OK, so I need some help, and I’m turning to you, dear readers, for your opinions and guidance. I do my best to be pretty understanding of all kinds of people and their perspectives. But there is something that I really don’t have much tolerance for, and I think it’s kind of callous of me. I’d like to get past it, but I need some help to do that.
As many of you know, I have very little interest in children, and no desire to have children of my own. Combine that with the immense pressure on women to tie their social value to children, the expectation that women want to and will have children, and the fact that fertility treatments are highly invasive for women, and the end result is that I have hardly any patience or sympathy for people who have fertility problems.
I just don’t understand why it is so bloody important for people to have “their own” children, biologically. There are SO MANY children who need loving homes out there. Would these infertile people really love another child less than “their own”? If so, I just don’t think these are people who should be parents in the first place! It seems so very selfish to insist on invasive and expensive medical procedures to conceive when there are so many kids out there who grow up in orphanages and the like. I kind of think it’s narcissistic, that these people who are so bent on having “their own” children really want their children to be little extensions of themselves. There are lots of ways to parent – why place so much emphasis on having biological children?
This all came up because of an article in my local paper, about infertile couples who want our provincial health care system to pay for their fertility treatments. I near lost it! (The Canadian health care system, if you don’t know, is not a national program – each province has a standard of care that they provide, according to what the province deems to be medically necessary. Cosmetic surgery, for example, is not covered in my province, for the most part. Life-saving treatments are, for the most part.) Fertility treatments are not medically necessary – it is not a health concern to be infertile, you don’t die from it, it isn’t something that interferes with physical well-being. I agree that it can certainly interfere with emotional well-being – but the treatment for that, in my mind, is psychotherapy, not fertility treatments that may or may not be successful and will most certainly be expensive and invasive. Also, what if it doesn’t work and people keep on doing it over and over and over again until they are happy with their results?
So that’s my feeling on infertility. It bugs me that people are so close-minded and selfish and narcissistic that they think they can only love “their own” children. I mean, it REALLY bugs me. Also, the nature of fertility treatments really bugs me too, and of course the state of society that ties women’s value to their fertility and ability to produce (perfect) children. BUGS ME. And I can’t wrap my head around it enough to be able to be sympathetic.
And I think that is rather insensitive of me. but there it is. So I welcome your comments on how I can reconcile these concerns!
UPDATE: Wow, there have been so many responses to this post! Since I wrote this, several people have linked to it on their own sites, mostly sites for and by people who have fertility issues. First, from my comment on discovering this:
oh my goodness, thank you all so much for contributing here! I truly appreciate it, as I am most sincere in wanting to understand more about why people feel it is necessary to have biological children and subject themselves to difficult medical procedures in order to do so… I am so very pleased and grateful that you’ve all taken the time to come over and try to help me work through my questions and concerns. I appreciate all of your perspectives. Welcome!
As there have been so many new voices here who are not regular readers, I wanted to point newcomers directly to my comment policy, which is mandatory to read and adhere to for comment publication. One of the most important points is to read all the comments before commenting yourself, as many things raised in the post get worked out in the comments. Every post is a work in progress.
Even as every post is a work in progress and open to debate, this post is especially so. From one of my comments:
please don’t take this post to be anything resembling an ‘argument’. I simply gathered together my raw feelings about infertility and threw them together in a post in order to try to learn more and overcome my insensitivity. I’m not arguing anything – arguments are carefully reasoned, and what I wrote in my post is certainly not that, just a collection of thoughts that I’m not proud of, and an admission that I need help to gain better understanding.
From another comment by me:
once again, thanks to all those who have made thoughtful comments here, as well as those who have written their own posts in response to this one… I would like to say that this post has been just what I hoped it would be, a wonderful opportunity to reach out and engage with people who have been very generous and kind enough to help me become better informed, as well as to help soften my heart. As I said, being someone who is quite open-minded, my narrow thoughts on this topic were disturbing me quite a bit. My deepest thanks to all who opened up and helped me get to know some different perspectives.
to those with harsh words for me: did you miss the point of the post entirely? I recognize and acknowledge that my thoughts on infertility have been insensitive, and the whole purpose of writing this post was to try to break through that. I would also encourage you to read the comment policy here, and refrain from breaking rule number one, which is basically akin to peeing on the carpet at my house, as well as rule number four, which is to read all the comments, and also rule number seven, attack the argument not the person. I should remind you that calling me names and accusing me of not being a Real Feminist is not really going to help you make your case. It’s just going to get your ass banned.
I’m willing to take a little bit of abuse for holding ignorant and insensitive views, even when at the same time I am reaching out to gain better understanding of infertility, but I think I’ll draw the line here. So if anyone else has nasty things to say to me along with your criticism of the position I outlined in the post, don’t expect to get published – if you want your points to be heard, please follow the examples of so many of the commenters here and be respectful. I understand if you’re upset and angry by what I wrote in the post, I really do. but, if you want to have your say, be mindful of how you do it. OK?
That’s all – once again, thank you to all who have contributed in a constructive way and who have helped to open my mind and soften my heart about the issue of infertility – it’s EXACTLY WHY I WROTE THE POST IN THE FIRST PLACE. My deepest thanks, and best of luck to you all.
UPDATE 2: Some commenters suggested I write a post about how your comments have impacted me and my thoughts about infertility. So I did. Read it here: infertility and a changed heart.
Unfortunately, I can’t help you get over this. I think that people who aren’t willing to adopt are not the sort of people who will make good parents.
Just to add fuel to the rant, think of it this way…if you were willing to adopt a child, you might have to also be willing to adopt and love a human being that isn’t the same colour as you. Hmm. Well…I think that just about says it all. As for the invasiveness and so forth, I’m also a bit ticked at how much research money is spent on that when the same money could be spent on other health issues.
I don’t think that the federal/provincial funding issue really matters. If it was a federal program it would still be annoying for the same reasons you gave.
I have the same kind of opinion about this. Why make more kids rather than saving kids who are in danger or abandoned?
According to a friend who’s weighing both options (FIV and adoption), the prices are similar (figures may vary between countries, my friend is Aussie).
There are many hurdles for adoption in rich countries. The process is very long, there are few kids to adopt from your own country. Foreign adoption is also a long process, certainly easier when you’ve got lots of cash (like for stars who seem to go baby-shopping without much previous notice). I know people who adopted in Kenya and who had to follow the rule : live 6 months in the country, visiting the orphanage regularly, before the adoption was final. It certainly changed their view of the world, and I think it is an interesting rule. But I’m not into impulse-baby-buying, I certainly feel it’s a life-changing decision for both parties. Others might dissent.
The money spent on FIV research also bothers me. Why not spend money on detecting and solving the environmental issues that are leading to a decrease of fertility in our polluted countries? Nah, there’s not much fun into such research, let’s rather spend time tailoring eggs to our needs.
Intolerance and Infertility:”I think it’s kind of callous of me. I’d like to get past it, but I need some help to do that”.
Before I respond, can I just ask you one thing? Do you really want to get past it, or are you seeking some justification or approval of your sentiments?
FemSoc66 – I don’t play those sort of games. My perspective, or standpoint, on the subject of children and everything to do with them is preventing me from seeing past the views I have outlined (others who have responded may be different), and I recognize that and would like to understand, at the least, the reasons why couples are so intent on having “their own” children rather than adopting or settling into a child-free life. I think it’s a good thing to be sympathetic and seek to understand something better, so I am asking for some help from different perspectives to do that.
The drive to reproduce is a very strong biological drive, perhaps the strongest. Why should it be surprising, then, that so many people follow this internal drive and place so much importance on it?
And there IS something different about kids that are your own, at least in my experience. I’m not exactly someone who likes to work with children. I had absolutely no interest (and still have no interest) in doing things for other people’s children. But I’d do anything and everything for my own daughter – it is just different and I don’t know if I can even describe exactly how that feels other than to say what I just said. There is a bond there that simply does not and cannot exist with someone else’s child, at least not with me.
Now perhaps those without children see that in those who have children and also feel a biological drive to have it.
I can think of a number of reasons why a couple might want to have biological children as opposed to adopting children, or, at the very least, might want to have a biological child before considering adoption.
Part of it is probably related to the biological drive that DBB mentions, but I think it goes further than that.
1. I think that there are social pressures at play. I don’t think that it’s a particularly good thing, but I think that they exist. There’s a sense that only biological children are really your children. There’s pressure on people to have their own kids, and if they don’t, there’s some kind of failure there. It’s shitty, obviously.
More important:
2. I think that part of it is has to do with how we view family in the Western world (it could be that other cultures also view family this way, but I don’t know). Adopted children don’t carry on and combine the traits of the parents. There are lots of reasons why people have children, and, quite frankly, I think that most of them are selfish reasons, but I don’t think that’s a problem. One of the reasons people have children is to create a legacy of sorts- they want the family line to continue. When people have children, think of how often the talk about how they child has her grandmother’s eyes, or his father’s hair, or his mother’s nose, or her grandfather’s smile. I don’t think that parents like that would love an adopted child less, it’s that there’s a distinct preference for children that you’re attached to in ways beyond love. There’s a genetic and physical attachment there. The child isn’t just loved by you- you’re a part of the child and the child is a part of you in a way that transcends most human relationships. I think that’s a strong bond, and it lets you pass your history to your child. You know where sie is coming from, and you can share the combined family histories with the child. That’s obviously going to be more important in some families than in others, but I think that’s an important drive to some people.
