think that you can only understand this pain if you’ve lived it.  Granted the character in the book is going through a life crisis and is incredibly intellectual and so these issues are discussed through a filter of self-analysis . . . but even that, the self-analysis part of it, leads me to wonder if there isn’t some personal connection to infertility that I am unaware of.  Maybe I will re-read the acknowledgment section?  Maybe I missed a thank you to someone who shared their heart.  But if I didn’t miss it, then this is one book that understands the infertile woman (and maybe will help people find their way through their infertility to consider an option of family building that without this book they might not have understood or considered).

It’s been a long week and I am brain dead.  I hope I made the point I wanted to . . . I don’t typically think that it’s possible to understand what we go through and I don’t typically find that people get the legal issues involved in what I do everyday.  You know I analyze every movie and magazine article looking and hoping to find an accurate portrayal of the path to parenthood when you’re not a fertile person.  Did I finally just find one??

I think so.  Maybe I won’t just re-read the acknowledgments. Maybe I will re-read this book.  This might be a first.

Thanks Emily.  You done us proud.

I have to say I have a little bug up my arse today.  I just finished writing an article for the American Bar Association’s Family Advocate magazine, talking about why you need to draft egg donation agreements and what you need to include in them.  I also have been working on the same issue in my e-book.  But what’s really got me peeved is the amount of explaining I have to do with potential clients, or just people calling for a consult, about why egg donation agreements are so important.

In two words: parental rights.

I don’t know whether it is agencies trying to save their clients’ money or whether its clinics trying to make things easier but let me tell you that the consent forms you sign at your clinic doesn’t provide you and your soon to be larger family in the event your child gets sick and you need medical information from you donor (just one of the many benefits that can be addressed in an egg donation agreement).  And any representation that anyone makes to you about someone living in a “donor friendly” state thus you don’t have to be worried about parental rights, is only 1/4 correct.  If you are lucky enough to live in a state with an egg donation statute that is a huge plus, but I bet you anything that statute says something about the fact the someone, preferably you and your donor, sign some document stating that this statute is going to apply to your relationship and your donor isn’t going to have any rights or responsibilities with respect to any child conceived from your donation.

And even if the statute doesn’t require a legal document, egg donation agreements state the parties’ intent throughout the agreement and the law in the United States pretty much consistently relies on the parties’ intent as they enter into third party assisted reproductive arrangements, so statute or no statute, having a legal document that addresses your intent is critical.

There are ten key points on which you want to express your intent.  Other than parental rights, can you guess what the other nine might be?

This is your baby folks — or this is a baby you don’t want to have responsibility for if you are an egg donor.  This is a family and this is the rest of your life.  Why wouldn’t you take the time to at least speak with a reproductive lawyer in your area about whether the steps you are taking are sufficient to protect you and your family, or you from having an unwanted family?  One of my clients and I had this discussion one day.  Their agency was telling them that they didn’t need an egg donation agreement and that it was a waste of money and time.  Once I explained my top ten reasons to have an egg donation agreement, my former client was speechless for a few minutes.  And then he responded with:  ”when you put it that way, it seems like it’s kind of a no-brainer. . . . ”

I understand — all reproductive lawyers understand how expensive this process is and how overwhelming it is.  We all want the same thing for you.  A protected family or lack thereof.  If you can’t afford our fees, most of us will try and work with you but in the grand scheme of things what you spend on your egg donation agreement is pennies compared to what you are spending on the rest of the process and if you look at its value over time, well in the words of my former client, I think it’s a no brainer.

So anyone want to take a shot at the other 9 things on my top ten list?  Egg donation agreements run about 30 pages.  What the heck do we put in the agreement that could possibly make it so long?

Thanks for listening to me vent.  I look forward to posting a link to the article I wrote for the Family Advocate and I look forward to the publication of my e-book where I answer all these questions.  But in the meantime, feel free to ask me about it.  It’s your family or someone else’s . . . you should know what you might be missing.

p.s. this post wasn’t proofed so please forgive typos.

Well that has all changed.  Last weekend I was watching a movie with my DH (Dear Husband).  He had rented the film and I had agreed to watch it (despite an initial lack of interest) because the main character was played by Katherine Heigl, who is as we know, an adoptive mom.  Not only do I love her films in general but I always am willing to watch a movie where the actor is in real life a parent through ART (assisted reproductive technologies) or adoption.  And I am especially interested if the film involves parenting or the formation of a family.  Putting aside a desire to escape my life and enjoy the movie, I always wonder whether the actor’s personal experiences with infertility, ART or adoption will influence his or her choices as an actor.

To be honest, when DH proposed watching this film I had no idea what it was about.  I was inclined to pass as I had a vague recollection that the film had not been a tremendous success at the box office.  But when I heard that Katherine Heigl (who ranks #2 behind J.A. as one of my favorite female actresses) was one of the lead actors, I caved.  And what a good decision that turned out to be!