3. The pregnancy itself. I don’t think that one can discount the strong drive some women feel towards pregnancy. I know women who, even though they don’t want children, still claim to have a strong desire to be pregnant. Again, this can be thought of as selfish, and maybe it is, but I can definitely see how, if you want children, that you might want to do everything possible to become pregnant. There’s the experience of pregnancy, as well as the physical bonding that happens when you’re carrying a child.
I certainly wish more people would consider adoption, because I absolutely think it’s terrible how many children need homes and don’t find them, but I don’t think it’s horrible or wrong for a couple to want to have biological children, given how many forces there are in our society that push people in that direction anyway.
I think one thing to remember, too, is that there are unique challanges in either case. When you adopt a child, you’re rarely getting an infant, you’re usually getting a toddler or older, and that can be problematic for a lot of reasons.
Fertility treatments aren’t a route I would want to go, but what I’m saying is that I can sort of understand why it’s important for some people. I can only hope that some of the people who undergo them end up adopting children if they decide they want more.
My wife and I are a few months out from starting the process of getting her pregnant, so we’ve been thinking about this. And we have agreed that, if she has trouble conceiving via IVI/ICI (intravaginal and intracervical insemination: the pipette method) we might go up to IUI (actually getting the sperm into the uterus, which sounds extremely unpleasant to do) but won’t go for any fertility treatment beyond that.
Part of the reason I’m spelling this out in such detail is that ‘fertility treatment” as a category is very amorphous, and a lot depends on who is being ‘treated’ for what. In the US, queer women and single straight women trying to conceive often get shunted into the fertility paradigm, because we aren’t conceiving with a male partner around. There are also real differences in fertility between frozen and fresh sperm, meaning that people trying to conceive with frozen sperm may need more intervention (difference between ICI and IUI, for instance) to actually conceive.
The fact that some people want to get pregnant explains why they go through this (I have tried to get the wife to explain this to me repeatedly, to no avail). So does the fact that, when you’ve been trying to get pregnant, you get into a headspace that is all. about. pregnancy., such that I could very easily see ending up quite far down the road without ever making a conscious choice. Again, who gets shunted into the ‘fertility doctor’ discourse [in the US]? If you’re already there (because you’re over 35, because you’re queer, etc) the road is much shorter.
Also, not everyone has equal access to adoption. There are states in the US that ban adoption by queer folks; there are many countries that ban queer folks from adopting from them; there are domestic adoption agencies that won’t work with queer folks. Adoption also requires that the state approve of your lifestyle and ability to raise a child; some folks are scared, and some folks object to letting the state make that sort of decision for you. The only thing the fertility clinic cares about is that your checks don’t bounce.
The question of to what extent the state should pay for it is a different one–you make an implicit comparison to cosmetic surgery, and it’s got some merit. But–while my conclusion from learning about fertility issues is “WIFE. LET’S NOT DO THAT. PLEASE.”–I can see why the issue is so fraught for so many people.
It bugs me, too. But I also don’t feel any need to get over it.
What really drives me is people who spend tens of thousands of dollars (an adopted child’s college tuition, anyone?) in some desperate attempt to have just one child, and then they end up pumping out 5 or 6 kids! It makes me angry. Personally, I think any couple having more than 2 biological children is unethical.
As Angel and I get on in years the baby talk comes up more and more often. Part of our discussion is whether to skip the biological route altogether and just adopt. Definitely not a family planning discussion most couples have…
I also find it frustrating when fertility measures go wrong and we are suddenly celebrating the “miracle” of quintuplets. Not to mention that it seems to be okay for clinics to discard potential stem cells, but not as ethical for us to use them for life-saving research.
Having said that, I think there is something beautiful about having a child who combines the traits of both you and your loving partner if possible. Nevertheless, I am leaning toward adoption for my own family for many of the reasons described above.
Wanting to understand a widely held position is admirable. Being willing to change one’s position on gaining said understanding is similarly admirable.
I think that’s what TG means when she says “get over it”.
Roy raised a very good point about social pressures. In my opinion, the best way to deal with this is to attempt to alleviate the social pressures so that people are more comfortable with adoption.
Hmm, I agree with the comments about biological drive being the fuel behind those who “need” their own children.
There’s a very personal link between sexuality and self esteem though, and I think infertile parents are more thinking of their own incapacity to reproduce as a reflection of their failure as men or women.
That said, some in my family have been adopted. The result is that the parents love the adopted child just as much and maybe even more than their biological children and even the siblings feel the same way.
thank you everyone.
Roy, you raise some good points about the rationalization behind wanting biological children. I tend to feel like social reasons aren’t sufficient ones in many ways, but contradictorily (is that a word? guess so, didn’t come up on the Firefox spell-checker) I also feel that biological drives are not sufficient reason either, seeing as we overcome biological urges and drives all the time. hmmm. I’ll have to think about that.
Emily – thank you very much for your perspective on this. Of course, my heterocentric, hetero-privileged perspective didn’t take into account at all the difficulties facing queer couples who want to adopt. thanks for the slap upside the head on that front! I hope everything works out for you and your wife.
Interesting the desire to be pregnant thing that you and Roy both mentioned. I don’t get that one at all, so it didn’t even register in my framework. If I ever decided to become a parent, I would still not want to ever be pregnant.
Matthew – might want to expand on why you think having more than 2 kids is unethical. I’m pretty sure I know why you think so, but then again I know you really well in real life.
I also find myself annoyed at the multiple births thing, and I think this is related to my disdain for religion in general as interfering with logical medical decisions in favour of the life and health of pregnant women and their foetuses. GRRRR.
Aaron – good call on the link between sexuality and reproduction and fulfilling gender roles. very insightful.
Oh wow! I feel like the pressure for women to go to college and have a ‘career’ is far greater than the pressure to have children.
Perhaps you don’t understand the drive to have a child of your own because you don’t understand the feeling that creating someone out of a love you and your partner share feels so right. And it most certainly is NOT selfish.
How about the fact that since infertility treatments AREN’T covered and these couples pay out of pocket to conceive their children they are more likely the parents that can afford to take care of their children?
No I am not infertile and didn’t deal with infertility ~ my two daughters were conceived naturally.
You would begrudge these women the desire to feel the bond that is created with your child while the child is in utero. I am guessing since you have no children of your own that you have no idea what that bond is or how strong it is.
Is adoption really an answer? How long do people wait to adopt? I know here it is a long process and can also cost thousands of dollars ~ so no money spent on IVF would not be put away for an adopted childs college ~ it would be spent in adoption and legal fees.
Good luck on your journey to get past your insensitivity.
I guess my only question is, why should infertile couples be the only ones asked to adopt the world’s unwanted children? IMO, every couple that has biological children (assuming the children are well taken care of) should be willing to adopt at least one child.
I don’t think I would love an adopted child any less than a bio child and, in fact, have always wanted to adopt, even before I knew I would struggle with infertility. But why is it selfish of me to want a child that is half me, half my husband? Why is it selfish to want something that the large majority of couples achieve without even trying? The biological urge to reproduce with the partner of your choice is absolutely intense. Some people get over it once their “clock” stops ticking, but for most of us we have to go through all the attempts that we can stand, years of therapy and finally just forcing ourselves to move on (either by adopting or living child-free).
Infertility is absolutely a medical problem. There are diagnosed medical reasons why my body will not reproduce without medical help. I won’t go into the insurance topic, because I don’t know anything about Canadian insurance (or much about American insurances for that matter).
I tend to be sceptical of biology/it’s natural arguments because they are often used to excuse ugly behavior, and as TG points out, we overcome or urges all the time. However in this case, I *do* think that biology plays a part, and I think it is also intertwined quite deeply with societal pressures. This might be an extreme case taken out of context, but here’s an example: a few weeks ago Lauren at Faux Real Tho wrote a bit about a white woman who married an Indian man. They had a kid, and the woman found herself disturbed when the child was born and was not (duh!) white. Take a look at some of the things the woman Lauren critiques wrote:
Pretty much everything Roy said in #1 and #2 is summed up right there. And it adds to Bongo Mongo’s comment about being willing to adopt a child of a different color in a way that disturbs me. Now, all of this was written as a sort of defense/admission of guilt peice, which I think Lauren was right to call out as racist bs, but I also think that this woman felt more comfortable saying these things (in a national newspaper no less) because she assumed that what she is saying is going to resonate with a lot of society. Notice that it’s taken as a given that there’s something wrong with adoption. WTF???
The drive to have fulfill your biological role as a parent is hard to describe. Many people spend years not wanting children to all of the sudden wake up and want them more than anything. Maybe you will, maybe you won’t. I can’t say where the urge came from or exactly when it happened, but here I am, going through IVF.
It’s very hard to understand or to explain unless you’ve been through it. I never agreed with IVF. I thought it was selfish and just a tad bit morally wrong. After 2 years of infertility we even went so far as to choose an adoption agency and prepare all of our paperwork. Our family and friends were even writing letters for us. To make a long story short, the Country’s program changed so we stopped pursuing it for the moment. What I don’t think people understand about adoption is that it’s just as invasive to your personal life as fertility treatments are to your body and in many cases, it’s more expensive. Just because a you embark on the adoption process does not mean you will get a child. There are long waits, mothers who change their minds, and even scammers.
In all of my time on infertility and adoption forums I have only a few times hear someone say they don’t think they could love a child that wasn’t biologically theirs. Most fear the costs, the invasion of their personal life, and desire the complete parenting experience from birth.
The question I would like to raise to those who’ve insinuated that infertile couples should be the ones to shoulder the responsibility of adopting all of the world’s orphans, I ask you: How many children have you adopted? Why do you choose not to? Are you even aware of the process or of all the potential complications involved? Adoption is not an easy path nor it is a fast one. Could you raise a child of a different race with special needs? Could you, with no experience raising children, feel comfortable effectively parenting a teenager? What about a child with behavior and anger issues? The fact of the matter is, infertility does not equate to sainthood. If you would question whether or not you’d be able to take on those challenges, then it should come as no surprise to you that infertile couples do too.
The motives of parents who successfully have biological children are rarely, if ever, questioned. I think to force someone to be open to adoption purely based on their ability to reproduce is closed-minded. If one really cared about the orphaned children in the world, they would advocate adoption for ALL people, not just infertile couples to include themselves.
Infertility and adoption is not cut and dry. Why? Because people’s feelings, lives, and the unexplainable biological force to reproduce are involved. It doesn’t help that the media portrays us as a bunch of crazed lunatics and society looks down on us for trying to correct valid medical conditions they perceive to be self-inflicted.
So you ask how can one get over this? I guess you can start the next time you’re standing in a large crowd. Stop and take a look around you and acknowledge that 1 out of every 8 people in that room with have some sort of fertility problems. See those people for what they are, human beings with dreams like most other people: to get married to the man or woman they love, and to make a family with that person.
And if money is still on your mind you can also note that fertility treatments only account for .07% of all health care costs and only 3% of infertility treatments are for IVF.
I know your words have been very hurtful for some readers but I just find them to be ignorant. I understand them because I used to feel the same way. I know it’s completely cliche’ but you REALLY don’t know what you’ll do until you’re put into a situation. I used to say I’d never do IVF and yet here I am. And like I said before, I can’t pinpoint when or why my feelings changed, they just did.
If you can try to explore the processes involved with infertility and the people affected by it with an open and loving spirit and I think you will find your answers.
Perpetuity, the drive to perpetuate yourself.
My husband and I have been trying to have a family for 3 years now. Obviously these have been unsuccessful three years. We have done some fertility treatment but have not yet pursued IVF as there have been some kinks in the road.
Our desire for children is pretty simple. We both love children with all of our hearts and want the opportunity to extend our lives through little ones.
Up until now we have generally pursued the biological routes and are now considering adoption. I have varying feelings on this.
Having had two failed pregnancies, I am scared to death having yet another similarly devestating blow. However it breaks my heart to think I won’t see my husband’s eyes beaming out of a baby or have our combined attributes uniquely mixed in a new human life.
When considering adoption there are three major options: 1) private adoption 2) adoption via social services 3) adopting overseas. My thoughts on each of the following are as follows:
Private adoption:
A wonderful option if all the right variables fall into place. However nowadays with private adoption there is expected to be an ongoing relationship with the birth mother. This can be a good thing, yet there is always this reminder that the child is not all ours.
I also have a mix of personal issues with this option. The waiting lists are chalk full of excellent candidates for parenting. People who are willing to wait for years for a placement. The kids placed via this method aren’t exactly in need. We live in a great country with amazing opportunities which will be extended to these kidlets.
Adoption via Social Services
I am presently exploring this route at this point. These children certainly come out of a place of need. The flip side is that many of these children present with disabilities, with FAS being the primary challenge. Don’t get me wrong, my heart is big enough for any child and I would be willing to except such challenges if that is what is called of me. I would love that child with all of my heart. Yet sometimes the unfairness of it all jumps up to bite me. One child that I have become aquainted with is the fourth child of a woman who is in and out of jail and has drank through all of her pregnancies. Why can’t I, a fairly decent person, have a chance to have a pregnancy where I will do everything in my power not to compromise the well-being of the next generation. I know disabilities happen regardless and that does not subtract from the worth of an individual, but I can at least do my part.
International Adoption
I actually find this option very appealing. There are so many children waiting for families who ask only to be loved and sheltered. However this option costs a minimum of $20,000 and can take several years to process. I think I may be more inclined to consider this down the road.
We find ourselves stuck between a rock and a hard place. Sure, our dream for kids may be somewhat selfishly based- but what dream isn’t? Meanwhile our hearts are breaking.
Thank you, Thinker Girl, for opening up this discussion. My apologies for my extended ramblings. I hope that they make sense.
Did you ever consider that perhaps, some couples who want their own biological child, also want to adopt?
Did you know that adoption can cost just as much, if not more than IVF?
Some people do have this incredible urge to have their own child. I realize some people do not, and more power to them! However, that doesn’t mean you have to be insensitive to those of us who do wish to have a biological child. I do not think I can only love my own biological child. That is ridiculous. I want to have a biological child AND adopt.
I was wondering, you said, “the nature of fertility treatments bugs me too” What exactly bugs you? You also put: “the state of society that ties women’s value to their fertility and ability to produce (perfect) children. BUGS ME.” I agree that there is way too much value put on women having a “perfect” life and society does tend to view women who cannot or choose not to have children as less, and I totally disagree with this. However, just because I do not agree with the pressures of society does not mean that I do not want my own biological child. That also doesn’t necessarily mean I’m “giving in” to society. Sure, there are women who do “give in” and think their life should fit a certain mold. I assure you, I am not that. I simply want my own child.
I also suffer from a medical condition, PCOS, that makes it difficult for me to conceive. However, this is a condition that affects more than just fertility. It is essential that women who have this condition get treatment for it. I think that many women tend to think of it only as a fertility disease, and it is not. Not ovulating for long periods of time is not healthy. So it goes beyond fertility. And in this case, yes, you could essentially die from it. If you do not ovulate on your own, you eventually will get cervical cancer. So treatment for PCOS IS medically necessary.
I get that for someone who does not wish to have their own children, it is hard to understand someone who desperately wants a biological child. But I urge you to talk to some women who do want children, women who suffer from infertility. You may not agree with everyone procreating, but I think you can start to understand.
This is an interesting and thought-provoking discussion. I am a huge supporter of adoption – and honestly admire those who go choose to go that route. The key word there is “choose”. Whether or not to have children, whether or not to pursue fertility treatments, whether or not to adopt are all choices that are personal. To call those who choose to have bio children and don’t adopt “selfish” seems a bit narrow to me. There are many reasons (some outlined above), and none of us can possibly imagine every situation.
If I were single, I would adopt in a heartbeat (a child of ANY race, by the way). However, my husband has had terrible experiences with adoption in his family and cannot consider going that route. So, in our situation, having a bio child is our only option (and it isn’t as easy as we thought!)
I totally agree with folkrockgirl about the media glamorizing multiple births. That was one of the reasons we were hesitant to pursue fertility treatments – we didn’t want a litter! My doctor agrees and his goal is for women to have a healthy SINGLE pregnancy. I think the medical community has some responsibility as well. Speaking of the medical community – we all have things we don’t think $$ should be spent on for research. For me, I’d much prefer they find out why some people are unable to reproduce than find multiple ways for a 65-year-old man to have sex.
Just thought I’d add my 2 cents with a slightly different perspective.
Roy pretty much summed a lot of it up for me too, re: being pregnant, the bio-drive etc.
There is also the birth experience itself which for me was very meaningful, almost spiritual.
Having said that, I know many women who have no desire to experience any such thing, and I fully support any woman’s decision not to have children at all, to have them through a fertility programme, or to adopt them. So long as it’s her choice I’m fine with it. And although I also find it hard to understand when I see people putting themselves through lengthy IVF programmes, I accept that that’s the way they want to go; I don’t feel it’s something I should comment on, having never known the feeling of not being able to have my own children.
As for it being invasive, well the adoption system is highly invasive too and involves much nosing and prying into people’s lives. It’s also (in my country at least) biased heavily in favour of nice white middle or upper working class hetero couples who live in a house with a picket fence in the suburbs.
I have no doubt that were I to approach an adoption agency and lay my life open for people to judge me/my lifestyle, then I would not pass their test. I would not be considered “fit” to raise a child.
I’m infertile, and going through IVF in order to hopefully have a child. I’ll offer my viewpoint.
You say you don’t want children. I’m okay with that. I am certain that there are people who aren’t. I know friends of mine who have decided not to have children do face a lot of pressure for their decision, because it’s not “normal”. I know sometimes they are called selfish because they wish to spend their time and money and life on their own, instead of raising a child.
I don’t think it’s right to criticise or judge someone on their choice to not have a child. If it’s not right for them it’s a very personal decision and it’s one you have to live with the rest of your life.
On the flip side I don’t think it’s right or fair to criticise someone for wanting to HAVE a child (or for how they wish to have a child). It’s a very personal decision. I want to have a child. I want to CARRY a child inside me. And that desire is very very strong – far stronger than I ever anticipated. (Growing up I had no interest in ever having children. I was absolutely not one of those girls who grew up planning her wedding or dreaming of having babies.)
I just think it’s a very slippery slope to start defining something as “selfish”. To me wanting to have a child is the farthest thing from selfish. It’s terrifying, in a way. You give up your life for your child.
Adoption is usually a tough decision to come to. Even friends of mine who have chosen the path of adoption had to first mourn the loss of ever having a biological connection. For someone who doesn’t understand the desire to have a child it may be hard to fathom, and I understand that.