The movie in question is “Life as We Know It” starring KH and Josh Duhamel (JD).  You can check out a trailer at http://lifeasweknowitmovie.warnerbros.com/dvd/

In this movie KH and JD play the close friends of a couple who pass away, and who name KH/JD as their baby’s legal guardians.  Romantic comedy aside, the movie is a fantastic and very realistic portrayal of the Leap, and how the relationship between the parents can change.  As I was watching this movie, both my DH and I were struck by how much the movie reminded us of what it was like to suddenly go from being wanna-be parents to BOOM being parents.

I think the movie really resonated for me because I am an adoptive parent who had very little notice of our pending adoption and I had never really focused on what it would be like to be a parent (let’s face it I spent the entire time wanting a baby and never realistically envisioned what it would be like to have the baby and be a mom).  Once the movie really gets past the characters’ acceptance that they are now parents, there are some very insightful moments about the reality of being a parent and how different that reality is from your expectations.  Whether or not you take a baby care class as part of your adoption plan, I highly recommend this film because I think that it really shows you — and in a humorous, light-hearted manner — what you are in for when someone hands you that baby!  From changing that first poopy diaper, to installing baby gates and midnight runs to the pediatrician, I think that Life as We Know It is a great primer for prospective parents through adoption or assisted reproductive technologies like gestational surrogacy.

Most people who have gone through infertility tend to have blinders on about the reality of parenting.  Whether you only have 24 hours notice or ten months to prepare for your baby’s arrival, this film has some very poignant moments about what the transition feels like and what surprising issues parenting can present us with.  Best of all it’s fun to watch.  It is a surprisingly good romantic comedy, Josh Duhamel is total eye candy (and I won’t hold it against my DH that he thinks Katherine is eye candy too), and it’s sweet, has a happy ending and all that stuff.  So if you are on your way to parenthood after experiencing medical or social infertility, I think this movie is a Must See.

And not to totally discredit my intelligence, my DS (Dear Son) has turned me on to SpongeBob SqaurePants.  I had the unexpected pleasure this week (while cleaning up a child’s puke) of watching an episode of SpongeBob involving a baby scallop and SpongeBob’s experiences as a new parent.  This episode of SpongeBob presents a similarly hysterical and informative perspective of what the Leap is like to being a full time SAHM.  I can’t remember the title of the episode off the top of my head (I will check the DVR and post the name of the episode if I can find it), but suffice it to say that I could relate to SpongeBob’s adjustment to caring for a baby all day and all night while Patrick (his best friend) goes off to work every day as they simulate and satirize what its like to be new parents.

I totally and completely remember that in the beginning of my “maternity leave” I had a rough time.  By Wednesday night when DH walked through the door, I was an exhausted mess.  Thursday night, when DH returned from work and walked-in the door, I handed over DS and went upstairs to have a good exhausted-woman-cry-in-the-shower.  By Friday night, I was prepared for the hand-off at the door, and upon hand-off I bolted out of the house to have coffee at Starbucks (decaf of course b/c I was breastfeeding).

So what am I getting at?  ”Life as we know it” as parents is very different from life as we know it while waiting for the Stork.  I don’t really care whether or not you are taking baby care classes or infant CPR (although I think both are excellent ideas) because the reality of life as a new parent is vastly different than anything we can ever learn in school.  As infertile prospective parents we tend to be so focused on our goal of becoming parents that we lose sight of what we are in for when we are parents.  It is a transition the likes of which you just can’t understand until you are living it and why I call it the Leap.  Life As we Know It and even (surprisingly) Master SpongeBob, have nailed it on the head and I highly recommend watching them (when I find out the title of that SpongeBob episode, I will post it and maybe you can find it somewhere and watch it).  Both are totally and completely worth watching.

p.s. please note that I am not complaining about being a parent.  I love every minute of this crazy, full-catastrophe life I am living! I want more kids and my attitude now is much more about enjoying and being mindful of the joy in this experience.  I am just saying that these movies can help prepare you for the full-catastrophe aspect of parenting.

p.p.s.  If you have any other movies that you think are good to watch as prospective parents, post them here.  Maybe we can start a list of “Movies to Watch During the Wait”!!

To think about everything that I should be doing in the office but can’t.  To think about everything that I need to be writing:  my e-book on egg donation is pretty much finished but I haven’t had time to input the final edits or to speak with my design and production team about getting it ready for the marketplace; I have an article on egg donation and surrogacy contracts that is due to the American Bar Association in a matter of days; I have to talk to my publisher about revising The Infertility Survival Handbook; I want to write a blog about a RESOLVE event I co-hosted on March 24th at Bis.Co.Latte Cafe in NYC regarding the legal issues egg and embryo donation; and oh yeah I am supposed to be teaching a class on third-party assisted reproduction at a law school and I have to prepare the syllabus (that one may not happen).

To think about all the contracts that I need to draft and edit for clients.

To think about the new series of blogs I am working on (perhaps it too will become an e-book?) on the mind-body connection in dealing with and resolving infertility.  Thanks to a Facebook friend, I discovered a wealth of information on something called “Conscious Conception.”  I have a ton of research to do on Conscious Conception, it is a seed germinating in my mind and something I very much want to talk about.   Just this morning I was staffing out work in the office and we got into a long conversation about how much I believe faith plays in people’s ability to deal with and overcome fertility.

And yet, all I am capable of on this gorgeous sunny day is to THINK about the overwhelming amount of things that are filling my proverbial plate.  I am utterly and completely without the ability to deal with any of it today.  For today my goal is to be able to breathe.  One of the fundamental things in life which I must attend to if I am going to get back to these things, yes?  Yet, instead of recognizing the very important need to take care of my own health, I have been beating myself up for my inability to do my work.  I feel like I am drowning, literally and figuratively.

It was only upon stumbling across an issue of the Wellesley Alumnae Magazine and its cover article about “When Life Doesn’t Measure Up” and reading about how, when and why so many of my fellow Wellesley sisters feel like failures, that I realized that I feel like a failure for having pneumonia and not being able to do my work.  And with that thought, I was off and running on a journey of self-analysis that of course brought me right back to the world of fertility and the feelings of failure that come with it.

Apparently, my college magazine conducted some kind of a poll asking graduates to discuss their feelings about their satisfaction with their life and feelings of inadequacy, failure, or success in a variety of different contexts.  I don’t recall receiving a questionnaire in the mail or an email like this — must have missed out on contributing my own thoughts to this very profound poll.  The reasons women gave for feeling like a failure were incredibly diverse.  And yet, despite the very diverse reasons or situations my Wellesley sisters gave when describing their own issues with failure, including dealing with chronic illness, the article did not mention infertility or an inability to have children (or the choice not to have children) as raising issues of failure.  Certainly, someone among the thousands of Wellesley graduates has experienced difficulties conceiving and must have felt like a failure.  I did.  I do.  Why didn’t someone else talk about it?  The Dixie Chicks talk about it in their song “So Hard” . . . a ballad that haunts me every time I hear it.  It’s all about the feelings of failure and loss we have when we can’t conceive.  One out of every 8 Americans is dealing with infertility.  Why didn’t the Wellesley College Alumnae Magazine talk about it?  Especially at an all women’s college, you would think that a topic like infertility and failure related to something so integral to being a woman would be recognized and not continue to be shrouded in secrecy. The article talked about the shame my sisters felt about their various failures, the secrecy that surrounded them but infertility was not among them.  What gives?

The secrecy and shame surrounding infertility is pervasive.  Just as for my sisters who are wrestling with their own failures of a different nature, the article pointed out that all of them felt better by talking openly in the article about failure and its impact on their self-perception.

Indeed, the magazine itself was often a cause for Wellesley alumnae to feel failure.  By hearing about the success stories profiled in the magazine many women admitted that they felt that they had let down the school or that they failed to measure up to the “Wellesley standard” of being or becoming another Hillary Clinton.  The article concluded with the following statement:

“But maybe what we don’t know is what failures happened to those women before they became household names that eventually brought them to the point of celebration.  And until we hear those stories, too, we can’t begin to make new templates for success that acknowledge the inclusion of failure as part of a life well-lived.”

And this leads me to the following conclusions:

Until we hear stories about our feelings of failure and inadequacy arising from our infertility, and our subsequent success at overcoming them, we cannot begin to make those new templates for success that acknowledge how much stronger or sensitive we have become as a result of our infertility.

Until we hear stories about our feelings of failure and inadequacy arising from our infertility, we cannot begin to find faith that our own journey will end in success.  We need to be inspired by the success of our sisters (and brothers) who have gone before us and achieved that which we long for — a baby — even if that success means embracing an alternate route to parenthood such as surrogacy, egg or embryo donation, or adoption.

It is, as my Wellesley sisters say, in embracing the loss in which we gain the faith to succeed.  I wish there was no stigma to being infertile but I must confess that the lack of mention of infertility in this article really drove home for me the sense of the overwhelming stigma with which we live.  I have a serious issue with the Wellesley Alumnae Magazine for not bringing to light a discussion of how failing at something as intrinsic as becoming a mother can be so devastating to our sense of self-esteem, to our marriages, and to our sense of failure as a woman.  (I cannot fathom that not one woman responded to that poll and didn’t mention infertility and if that was the case, I am even more troubled by the statement that makes regarding how much we hide about our infertility).