Here’s my position on insurance coverage: I think a person’s decision to have a child should be covered. And I think that a woman’s decision to NOT have a child – whether that means contraception costs, surgical sterilization, or abortion – should ALSO be covered. Prenatal care for pregnant women is already covered by pretty much every insurance everywhere.
My body doesn’t work right. It may not be life-threatening, but there is something still something very wrong. Most of the things you go to the doctor for – that are covered by insurance – it’s not life-threatening. Heck I could go to the doctor to have a wart removed and it would be covered by insurance. So who gets to decide what is “important enough”? Infertility is a disease. Something is out of whack, something is broken. There are 16 year olds who get pregnant while having a drunken one-night fling. How is it fair that they get what I want so very very badly, yet I have to shell out thousands of dollars even for a chance? Whether by adoption or infertilty treatments it is very expensive, and very invasive. And people who don’t want children *that badly* will choose to just life without children. The ones who go through with the treatments or the adoption screening are the ones who really honestly want a child.
Someone mentioned quintuplets/sextuplets. I get very angry when I hear of these cases. For one thing, they’re almost always due to oral medication (very cheap, very non-invasive), not in-vitro. Doctors frequently don’t do a lot of monitoring and can often hand out the medication far too willingly, without really knowing the result it’s going to have. And yes, I think that’s wrong. It’s the doctor’s responsibility to watch carefully to see what effect the medication has and prevent any possibility of high-order multiples. High-order multiples have a HUGE mortality rate, are almost guaranteed to be born premature, and to have serious health problems. And the cost of just a couple of these high-order multiples can be astronomical – and those costs ARE COVERED by all insurance as prenatal/pediatric care. Even twins or triplets generally require a stay in the NICU, requiring hundreds of thousands of dollars.
By offering coverage for infertility treatments couples will not need to take such desperate chances. If you only have one shot at success you’re probably going to be very aggressive and take higher-risk options. But if you have several cycles paid for, you can afford to try the smallest dose required. If it doesn’t work, you can try again, it’s okay. And studies have shown (according to RESOLVE) that the costs of insurance covering infertility treatment would actually be less than them covering all these higher-order multiples.
Just as I respect your decision to not have a child, I hope you can come to respect my decision to try to have one.
I hope that gives you a better understanding.
Ditto.
The question of whether Canada’s provincial health care system should pay for fertility treatments seems to have gotten lost in all of the “why people want to have their own kids” discussion. I’m in the U.S., so I don’t fully understand how the system works, but my gut instinct says yes. I’m curious to know what other Canadians (anyone really) think.
(An aside: btw, I keep forgetting to mention this, but I LOVE your blog name, Roy.)
I’m Canadian and my tax dollars go towards abortions, so they should also cover infertility. I also pay for people who smoke and destroy their lungs, drink and destroy their livers, and I pay for he cost associated with FAS and FASD. I don’t think I have the right to call anyone selfish for not wanting to adopt, it’s a personal choice. I would love to have a child of my own, and I’ve spent quite a bit to do so, unsuccessfully I might ad. I think you can also ask why people who can have children instead of having three of their own have two and adopt one. Sounds presumptiuous of me to suggest that. Maybe, but so does assuming one is selfish for wanting to experience the obvious joy of creating a baby of your own and bringing into the world. I think it’s all too easy to judge if you don’t want children, or if you’ve had no problem conceiving and giving birth to them.
I’m so glad that you have decided not to reproduce. In my opinion, you are a selfish and narcissistic and would be a terrible parent.
If you really want your opinion on this changed, spend a little time talking to someone suffering from infertility. Do some research on the treatments and on the alternatives. You obviously don’t know very much about the subject, not nearly enough to warrant your harsh words and cruel judgment.
oh my goodness, thank you all so much for contributing here! I truly appreciate it, as I am most sincere in wanting to understand more about why people feel it is necessary to have biological children and subject themselves to difficult medical procedures in order to do so. I assume that this post has been linked to on an online forum for women with fertility problems (correct me if I’m wrong), and I am so very pleased and grateful that you’ve all taken the time to come over and try to help me work through my questions and concerns. I appreciate all of your perspectives. Welcome!
Suze – you wrote: “Oh wow! I feel like the pressure for women to go to college and have a ‘career’ is far greater than the pressure to have children.”
as a woman who does not have or want children, believe me, the pressure is on. from “oh, but you MUST have children!” to “you’ll change your mind” to “you feel differently about your own” to “you’re not a real woman until you have children” – I’ve heard it all. I have a deep suspicion that these comments would not be directed toward me if I was a man. That is my main objection – the assumption that just because I’m a woman, I will want to have children. I’m not much for social pressures.
you wrote: “How about the fact that since infertility treatments AREN’T covered and these couples pay out of pocket to conceive their children they are more likely the parents that can afford to take care of their children?”
careful there – it sounds like you’re on a slippery slope to saying that the poor shouldn’t breed…. I’m sure that’s not what you mean at all, but the poor are so often presumed to be bad parents because they can’t afford to provide their kids with every luxury known to humankind. that kind of thinking (not saying it’s yours, just that your comment is on a slippery slope to it) has led to a whole whack of problems like forced sterilization and coerced long-term birth control for poor women, and more specifically poor women of colour, both here in the west and around the world in the guise of western ‘development’.
Many of you have mentioned that it is also very expensive to adopt, and that adoption procedures are invasive as well, in terms of the scrutinizing families are subjected to. very true, thanks for that.
Angie – thank you for commenting. I didn’t mean to imply that ONLY infertile couples should be adopting. I think adoption should be given equal consideration as reproduction for those couples wanting to raise a family.
hmmm, I’m concerned about the idea of infertility as abnormal, or a medical condition. what’s normal, anyway? when infertility is spun that way, women’s bodies become medicalized in ways that I find problematic. I feel like medicine is ruining us as a species, that we run around trying to fix everything that is different about us and our bodies instead of a more radical proposition of accepting differences and getting rid of the concept of “normal”. Sorry if that’s a bit abstract, but this is a feminist philosophy blog!
but what I really said was that infertility treatments are not medically necessary for the health and well-being of the couple in question. Infertility isn’t life-threatening in the same way as heart disease or cancer.
Kevin – thanks for those quotes. YIKES. that is some racist bullshit right there, for sure.
Daisy – thanks so much. As I said above, I didn’t mean to imply that ONLY infertile couples should adopt. I should have been clearer on that point, thanks for bringing it up.
the questions you raise are most excellent, about what kinds of children people are willing to bring into their families. I find the trend toward aborting fetuses that are less than perfect according to some arbitrary standard society has forged very problematic. I think these are questions every couple should ask before they begin to have a family. I would never ever question a woman’s right to decide the course of her life, including the right to abort a fetus on any grounds, but I do think this issue is more deeply tied to our conception of (dis)ability, and quite often, to sexism. Did you know that when a Canadian researcher developed a way to diagnose fetuses with genetic anomalies prior to implantation, the number one genetic condition couples who contacted him were concerned about preventing was the XX chromosome? Yes, the number one reason people contacted him was to prevent having a girl. He stopped the research and refused to perform PGD (pre-implantation genetic diagnosis) anymore. (thank god!)
You wrote: “I know your words have been very hurtful for some readers but I just find them to be ignorant.”
I’m sorry if what I’ve written has been hurtful to some readers. I know this is a very emotionally difficult subject for many people. Thank you for recognizing that I wrote this with the full intention of exploring what I am ignorant about, with the help of my readers, to try to get past what I know is an insensitivity on my part.
Bethany – thanks for sharing your insights into adoption options. Very helpful and informative!
Heather – what bugs me about the nature of fertility treatments is two-fold – that they are highly invasive, and that the woman bears the entire burden (unless you call watching some porn and jerking off into a cup a burden). It is the woman’s body that becomes medicalized, even when the fertility problem is low sperm count. It is her body that is subjected to daily injections, hormonal fluctuations, procedures to extract eggs, procedures to implant sperm, procedures to implant fertilized eggs, and sometimes procedures to minimize the number of fetuses she carries to term.
Yes, as I said, I wrote this to try to become less insensitive to infertility. Thank you for participating here to help me do that.
so yes, the medical condition causing your infertility is dangerous to your health, and treatment is medically necessary. that’s not really what I meant – of course I would never want to prevent anyone from having treatments for a life-threatening condition! god I am not that insensitive!
Allison – thanks! yes, I’m on the same page as you with multiple births. It’s just not a good idea, medically. And I think a lot of the reason why women end up having multiple births is because they can’t afford multiple rounds of fertility treatments, and also because of a conservative stance on abortion. The best way to deal with multiple births is to selectively abort some of the fetuses, and too many people are not willing to do that, so they end up risking their own and their fetuses’ lives. It’s craziness, I tell ya!
you said, “For me, I’d much prefer they find out why some people are unable to reproduce than find multiple ways for a 65-year-old man to have sex.”
ha ha, I’m with you on that one for sure!
FemSoc66 – thanks for weighing in.
Natalie – oh my gosh, thank you for commenting! I am officially adopting your view on insurance coverage for infertility treatments! I remember saying to my mother, with whom I was discussing the article I mentioned in the post, that I would feel better about covering fertility treatments if every other procedure that was not medically necessary was also covered. It’s that line that has been drawn that causes me to feel discomfort with covering fertility treatments; since the line has been drawn, I can’t agree with coverage. But, the answer is, of course, as it always is, to challenge the status quo!