Learning from others who share their own shame or other sense of failure about something with which we are all supposed to be able to do — conceive, carry and give birth to our children — is what will carry us through.  For others it is not necessarily biological or medical failure but a sense of frustration at being unable to conceive because we lack the essential components — we are socially infertile.  And learning from others who find ways beyond our social infertility will give us ideas and strength for achieving that which our sexual orientation precludes us from obtaining.

And as the wheels started turning and hit overdrive as I considered the article and my own sense of failure because I have pneumonia and am unable to work (and am thus letting down my clients to whom I truly want nothing more than to help have a child), and considered once again the stigma with which we live, I couldn’t stay silent.  I pulled out my laptop and curled up in bed to “think through” this article and my situation and put together the pieces of this puzzle.  My blog will now not only be devoted to discussing the concepts behind Conscious Conception, but it will be devoted to de-stigmatizing this disease.  I know there is a Wellesley sister out there somewhere who is struggling to defeat the NOvary™ or endometriosis, to locate a birth mother, to navigate the increasingly complicated red tape of Ethiopian adoption, or to find a way to establish the fact that she and her partner are both the legal mothers of the child one of them delivered and which they intend to parent together.

So in my failure of having pneumonia, new ideas and inspiration have been born for my blog and thus my day has turned into one of celebration.  And I ask you to please not be silent.  I took the pledge with RESOLVE not to remain silent and today my failure in being human and having pneumonia has given me an idea of how I can fulfill my pledge to RESOLVE.  My blog is a safe place where I hope to support people walking with me on this path, and to provide the occasional nugget of legal or medical information to move us another step forward on the path to parenthood.  And thus I ask you to talk about your shame.  Talk about your sense of failure.  Talk about your frustration, your anger or confusion. (And if you are a Wellesley alumnae, help me convince them to let me write an article about infertility).  Share your story here wherever you may be in your journey.  And I will try and find people to share with you how they conquered the NOvary, endometriosis, found birth mothers, survived the red tape of Ethiopian adoptions, or proven their joint parentage.

Because I know that if we continue to be silent and give in to this crazy stigma, we will never know what failures happened to those women (and men) among us before they became mothers (and fathers), and that eventually brought them to the point of celebration.  And until we hear those stories we can’t begin to make new templates for success that acknowledge the inclusion of infertility as part of a life with children.

And now for some random FAQ’s and reminders:

Yes, you can establish your parentage if you are a same-sex couple and one of you has a baby.  Depending on where you live the mechanisms for doing this will vary.  In some states you can file a legal action to have your parental rights established, in other states you may need or want to adopt (even if you are not married).  In some States and in some circumstances you may need or want to do both.

If you have a functioning uterus, egg donation is perhaps the most successful route to pregnancy for women who have issues with the NOvary™.  At many clinics, with a properly screened egg donor, live birth rates per egg donation are in the 60% range.  Yes, you read that correctly, you could have a 60% chance of conceiving a baby using an egg donor.  And among those that conceive using an egg donor, the rate of twin conceptions is in the 40% range (making a strong case for single embryo transfer).

If you are considering adoption but have financial concerns or are worried about wait times, relinquishment risks, or red tape, embryo donation is a rapidly growing path to parenthood.  Using embryos donated from another family who has cryopreserved embryos which they no longer wish to use to build their own family, you may have a 40% chance of conceiving a child.  In addition to the affordability of embryo donation and the high success rates, you have the opportunity to carry the child, control the uterine environment, and may have the ability to conceive more than one child (this will depend on the type of embryo donation you enter into, as well as the number and quality of the embryos donated to you).

If you don’t have a functioning uterus, gestational surrogacy is another option for becoming a parent.  Using either your own gametes (genetic material), or an embryo created from egg or sperm donation (or sometimes both), another woman can carry a child for you and you will have all legal and parental rights upon that child’s birth.  Surrogacy laws vary by State, and it’s far from inexpensive, but when done correctly, surrogacy is a wonderful means of building a family.

And let’s not forget what is now almost considered boring: IVF.  If you have a viable uterus, eggs and/or sperm but for other reasons have difficulty conceiving on your own, with the assistance of In Vitro Fertilization, your chances of conceiving get better every day.  With the improvement of the culture medium used to nourish embryos, together with advances in reproductive medicine, some families will have as high as a 70% chance of conceiving.  Although the vast majority of families using IVF will need more than one attempt before conceiving, this is a technology that should not be ignored.

Other things to consider are:

PGD, (Preimplantation Genetic Diagnosis).  This enables you to select only those embryos that appear chromosomally normal for embryo transfer in an IVF cycle.  For older infertility patients, those with a family history of hereditary illness, or those with recurrent pregnancy loss, PGD can increase your chances of conceiving a healthy baby.

ICSI, (Intracytoplasmic sperm injection).  This is where doctors inject the sperm into the egg to help facilitate fertilization.  For families with male factor infertility this can help side-step problems with sperm that might prevent it from fertilizing an egg.

DNA Fragmentation Assay.  This is a test performed on sperm to determine whether the sperm are chromosomally normal.  Although there is a large range of “grey area” where it is unclear whether the sperm are going to cause problems with conception or pregnancy loss, this is proving to be a very important aspect in solving cases of recurrent pregnancy loss, IVF failure, or otherwise diagnosing “hidden” infertility issues.

Blood Clotting Disorders and other immune issues.  Do you have unexplained pregnancy loss or IVF failure (with an egg donor)?  Go get a work-up from a hematologist or other doctor specializing in diagnosing harder to find infertility issues.  Sadly many physicians routinely overlook or discredit the influence or impact of blood clotting and/or immune issues on the ability of an embryo to implant in the uterus, or to the ongoing development of a baby.

Are you going to stay silent, or are you going to talk with me here about what you are feeling, what you are trying to do to overcome your infertility, or what you did that helped you overcome it?  Speak.  If not here, then find somewhere.  Please.

Today is the birthday of one of my children.  For privacy reasons I am going to call him James, but that isn’t the name we gave him.

On this day several years ago my husband and I, and our son, were racing in our car to meet a birth mother who was in labor.  I had been talking with this birth mother for many months and we had a solid and even loving relationship.  I felt a special bond with her and I was thrilled when she invited me to attend her baby’s birth.  Unfortunately, my husband and I just missed James’s birth, but we were there with his birth mother within hours of his arrival in this world.

While nurses frantically attended to James’s birth mother due to complications from his birth, my husband and I sat on a couch in the family area of the maternity center and held our new son.  Aware of my plans to breast feed James, a breast feeding specialist came by to help me get James settled and contentedly nursing.  Later that evening the social worker from our adoption agency arrived and after getting checked out by the attending pediatrician and approved for discharge, the social worker went in to sit with James’s birth mother and discuss whether she was ready to sign her relinquishment forms.

Every state law varies as to when a birth mother can sign these documents — most states require that birth parents have to wait a day or even more after the baby’s birth before the birth parents can sign the appropriate legal documents.  Under the laws of the state that was governing our adoption, James’s birth mother could sign her relinquishment papers at any time after he was born.  She had a relatively short period of time after signing them in which she could choose to parent and after that period of time her parental rights (and those of James’s birth father) would automatically be terminated.  She could also choose to appear in court before the time period had ended and relinquish her parental rights even earlier.  We had discussed it many times and she had decided to appear in court; she didn’t want to feel the pressure of waiting for the days to pass before the adoption was irrevocable.

After what seemed like an endless visit, our social worker came out and told us that James’s birth mother had signed the papers and we could go home with James that night!  We were told his birth father had already signed the papers earlier that day. Elated but still nervous, my husband packed up our things and collected our older son’s toys off of the floor where he was playing, while I finished breast feeding.  I visited with James’s birth mother and we said a very tearful goodbye.

Exhausted from a long drive and a very emotional day, we drove to our hotel now a family of four.  The next several days were a blur while we waited for ICPC approval to drive home.  When you adopt a child from a state that is different from where you live, The Interstate Compact on the Placement of Children (ICPC) requires that both the state in which the child is born and the state where you live approve the adoption; each state reviews all of the requisite paperwork to ensure that it complies with the law and once you have approval from both states you can travel home.  It seemed like we were in a state that had a very slow ICPC office.

Anyone who has gone through it knows that living in a hotel with a newborn while waiting for ICPC approval is excruciating.  We filled the days with a visit to a local pediatrician, introducing our older son (still an infant himself) to his new brother, meeting James’s birth grand parents, and with me learning to juggle breast feeding two babies.  Several days after bringing James home, while we were getting up in the morning and getting organized for another day of waiting for ICPC approval, the phone rang.  My husband and I both jumped for the phone assuming it was our social worker calling to tell us we had received approval to go home.  We were not so lucky.

She was instead calling to say that James’s birth mother had changed her mind and chosen to parent.  She wanted James.  His birth father still supported the adoption plan but wanted to support the mother of his son.  He thus advised our adoption agency that he too was choosing to parent.

Devastated and frightened, we spoke with the attorney from our adoption agency to review our legal options.  The good news was that the laws of the state governing our adoption were very favorable to adoptive parents.  Some states automatically return a baby to its birth mother or father when she/he chooses to parent and the adoptive parents face an uphill battle to regain custody and adopt the baby.  It was the reverse for us.  If we chose to fight to keep James, his birth parents were facing an uphill battle to prove that they would provide a safe and loving home for James.