I’d also like to see more financial help given to those who adopt.
re: multiple births – many couples end up having multiple fertilized eggs implanted in an effort to maximize their chances of one of them taking. I’m fairly certain this is normal procedure – correct me if I’m wrong? but you wrote: “If you only have one shot at success you’re probably going to be very aggressive and take higher-risk options. But if you have several cycles paid for, you can afford to try the smallest dose required.”
This makes perfect sense to me. I’m all for reducing the invasiveness of fertility treatments. my question, though, is: repeating the cycle, isn’t that going to be just as if not more invasive? how to balance out these options?
the road less travelled – you wrote: “I think it’s all too easy to judge if you don’t want children, or if you’ve had no problem conceiving and giving birth to them.”
yes, I agree, and that’s why I wrote this post. thanks for contributing. Yes, you’re right, there are a lot of things that are covered by our insurance that many people don’t feel too happy about having to pay for through our taxes. good point.
thank you to all. Many of you seem to take issue with me saying that infertile couples going through fertility treatments are selfish. I don’t blame you, nobody likes to be called selfish. I don’t like it either when people say that I’m selfish because I don’t want children. If it makes you feel any better, I was really referring to those who would never even consider adoption because they only want “their own” children. But, I kind of think wanting to have children at all is a selfish thing to do, considering the state of the world. I kind of take the “look after the ones we’ve got” stance – there’s so much work to be done to create a better society, a better world, and the exclusionary attitude some people have toward “other people’s children” is not really helping. Never mind the huge negative impact more western children have on the environment.
anyway, thanks again to everyone for your comments.
ECH – looks like we posted at the same time.
I actually do know a fair bit about infertility treatments, from research I’ve done on bioethics, and, I have a friend who underwent numerous fertility treatments in a very long effort to have children. I spent a lot of time hearing from her all about her various treatments and procedures as well as her desires to have “her own” children – they never considered adoption at all. nevertheless, I recognized that I am not sensitive to infertile couples and I wrote this post to try to gain better understanding and overcome that insensitivity. and for that you have insults for me?
nice. real nice. do recall that this is MY blog you’ve traipsed into, and you’re here on my good will. which has expired.
Thinking Girl – I am really happy to read your responses. I took the time to write a wordy comment because I felt like you’d really read it, and I’m so happy to see that I was right.
“re: multiple births – many couples end up having multiple fertilized eggs implanted in an effort to maximize their chances of one of them taking. I’m fairly certain this is normal procedure – correct me if I’m wrong? but you wrote: “If you only have one shot at success you’re probably going to be very aggressive and take higher-risk options. But if you have several cycles paid for, you can afford to try the smallest dose required.”
This makes perfect sense to me. I’m all for reducing the invasiveness of fertility treatments. my question, though, is: repeating the cycle, isn’t that going to be just as if not more invasive? how to balance out these options?”
Honestly not very many embryos are put back normally. Typically it’s two embryos (so yes a high risk of twins), and very rarely is it three or more – usually the only cases where more are put back are where the embryos are of very poor quality. (I actually heard an interesting lecture on treatments in Europe – some countries there do have covered IVF, but they mandate only one or two embryos be implanted. Which in MOST cases is fine, but there are cases where the embryos are of VERY poor quality and in the doctor’s expert opinion only implanting one has very very little chance of working. So it’s a very hard line to draw, and there are no rules right now. You just have to hope you have a very good doctor.) There ARE cases where an embryo splits into identical twins (or, heaven forbid, triplets), and the risk of that IS higher than “normal” cycles (where no treatment is taken), but it’s still very small. I myself am a big fan of single embryo transfers, and had my embryos given me the chance that’s what I would have done.
Your point about which being worse is a very valid one and it’s very personal. For me I wouldn’t really mind doing several cycles if money weren’t an issue. Most of my stress comes from worrying about how we’re going to handle the cost. It is very, very hard emotionally. But I would absolutely prefer to go through several cycles than get pregnant with triplets.
You wrote in someone else’s reply: “but what I really said was that infertility treatments are not medically necessary for the health and well-being of the couple in question. Infertility isn’t life-threatening in the same way as heart disease or cancer.”
Something else I forgot to note in my original post: several studies have been performed on the link between infertility and stress. These studies have found that the stress and emotional duress that couples deal with while going through infertility is on the same level as someone dealing with cancer. So while it isn’t physically as damaging (usually – there are conditions that cause infertility that are physically damaging as well, such as endometriosis which can be severely painful and cause many othe problems), it is just as emotionally damaging. And couples who deal with infertility frequently have marital problems. Just like any other life crisis that causes that much stress, it can be very hard on a partnership.
One thing I ought to mention: for me treating the infertility went beyond wanting to have a child. There’s a need in me to know why. What’s wrong. Is it something that could get progressively worse? Is it causing other problems? I was originally “diagnosed” with “unexplained infertility” and it drove me freaking crazy! I wanted them to find out what was wrong! Not just to get around the problem, but to FIND the problem and tell me, “Oh, that’s why.”
Oh, and PS, it ticks off us infertile women that the men have it so easy, too. It’s a brave husband who dares to moan about his “aweful” experience in the ‘private room’. They don’t usually get a very polite response.
I was doing a Google Blog search today under the keyword for “infertility” when I came across your blog. As a woman dealing with infertility, I felt I had to post this to my support group. I just wanted other people’s opinions on your stance.
At first, I have to admit I was hurt and angry when I read some of what you had to say. But you have since clarified what you intended to say and I no longer feel angry. If anything, you seem like you sincerely want to learn more about our situation and I would like to give more insight. The ladies above are terrific woman and they are probably much more articulate than I but I will do my best to see how I can add value to our communication.
While you and I want different things and have chosen different paths in life, I see that we are more similar than I first realized. There is a certain stigma against infertile women. We are often told that our medical problems are all in our head and that we “just have to relax” in order to have a child. While stress can (rarely) cause infertility, most cases cannot be cured with a trip to the beach or a nice bath. Just as someone with cancer will not beat it by doing the same. And I see that you also suffer from a stigma in society. That all women are not complete unless they have children, or that your life holds less meaning if you decide not to live up to this standard. I completely sympathize with you. Your choices are just that – YOUR choices. And I completely support a childfree lifestyle.
I have had 2 miscarriages during my battle with infertility, the latest being at 11.5 weeks on July 9. Some people may ask “why try again?” or “why put yourself through this misery if you can adopt?”. And I really don’t have an answer. It is inherent in me that I want to be a mother. I want to create a life with my husband. That may be selfish, but to want anything in life is to be selfish really isn’t it?
I believe adoption is a wonderful option for fertiles and infertiles alike. But adoption isn’t the answer for everyone. For example, my husband has a felony on his record for breaking into a friend’s house when he was 18 years old. The parents of his friend pressed charges and he now has a record. Even though he has straighted up and now has a Masters degree and a successful career, he still cannot get a government security clearance. We are afraid that because of something he did almost 11 years ago, we will be deemed “unfit” parents. So, even though we would consider adoption, it may not be an option for us. Where do we go from here? Well, we could try to find a surrogate. But what if I want to experience the bonding experience of pregnancy? That only leaves me with IVF, or possibly IUI depending on the nature of my diagnosis.
Also, you are very correct when you mention that the burden of IF treatment lies mainly with the woman. But having a semen analysis is just one part of the puzzle for men. In cases of Male Factor Infertility, there are many men who have amorphous sperm and they must take C.lomid or other drugs to try to correct the problem. Some men have a vericocele of the testicle that requires surgical intervention before IVF can be considered. I just wanted you to know that while women do carry most of the burden, there are many men who carry a heavy burden themselves.
And as for infertility coverage, I can only go by how insurance is mandated in the United States. I understand how people could see IF as medically unnecessary but what about someone who has lost a leg or an arm and wishes to have a prosthetic device? It isn’t medically necessary but may be covered. And many insurance companies say they won’t cover IF treatment because it is a lifestyle choice. But pregnancy is a lifestyle choice and I pay for maternity benefits for others that I can’t use. Also, smoking is a lifestyle choice and I have to pay benefits for someone’s COPD or emphysema. I just think there is this fine line and I guess it has been drawn, but since I am knee deep in infertility, I guess I can clearly see the inconsistency.
I’m so sorry to ramble on your post but I just felt I should give some input as well. I really do hope that we have been able to give you some insight into our condition and that we have represented the infertile community in a positive light. I also hope that you are able to overcome your insensitivity.
If you wish to know more, I also have a blog on which I discuss my infertility. I am always looking for ways to find more readers.
Best regards,
Kristen
I hate to see the antagonism between these two groups. Those for whom parenting is important, and those for whom it is not. Acceptance and understanding of each other’s lifestyle choices instead of judgement would be a better path surely?
I really can’t buy into the school of thought that says it’s selfish to have children because of all the world’s ills etc. Maybe I’m overly optimistic but I believe that it will be my children’s generation who will heal the world’s aches and pains. I’m proud to have raised two people who are caring, tolerant, informed and possessed of a finely-tuned social conscience. And I know many single women who are doing or have done the same.
My relationships with my children are also far and away the most meaningful I will ever have. They are the most wonderful friends I will ever have. Together we have created an extremely loving and mutually supportive environment, a soft place to land at the end of each day. This helps enable us to develop and grow in a personal and spiritual way, and contribute to society positively and effectively.
I struggle to understand why that might be considered selfish or unimportant to childless people.
As I said earlier, I’m fully supportive of people who choose not to have children. The right to choose has played a crucial role in the liberation of our gender and I would fight tooth and nail for us to keep that right. So it’s disappointing not to receive support in return for my own particular choice re: children.