After talking about it with our attorney and our social worker, and having a long heart to heart conversation, my husband and I agreed that we wanted to honor James’s birth mother’s decision.  Although we were heartbroken beyond measure, we knew in our hearts that this was what was best for James.  I packed up a small bag of things that James liked and that would smell familiar to him.  I breast fed him one last time and told him how much we loved him and that he would always be a part of my heart.  Crying, I tucked him into his car seat and my husband handed the bag and the car seat to our social worker.  She too was crying.

And James went back to his birth family.

No longer restricted by ICPC laws, we immediately packed up the car. The drive home seemed endless.   I sat in the back seat with our other son, unable to think.  The entire car ride I don’t think my husband or I said a word to each other.  We weren’t angry, we were just very, very sad.  I saved a small photo album of pictures of all of us, and a box with some of the clothes he wore when he was with us.  When I got home and walked through the front door carrying an empty car seat instead of two full car seats, it hit me and it hit me hard.  I started grieving at a depth I didn’t even know existed.  There were a few days that I don’t know how I survived.  I think that had we not already had a child I wouldn’t have been able to deal with the loss of James.  It didn’t matter that I knew we made the right decision, it still felt like he had died.  That is, and was, the only way I could deal with my feelings.  For me, James died several days after he was born and every year on his birthday and on the day “he went back” I have hidden under the covers and grieved.

A few years ago I accidentally found out through our adoption agency that “James” is doing well and is living with his birth mother.  But that wasn’t MY James.  It was someone else’s child they were talking about.  My husband asked me if it made me feel better to know that he was safe and loved, and to be honest, it didn’t.  It didn’t make it better.  Sure I was glad he was healthy and happy but it wasn’t MY child who was healthy and happy.  MY child had died.  Even though we never regretted our decision, it still felt like he had died; and a piece of me died with him.

This year, however, for reasons I am at a loss to explain, it isn’t as painful as it used to be.  I woke up knowing exactly what day it is but the grief was not overwhelming.  I didn’t want to hide under the covers.  In fact, I wanted to go straight into my office and help someone have a baby, TODAY.  People have been telling me for years that it would get easier and I never believed them.  But they were right, finally the day has come when it is easier to bear his loss.

I sent my husband a text message a little while ago wishing James a happy birthday and then I kissed my daughter and my other son.  And I went on with my day trying to help someone get closer to being a mother or father.

I did not know much about relinquishment and revocation rights when I started pursuing adoption with my husband.  I knew that there was always a risk a birth mother could choose to parent — and for what it is worth, I have since learned that more than 98% of birth mothers and fathers who choose to parent, do so before the adoptive parent takes the baby home.  But I didn’t know that then and it wouldn’t have stopped us from taking James home from the hospital.  At the time, his birth mother seemed resolute in her decision to place James for adoption and that is all that I thought mattered.

I also didn’t know the importance or nuances of the laws regarding revocation of consent.  I am glad our adoption agency found such a good attorney for us, one who advised us regarding the advantages of using the laws of the state where we lived to govern the adoption rather than the laws of the state where James was born.  Although the outcome would have been the same, we would not have had any choice to fight for James had we used the laws of the state where he was born.  (For reasons other than those surrounding relinquishment and revocation, James’s birth mother elected to use the laws of the state where we lived rather than where she planned on delivering. Typically it is the birth mother’s choice as to what law will apply to your adoption plan).

I never thought I would need to take advantage of those laws, but when faced with the enormous decision of whether or not to fight for James it was comforting and important for us to know that while prospective legal proceedings would be taking place, James would live with us (his birth mother and father would be given regular visitation), and unless they had a very compelling case we were told we had a very good chance that a  Judge would determine that James would stay with us, forever.

Do I recommend going into your adoption with a contingency plan for what would happen if you were in my shoes?  Absolutely not!  Statistics and my own experience as an adoption attorney all indicate that what happened to us won’t happen to the vast, vast majority of adoptive parents.  But I did do something stupid in not knowing more about adoption and how the laws in various states would impact potential adoption plans.  It is really important to know when and under what circumstances a birth family can choose to parent, when the adoption becomes irrevocable and even more important for many prospective adoptive parents, how long it is before a birth parent can even sign the documents necessary to relinquish their parental rights.  If you know this information in advance, you might choose not to advertise in a state where the laws require you to wait a longer period of time for the relinquishment documents to become irrevocable, or choose to advertise in a state where relinquishment documents are irrevocable upon signing.

Knowledge and information are power.  If you are pursuing a domestic newborn adoption, find out about the laws of the states in which you are advertising or those of the states in which you live and where the birth parents live.  Talk to your adoption professional about what your options are at various points in time and think about what you can handle emotionally.  For most prospective adoptive parents, there has already been a period of infertility treatment and loss that has taken place before their adoption journey starts.  You may need to factor in what you’ve already been through when you are thinking about this stuff.  And please keep in mind that sometimes you don’t have a choice and you have to use a particular state’s laws.  But most adoptive parents don’t think about this first and don’t know what their rights are or what they could be if they made certain decisions.

I am always saddened by stories I hear of people being involved in adoptions where they had no awareness of the legal issues presented by the location of the birth parents, or of the legal implications presented by a birth father situation or the existence of multiple potential birth fathers.  Do your research before you start out or while you are going through the process.  Initiate conversations with the adoption professionals you are using as you are making decisions and taking steps along the path toward adoptive parenthood.

My husband and I were very lucky that our agency had selected such a good attorney who made some very good and practical decisions that benefited both James’s birth mother and us as we embarked on our adoption plan together.  It probably wouldn’t have changed anything had we not been so well-informed but I am glad that we did have all the information to make an educated decision.

James is where he belongs, safe in my husband’s and my heart and a very special scrapbook.  And there is a very happy little boy somewhere celebrating his birthday with his mother, just as it was, and is meant to be.  Happy birthday baby!

Find out more at RESOLVE.org or watch this:

Take the Pledge!

Yesterday I read an article on some random website announcing that a celebrity had just announced she was pregnant. The article was extremely critical of the fact that she had waited until the 6th month to announce her pregnancy, and commented that it may have been due to the fact that she had suffered a prior miscarriage.  It then went on to discuss all sorts of celebrity pregnancy issues.  But it was about the third article I have seen recently commenting on a celebrity’s miscarriage.  None of the articles were supportive, not even for the one celebrity that was openly going through fertility treatment and then lost a baby.  Any miscarriage at any time in pregnancy is awful.  As many of you know my final infertility diagnosis was unexplained pregnancy loss (which has since been explained).  I had 5 IVF miscarriages (including a pregnancy that started as twins), and I don’t want to tell you how many more I have had on top of that because at some point you just have to stop counting and cope.  I have blogged about at least one of them.

I have always been open about my miscarriages and my pregnancies.  I am one of those “put it out there” kind of people.  But a lot of people choose not to share early pregnancies.  They instead choose to wait to make an announcement when they are sure that the pregnancy is viable or the fetus is otherwise healthy.  Everyone does it their own way.  And as this is a very personal subject, I was offended that this article “accused” this celebrity of failing to disclose her pregnancy earlier.  MYOB!

Miscarriage is poorly understood on so many levels.  I will blog about the medical aspects later, but for today let’s address the emotional component. I may have blogged about this before but someone recently commented to me that 20 years ago no one even talked about this.  My grandmother’s generation suffered in complete silence, often not even sharing the loss of a pregnancy with their spouse!!  The fact that we are beginning to talk openly about miscarriage is a huge leap forward.

Did you know that among the fertile population only 20% of all conceptions result in a live birth?  That number decreases with age.  With so many women choosing to build their families later in life, whether they conceive on their own or with some form of medical assistance, their chances of experiencing a pregnancy loss are much higher.  Doctor’s often warn patients who are over 35 not to get excited about a pregnancy until they see a heartbeat on ultrasound because the risk of miscarriage is so high.  NOvary™ or not, miscarriage is devastating.

If you ask me, all these women need support, information, and the ability to discuss their grief in whatever manner is most appropriate for them and to do so without criticism!  But the fact remains that most people still won’t even admit they had a miscarriage.  The entire first trimester of pregnancy is shrouded in secrecy and thus any resulting miscarriage is as well.  It is not a personal failure to lose a baby.  It is an overwhelming emotional experience whether you are six weeks or six months pregnant.  I think people should be able to talk about miscarriage — I think people need to be better educated about pregnancy loss but as noted that is a subject for a different blog post — and not have it be considered something shameful or even worse, “no skin off your nose dear, you were only 7 weeks pregnant, get over it”.

Is it the fear of being shamed that causes us to hide our miscarriages as was true for my grandmother and her generation?  Is it the need for privacy and the accompanying silence during the first trimester that causes the secrecy?  Or is it the fear of the “just get over it” response that people don’t discuss this topic?

Well, I am going to discuss this topic.  I think I have enough experience to have some insight into the emotional aspects of pregnancy loss and I’ve done a ton of research on the topic, both for The Infertility Survival Handbook, my own personal curiosity and now for the revised and updated version of my book.

My final comment of the day is this.  Whether we choose to grieve in silence or in public, please don’t attack us for our choice in so doing; you need to understand that it is a tremendous blow to every woman (not to mention her partner) who experiences a pregnancy loss.  If you know someone who has shared this information with you, BE SUPPORTIVE.