I know what it’s like to have to defend your lifestyle choices to people who want everyone to just be “normal” ie; just like they are. It can be tedious at times, but I believe that other people can only pressure us as much as we allow them to. So what if annoying people keep asking you when you’re going to have kids? Use the opportunity to educate them and inform them that not everyone has to be like them. Don’t fall into the trap of taking out your resentment on those people who did live up to society’s expectations by having children.
Another two cents:
I think it is worthwhile to separate wanting to have children and wanting a family. Hopefully those who want children also want a family, but your question seems to be whether there are rational grounds for wanting to have a child other than wanting to have a family and I think there are.
When TheWife and I decided to have kids, we also decided to make a feminist social statement and use her last name (she kept it, of course) if we had a girl and use my last name if we had a boy instead of the child always taking the father’s surname. We had a daughter and followed through. A few days later, my wife was in tears over the decision saying, “there’s no you in her name.” And that’s just a name. (We changed her name and our kids are now hyphenated.)
I think part of going into having children is to think about what it would be like to create a new life that embodies those properties of your own that you are proudest of and those qualities you admire most in your partner. Since some of those properties are heritable, I don’t think you can help but yearn on some level for the additions to your family to carry on a part of what you love most about who love most. You love your partner and you know you’ll love your child, so naturally you want to endow your child with what you love so much in your partner.
Maybe it’s silly, but I think it’s part of what’s going on upstairs.
Good catch, SteveG!
Not at all silly–seeing the qualities of your partner and yourself, combined in another living being is, for me, the only attraction I can think of to having biological children. Whenever I weigh the decision between adoption and gettin’ it on, this one factor almost outweighs all the others, from both side of the argument, combined. It’s definitely a powerful temptation.
But still, personally, having more than 2 biological children is unethical. It leads to population explosions that are unsustainable and contributes to mass-consumption of the Earth’s resources. Ever since I was a child (in a family of 4 boys) anything more has never made sense to me. (Maybe if you lived on a farm in the 1800s, but not these days.) Not to mention all those kids who wait to be adopted in the meantime.
On a side note: Thanks Kevin, and for linking, as well. Much appreciated. =D
I think children and creating something that outlives us, a novel or painting or a blog, are all instinctive attempts at immortality. We want something of ourselves to carry on after us. Plato went so far as to say, if we’re talented, we can leave behind an amazing creation, like an epic poem or something, but if we’re not so bright, the best we can do is have kids.
Adopting just doesn’t fulfill this survival-of-the-individual need to keep the genes alive. I think that’s also why parents get a little antsy for grandkids once they’re in their later years. It’s not just to make you suffer like they did. It’s to keep those genes going beyond the first round.
I never actually desired kids, but I did desire sex. So now I’ve got more than my ethical allowance. Sorry.
Or should I say, Thanks, Thinking Girl, for balancing the equation for me. I’ll have 3 and you have 0, and together, we’re both under!
(NOTE: I’m officially claiming TG to help decrease my child quota. Don’t anyone else jump on that bandwagon.)
Plato also endorsed and enabled religious institution and the idea of “god” which in turn helped facilitate the gender stereotyping and inequalities that make women feel pressured to have children.
Just had to add that.
I am adopted. I was also told as a teenager that I am unlikely to ever be able to carry a child of my own to full term. I’ve tested this diagnosis and it appears, sadly, to be correct.
I understand the overwhelming urge to have a child of one’s own, to see one’s own genes passed on. This urge, I think, is even more keenly felt by those who, like me, also have no genetic ancestry.
I once felt as though I was untethered, nothing behind, nothing in front, nothing that is a part of me in either direction.
But wishing has not helped and wanting has not delivered a result.
Fertility treatment, for me, would be pointless in any case; it’s not the getting pregnant that’s the issue, it’s the staying pregnant.
I have turned my thoughts to other things, pointed my engergies in other directions because there is no alternative. Consequently, the lifestyle I’ve chosen means I’m not in a position to adopt a baby myself right now and I have made a decision not to adopt or try to adopt a baby in the future, when I will be older and less able to cope. One day however, I hope to foster older children.
If my personal circumstances were different, and there was a chance fertility treatment could work for me, I still don’t think I would choose it. Being adopted myself gives me a different perspective on nature vs nurture.
I refer to my adoptive mother as my ‘real mum’ and not the other way round as most people seem to expect. She is the one who brought me up, loved me, took care of me and is still doing so even now (I’m halfway through my 30’s). When my (adoptive) dad died, she and my adopted brother were the family I had left and although we had our problems, as all families do, I would not swap my life, my family, for the world (and I have since been in contact with my biological mother, so I know the life I would have had and it would have been more than fine, but I would still pick the one I got).
I cannot speak for my (adoptive) mum: would she have cared more deeply for a child that was biologically hers? Possibly. All I do know is that she gave me everything I have and made me everything I am and I don’t care if her blood does not run in my veins because her love runs in my soul.
Thinking Girl, yes! You are absolutely right! The woman does have to go through all of that. And trust me, there is not one infertile couple out there who has not had arguments about this. It is rough when trying to get your husband to fully understand in the beginning. I have been very upset with him because he really has to do nothing, and here I am, injecting myself daily, which really isn’t the worst part of the process. But since women are the ones who carry the child, I really see no other way, if you want to have a biological child.
I am glad you are trying to understand other’s points of view. I think it is difficult to explain WHY someone really wants a biological child. It’s an incredible urge. But I in no way shape or form want to have a child just because society says I should.
this has all been very interesting to read. TG, i am in the same boat – i am not interested in bearing children, and fathoming the idea that one could not only tolerate pregnancy, but long for it, is a cognitive divide i am not quite able to get across.
here’s what i’m wondering. many commenters are talking about biological drives. i have no beef with the idea that we, as a species, are programmed to reproduce (darwin and whatnot!). however, i am somewhat skeptical of the conflation of the species’ biological drive to reproduce and the alleged biological drive to bear and nuture one’s own, cherished child.
the idea of a child as someone who is a) solely and utterly belonging to his or her parents and b) to be cherished and adored is, historically speaking, relatively new. the development of such a paradigm evolved gradually, of course, but it had a lot to do with class and gender.
so, is it possible that women who feel it’s “inherent” in them to bear children are not entirely under the sway of biology? that we, as a society, have vested so much time and energy into propogating this idea of the nuclear family (and its concomitant structure and social purpose) that people think a thorough social conditioning is actually a biological imperative?
/probably fury-inducing questioning
Wow. I don’t know what to say except that maybe for a minute you could step outside your neat definition and opinion of the infertile woman and maybe TRY to understand that the infertile woman wanting to have a child of their own has something going on inside… a deep desire that is very basic and strong in nature that obviously you don’t have. Since you don’t, it’s probably hard for you to understand? I’m not sure. I remember over a year ago NOT wanting children and now do. I cannot tell you what happened in the meantime moving from one extreme to another – but my husband and I want to have a child of our own.
Feel free to judge us for that, but it’s a dream that we both want, and I don’t feel that we’re being selfish not to adopt. Some people have different reasons for adopting and for not adopting… regardless what they are, they can’t be all categorized into a neat little definition of selfish and certainly can be categorized as a bit insensitive.
You are really labeling a group and is no different than labeling a group of homosexuals, a group of feminists, etc… All infertile women aren’t the same as you imply fitting into the neat little definition of selfish and closed-minded – as you called them.
I think sometimes it’s good to step outside your own belief system and paradigm and TRY for a moment to imagine why a couple would want a child of their own. Try to imagine someone dealing with infertility in the meantime and going to great links to birth their own dream.
We certainly strive for tolerance in every other group. The infertile women need it as well. Harvard Medical School has published evidence of the type of depression and anxiety suffered by the infertile woman is comparable to someone dealing with the diagnosis of AIDS, cancer, etc… and is something that not only affects a woman emotionally, but physically as well.
Personally, I am definitely more than just wanting a child. I am definitely not infertile in my own mind just yet, but I am quite taken aback by this entry that seems to be written by a woman who initially at first blush seems to be quite tolerant of others and smart. After finishing the article, I now understand how maybe the minority felt in America when the whites spoke of the blacks? It’s stereotyping, narrow thinking, and just plain ignorant in my opinion.
Maybe I’m wrong… but it comes across really judgmental.
[...] 28th, 2007 · No Comments intolerance and infertility OK, so I need some help, and I’m turning to you, dear readers, for your opinions and guidance. I [...]
@Zee – on loving adopted vs bio children: After having two kids, I stayed home with them and took in other kids, making my house into a daycare center. Some of the kids I took in I cared for and was loving with, but didn’t actually love, but there were a couple that I formed strong attachments to, I loved them as much as my own kids. And I didn’t get them under my care until they were 9 months and 15 months old. And it was heartbreaking when both families moved away one after the other.
I couldn’t have cared more deeply for them if they were my own children, adopted or bio, instead of children under my care for the day (well, 50 hours a week for a couple of years). So it’s clear to me that an adopted child can be loved just as much (or just as little as the case may be) as a bio child.
Thanks Sage. My mum and dad were so pleased, after trying for over 10 years, to get me and my brother and I don’t think it mattered to them terribly that we weren’t biological.
It occured to me though, that they may not have felt like that until after they got us and that they may very well have had misgivings about non-bio children before we arrived, that then dissipated once we were there.
I will ask my mum one day.