I was dropping my son off at school recently and there is church nearby where I had parked my car.  Alongside the church is a beautiful garden and in that garden there was a headstone that caught my attention.  It was a headstone with the picture of a baby in-utero and it was dedicated to all the unborn children in the world. The headstone had the name of a baby who died in utero at about 5 month’s gestation.  It wasn’t some pro-life stunt; this was a real headstone for a real fetus who died leaving a family devastated.

If I can do it, I will try and post a picture of the headstone (without the family’s name).  I would like to thank that family for putting that headstone there and for the church for allowing it, because I now have a place to go and lay flowers on my “bad” days.  Because frankly, my girlfriends don’t get it.  This headstone gives me an outlet, a place that recognizes what I and so many others have been through.

And for those of you who have experienced a pregnancy loss you have my empathy and a giant cyber hug. To that celebrity who just announced her pregnancy at 6 months, you have my congratulations.  To that cyber author, I can’t post what I think about you, but I do hope that you never have to endure what so many of us have been through.

I try and stay out of highly controversial discussions in my industry and to avoid taking sides unless I feel passionately about the issue.  Sometimes blogging backfires (ala Sarah Palin’s recent “hit list” and the resulting death of 15 people).  But I have come across another of those issues that MUST be discussed, so I am hereby entering into the foray and it’s along the lines of my “what was Brooke Shields thinking” blogs.

Let’s get real for a moment and turn to a movie reel about egg donation.

I today learned that the “documentary” Eggsploitation was announced to have been nominated as best documentary.  When I read this on FaceBook this morning I almost vomitted.  For those of you who haven’t seen it . . . and please don’t see it if you are considering either becoming an egg donor or using an egg donor to build a family . . . it is highly inaccurate and inflammatory.  Please understand that I am trying to be nice.

The movie is an attempt by right wing, pro-life. Christian conservatives to reveal the “real world of egg donation”.  And Honey, it doesn’t.  It serves one purpose only, to promote an anti-IVF anti-egg donation agenda.  And in my mind it isn’t a documentary unless you are basing your documentary on something with a substantial amount of truth or accuracy.  A documentary by one definition is the “creative treatment of actuality”.  I will agree to the creative part with respect to this film, but not the actuality part (with one caveat, I will agree that egg donation exists as a means to build a family).  Another definition says that a documentary presents the facts with little or no additions.  Isn’t it a failure to present the facts if you only present one side, or one statistically insignificant, rare and otherwise atypical aspect of something, i.e. ONE fact when there are many facts to be discussed?

This film is based on untruths, inaccuracies, mythical stories, and an agenda. It veils itself as a documentary in order to lend some false sense of “truth” to the movie’s topic, the exploitation of egg donors and recipient families all to the benefit of the massive money generating industry of reproductive medicine.

The reproductive industry has responded many times in opposition to the film, as have many of my colleagues (for example, here is another blog on the topic http://weblog.prospectivefamilies.com/2011/01/13/what-more-is-there-to-say-about-eggsploitation/ ).  I think it’s pretty much a universal sentiment in my world, both professional and personal, that this movie has nothing to do with reality and is serving to mislead the general public about a viable and very successful means of family building, egg donation.

I really think it has gotten to the point that the movie is now exploiting itself for its own financial benefit.   They are now twisting all the negative media attention into an argument that if they weren’t so “right” about the industry that there wouldn’t be so many defensive and anti-Eggsploitation blogs/articles/reviews.  It’s kind of like the old saying “you know you’ve done something right if they’re shooting at you!”  And they are using that to drive more people into movie theaters.

Well I don’t think they’ve done anything right, I am disgusted by the MOVIE, and I am disgusted that anyone would think it was worthy of the title “best” in anything.  I haven’t spoken out before because I didn’t want to further publicize this movie and thus encourage people to watch it — even if it is to see how wrong it is.

And for the love of all that is sacred about the word FAMILY, I respectfully request that the movie industry get a grip and get real.  Don’t endorse this movie.  Many a Hollywood family has been created through the gift of egg donation.  Do you really want to slap your egg donor in the face like that?  By promoting, endorsing, and casting something that she did to help you have a baby and a family, in such a negative, illicit and patronizing light?

I’m not saying the world of reproductive medicine is perfect.  I have some bones to pick with things that happen in the world in which work.  And I will cut the producers of this movie and Hollywood some slack and say that if you are going to focus on the very creative aspects of the use of truth to create a dialog (albeit the wrong dialog) then okay maybe this is a documentary.  But it’s a documentary that I refuse to endorse on any level.

Someone can, and should, do a better job at looking at the gifts that third party assisted reproduction are giving to infertile families.

Blech Blech Blech.