I had more thoughts regards the biological ‘urge’ and I agree with kate.d that it is to a greater or lesser degree down to social conditioning.
Also, being told I could get pregnant but couldn’t carry to term left me with no option but to rule out a bio child completely (sorry, that term makes me smile, I keep thinking of either washing powder or the bionic man). If I could have been a candidate for IVF etc. would I have ultimately developed that strong urge from that first faint glimmer of hope? Would I have pinned my hitherto vague-ish maternal instinct to that ‘maybe’ and eventually let it become an all-pervading need?
I don’t know.
I have felt the irritation that TG is talking about and for two separate reasons. From my adopted perspective: why not adopt and care for a child that way; and from my can’t-carry-a-child perspective: That’s life, better to put one’s energies into something else, whether adoption or something completely unrelated to children.
Then my irritation usually turns to sadness and I really feel for women who are in that position and who do feel that desperate urge, regardless of whether it’s conditioned or evolutionary.
I do think that IVF is waved about by the medical profession and the media as the ‘golden ticket’ and I don’t think that helps. Perhaps if the pain and the uncertainty and the sheer awfulness of the procedures were more publically known and understood then the conditioning aspect would be lessened and the stigma of not having a child of ‘your own’ could be also be diminished.
I try not to be irritated, I try to be compassionate but mostly, I have a underlying, cynical feeling that it’s got more to do with the big P than we think.
I’m wondering about the bio-drive. Any time we use birth control we are subverting that drive. I don’t think these drives are as hard to subvert as it might seem.
Yes. I know people have religious issues with it. I count that as a social pressure.
Also, counting up the amount that people have talked about social pressures vs. bio-drive makes me think social pressures are the more important factor.
Just wanted to leave a reply as the mother of both – I have 3 bio children and 1 adopted child. I gave birth to two sons in my first marriage, which ended in divorce. When I married again, after deciding to have a child together, it just … didn’t happen. After about a year (and some inconclusive medical testing) we decided to adopt. I was the one who was hesitant, because I honestly did not know if I could love an adopted child as much as my bio ones… and I was afraid of that.
My husband, however, never had any doubts. I think it was because he was already loving some non-bio kids – mine.
We adopted through social services; our daughter came to us when she was about 2 months old, she is now 15. I did have moments even after she arrived when the wondering continued, but not for long.
Oh, yeah, because we never went back to using birth control, about four years after our daughter came to us I got pregnant. It was not a happy surprise because we were anticipating the end of little children, so interestingly enough I went through the same kinds of doubts and fears during my pregnancy with him – would I love him as much as the others, or would I simply resent him?
I do love him. But it was hard to come to terms with having another baby.
Just another perspective.
I’m wondering about the bio-drive. Any time we use birth control we are subverting that drive. I don’t think these drives are as hard to subvert as it might seem.
I don’t think anyone is going to argue that biological urges can’t be supressed- I’m certainly not going to.
Even though we can supress our biological urges, that doesn’t mean that we always do. If you’ve decided to remain child-free, then, yeah, you’re intentionally going to take steps against the biological urge to reproduce. You’re going to take steps to ensure that you don’t get pregnant or get someone else pregnant.
But, what we’re talking about is the subset of people who’ve decided that they do want children, and we’re looking at reasons why they might want children that are biologically their own. I don’t think that it’s fair to hand-wave the biological drive to have genetic children in that case. Sure, they can supress whatever biological drive there is to have their own children, but that doesn’t mean that they will. Hell, they may never have even considered what biological drives they’re giving in to.
I think that it’s probably a mixture of factors- some social, some biological- that give some people the strong desire to have children that are biologically their own.
Does that make sense?
here’s what i’m wondering. many commenters are talking about biological drives. i have no beef with the idea that we, as a species, are programmed to reproduce (darwin and whatnot!). however, i am somewhat skeptical of the conflation of the species’ biological drive to reproduce and the alleged biological drive to bear and nuture one’s own, cherished child.
I’m not sure I understand what you’re getting at. If we, as a species, have some particular drive- in this case, the drive to reproduce- how, if not at an individual level, would that manifest? I’m not sure what you see getting conflated.
The way I’m reading that, it looks sort of like you’re saying that there’s some kind of biological drive within the group that doesn’t exist at an individual level, and I’m not sure I understand what that would look like.
I can understand saying that the drive might not exist in all members of the group, but it reads to me like you’re suggesting that it doesn’t exist in any members of the group.
Could I press upon you to go into more depth about what you mean?
i unfortunately don’t have enough time to go into too much more depth at the moment – hopefully tomorrow i can come back and elaborate.
maybe this will help – it’s that i think the “biological drive” is to reproduce in order to propagate the species – so in that sense, the job is done when the baby is born. so it’s more about successfully birthing one and setting up some system for its survival rather that having a baby in order to love him and squeeze him and call him george.
(that’s more snarky than i intend, but hot damn, i just enjoy the phrase “love him and squeeze him and call him george”!)
so, in society today, the system to ensure a child’s survival is a nuclear family in which the child is a precious gift. but it most certainly was not always this way.
shoot, dinner’s ready. more later, hopefully…
Thank you TG for bringing up this subject and thanks to everyone who has commented because I too have been in trying to become better informed.
It hasn’t been until the past year or so that Matthew and I started to seriously talk about having kids although we haven’t started trying yet.
Most recently, I swear I hear my biological clock starting to tick! I have always thought I would adopt or become a foster parent and am really surprised that now I’m thinking about having a bio-child. The urge is strong and unlike anything I have known or experienced. Personally, I think perhaps it’s a combo of biology, societal brain washing, the place I’m at in my own life and where we are as a happy couple.
Ever increasingly, as individuals and as a couple, in support of social justice we find ourselves challenging convention/ status quo. Yet, as aware and socially active as I am, this persistent desire to have a bio-kid has emerged in me from somewhere. Having this discussion space to help me challenge and understand what different women go through has been really helpful to me. Having men in support of women share their thoughts has has also helped.
In our privilege as able bodied, well educated, Canadians we’ll have access to every choice available whether or not we end up being able to have bio-kids. My concern is the accessibility of the full spectrum of choices available to all women and men. For this reason as a Nova Scotian I hope infertility treatments will become covered.
Also, in thinking about my own societal brain washing in wanting bio-kids, I think it’s strongly tied up with ideas of love. Is it silly to think raising a child in this world could be the most revolutionary act of love between two people? I’m much more afraid of the idea of having a bio-child than adopting because of the health related risks that still exist. Yet, I think sharing our love to raise and nurture an aware and thoughtful human being into adulthood would be a most joyous way to celebrate our love and hopefully, in some way, continue our fight for social justice through whatever said child decides for her own life.
So, as Tina says, “what’s love got to do with it”? It’s gotta be a mix of biological and societal construction just like everything else. From what I can gather, it’s not selfishness at all that drives people in need of infertility treatments at all….
I hope this makes sense…
I’m going to throw this one out for good measure. Along the lines of what Steve was saying up there, but down a different path – I wonder to what extent the desire for bio-children is a means to actually possess part of the partner. I don’t mean the stereotypical trap the guy into marriage scenario, but a more gut need to have a piece of the person who makes you positively weak with your love for them. And if the person dies or leaves, you have a bit left of them. It might be an attempt at immortality of the loved one that feeds the desire.
Wow… my comment wasn’t added?
You are quite the little infertility shock jock, aren’t you? Wow. Yes, lets all stop having our own biological kids and adopt all the children of the world. Then, nobody will go hungry. How many have you adopted? Oh, you don’t like children. Hmph. Interesting. I cannot help you in your quest to find out why you are an inconsiderate, judgmental, shallow, vacant human being. Thinking girl. I didn’t see any thinking whatsoever.
Wow – you are certainly not a feminist – as a feminist believes in choice. If you think adoption is easy, let me tell you – fertility treatments are FAR less invasive, less expensive and easier than adoption. I have a close friend who lost FOUR babies when all four birth mothers changed their minds – one after the baby had been with my friend for two weeks. Breast reconstructive surgery is also not medically necessary (after cancer) would you suggest insurance not pay for that?
After recently having a new addition, I felt I must weigh in on this topic.
Its already been covered here, but…having biological children (sorry, I can’t use the word ‘bio-children’, it just makes it seem they’re fabricated out of recycled bio-matter in some bio-dome like in the 5th element) is inherently part of our genetic makeup and life drive. We live to propagate the species — which creates a whole host of problems, yes. However, I cannot express the joy in seeing characteristics of you, your family and your heritage be passed on to an off-spring. Seeing your grandfather’s face in your own child — now that’s amazing. There’s nothing in the world that is more exciting than seeing that and knowing that…that too is part of our genetic makeup.
Of course, I’m not one to bend solely to genetics — and I have been entertaining the idea of adoption for a second child. However — for those thinking that adoption is the be all end all to problems of over-population and other issues (ad nauseum) — adoption in Canada is very hard. I would even suggest that adopting a child would be as difficult to do as would having a baby for an infertile couple. I know of several couples who have tried to adopt in Canada, but were delayed years by red-tape and availability to adopt a baby. Some of these couples eventually skipped the lengthly process and used their own money ($25,000+) to adopt a baby from China and bring it back to Canada. This is an enormous undertaking — and should not be considered as an ‘easy’ recourse, despite the societal benefits of adoption. Just some food for thought..
Hi again everyone,
once again, thanks to all those who have made thoughtful comments here, as well as those who have written their own posts in response to this one. I’ve been away the past several days, and it’s quite late here now, so I won’t be responding in detail at the moment. However, I would like to say that this post has been just what I hoped it would be, a wonderful opportunity to reach out and engage with people who have been very generous and kind enough to help me become better informed, as well as to help soften my heart. As I said, being someone who is quite open-minded, my narrow thoughts on this topic were disturbing me quite a bit. My deepest thanks to all who opened up and helped me get to know some different perspectives.
to those with harsh words for me: did you miss the point of the post entirely? I recognize and acknowledge that my thoughts on infertility have been insensitive, and the whole purpose of writing this post was to try to break through that. I would also encourage you to read the comment policy here, and refrain from breaking rule number one, which is basically akin to peeing on the carpet at my house, as well as rule number four, which is to read all the comments, and also rule number seven, attack the argument not the person. I should remind you that calling me names and accusing me of not being a Real Feminist is not really going to help you make your case. It’s just going to get your ass banned.
I’m willing to take a little bit of abuse for holding ignorant and insensitive views, even when at the same time I am reaching out to gain better understanding of infertility, but I think I’ll draw the line here. So if anyone else has nasty things to say to me along with your criticism of the position I outlined in the post, don’t expect to get published – if you want your points to be heard, please follow the examples of so many of the commenters here and be respectful. I understand if you’re upset and angry by what I wrote in the post, I really do. but, if you want to have your say, be mindful of how you do it. OK?
I’m curious now – (as I often am about many things) – TG – have you ever had to take care of a child for any length of time? Or a baby? What was that experience like for you (if you had it?) What is it about children that you do not like?
Obviously, they take a lot of time, energy, and money if you have one, but I don’t think that is the reason you don’t want one.
DBB – hiya. yes, I have plenty of experience with children, of many different ages, from infancy to tweens. For many years, I dated a man whose sister had children, and I often cared for them as an auntie would. I loved them very much, even as they annoyed me at times. I babysat for many many years, as teenage girls do, and I was very popular and busy, because I was one of the few babysitters who would actually play with the children, read with them, help them with homework, listen to their piano and singing practice, and talk and listen to them. I also volunteered regularly with children – both mentally ill teenagers and poverty-stricken pre-schoolers, and gave music lessons in my community. At that time, I quite enjoyed children.
I’m not sure when the tide turned for me, or why, but it did. What I do not like is unruly and ill-behaved children, which unfortunately seem to abound lately. Parents don’t seem to be teaching their children manners, limitations, boundaries, or discipline. I do not like the unpredictability of children, or their screaming, or their brattiness, or their self-involvement, even as I know that they cannot really be any other way – especially if nobody teaches them another way to be.
I also don’t like what children do to independence. Where others see joy in having a fragile life completely dependent on them for everything, I see a huge burden I would rather be free from. I find this tedious and frustrating, and I have little patience for it. I would rather spend my life working in service of others in a different kind of way.
And, of course, I resent the implication that just because I have a uterus, that must mean I love and want children. biological essentialism is not my cup of tea. furthermore, I have no interest in pregnancy, where others see it as a miracle of life and rejoice in the changes with each passing week, I’ve always thought it was kind of gross, and the thought of having to endure such a state of being for 9 months is, to me, a nightmare. I have no desire to immortalize myself in the features of a tiny baby, or carry on my family line, or to nourish another with my own body, or teach a little being everything I know and instill in them my values.
I see children as belonging to themselves, not their parents. As I’ve told you before, I feel that some parents see their children as extensions of themselves (as so many here have stated), which I see as a bit narcissistic, and I also think some parents view their children as property in a weird way. I see parents as having a responsibility to their children to allow them to discover as much as possible about the world and their own place in it. I also see parents as having a responsibility to society to raise aware and empathetic children. Hatred is not a family value and all that.
does that answer your question? confirm your suspicions of my psychic state?
TG – thanks for answering, and so completely. Actually, I had no suspicions of your psychic state – I asked because I had no idea why you did not want children. So I had no preconceptions, just open curiosity.
Given the huge investment involved in having children, I can understand why anyone would choose not to make it. If anything, I think it is the case that some jump in too quickly without realizing how hard it is and how much of you it takes.
I really don’t know what it would be like to be pregnant, though my wife right now is not too thrilled with being nauseated and wishes she weren’t, she knows that is just part of the process. It is funny. When she was pregnant with our first child, she said “never again” and was about ready to give the baby away. But then a year later, she was enjoying our daughter so much she told me she wanted five more. (I think we’ll probably have three at the most, assuming we survive two).
We’re not getting any younger, so there is a chance this second child will be our last, who knows.
I know what you mean about unruly children – I hope I’m teaching my daughter not to be.
I can understand not wanting to go through all the trials of pregnancy, though apparently, from what I’ve seen, the middle part isn’t all that bad. It’s just the first and third trimesters that can be difficult, for the most part. Not exactly a ringing endorsement, eh? I would certainly never expect someone to feel obligated to have a baby just because they could. If anything, we need less babies, not more, preferrably limiting babies to those that both want them and who are emotionally and financially able to actually take care of them.
It amazes me that anyone would actually think your choice to have kids or not would be anyone’s business but yours (and that of your partners in the event you chose to have kids). What ever happened to live and let live?
Another thing to think about is that for some it is cheaper to do IF treatments than adopt. Go figure. My health insurance covers IF treatments, but I’d have to pay the fees to adopt. Although we’re thinking about both options for having a second child. We are even thinking about fostering to adopt.
I also agree that some parents do have children for narcisstic reasons or view them as property. We have a six year old daughter and we have always raised her that she is a person in her own right. Although I do expect certain things of her: to be respectful to us as her parents, do well in school, be a good person and use her manners always.
What about unruly and ill-behaved adults? I see them everywhere I go, especially male ones. Children are just people, only shorter.
This is a really sensitive issue as you’d be able to see from some of the responses. I’ve struggled not to be offended by some of the sentiments I’ve read.
I haven’t felt that way while reading the other threads. As I said elsewhere I’ve really enjoyed your blog, TG. This thread just seems out of place on a feminist site, and I apologise if saying that is akin to peeing on your carpet but you did ask for honesty.
Interesting point of view. I didn’t read all the comments, but wanted to share that I have done fertility treatments in attempt to get pregnant. None of them worked. I have a disease called PCOS that actually is very difficult to deal with physically. One of the common symptoms is infertility. If left untreated, it can lead to cervical cancer, diabetes, and a slew of other horrible diseases. Pregnancy is a temporary cure for the disease and can possible eliminate it altogether. The reason we pursued fertility treatments rather than adoption was not because we longed for a biological child, but because the process of fertility treatments was quite simply less expensive than adoption. I’m sure others have their own reasons.
I really do appreciate your inquiring of other opinions!
Your assumptions about adoption are wrong. It takes seven years to adopt a child internationally (where I live – it may only be a year or eighteen months elsewhere) and you have to get on the end of a long, long, long queue. Not everyone is eligible to adopt – some are disqualified for reasons which don’t affect their ability to parent – and not all of those who are can afford it.
But most importantly – we should be aiming to put everyone in charge of their own fertility. Medical science has put you in charge of yours. It can put “needy” families in charge of theirs. Economic development and humane social welfare work towards the same ends. And fertility treatments are the last part of that puzzle.
It’s not just better for the parents, it’s better for the children, too. How can you argue against something that’s better for everyone?
Bea
I haven’t read all the responses, so I’m not sure if it was covered, but I can give you my personal perspective. Before my husband and I decided to have children, we always thought adoption would be an answer if we had trouble. Back when it was still an abstract to us. However, once I started miscarrying pregnancy after pregnancy, it became a determination to get it right. After my first visit to the doctor, it was realized I had a very real medical issue that had to be addressed, not just for procreation but for my HEALTH. The treatments were labeled, “infertility” by the insurance companies, and were therefore covered partially, if at all. Once all was said and done, and I had two surgeries and numerous drug treatments, we had still spent FAR less money than we would have to adopt, I’m much healthier now, and now we are expecting our first child any day. It’s not always an ego trip, sometimes it is a far deeper matter.
Your assuptions about the health issues of fertility are also wrong. Nulliparous women are at increased risk of reproductive cancers. More than that, the inability to function reproductively is a more serious medical condition than many things funded by your national health system.
Your assumptions about the cost of fertility treatments are also wrong. Paying upfront for fertility treatments is cheaper in the long run, as it allows couples to pursue safer treatments instead of taking big risks because it’s all they can afford. The savings you’re making in fertility costs are outweighed at the moment by increased spending on obstetrics and paediatric treatment.
Mostly, I’m surprised you’re taking this point of view as you call yourself a feminist. I thought feminism was about appreciating the diversity of roles women – people, in fact – may choose to take, not saying a woman “should” this or “shouldn’t” that.
But that doesn’t matter so much because you have based your arguments on assumptions rather than information.
Bea
I didn’t mean that last bit to sound quite so snippy. Perhaps I should have said, “The answer will be more clear to you in the light of the facts.” You never have to gather information about these options until you’re trying to decide how to revise your intended plan.
Bea
Wow, so many points I want to make, so I make no promises that my comment will be grammatically flowing, concise.
There are alot of medical treatments that are paid for that aren’t necessary for sustaining life (such as acne medication).
I think that we all have our intolerances towards certain people; often times people whose situations we are not familiar with or our histories or experiences give us another view point. You have no interest in children, so you don’t have tolerance towards infertility. But if you had dreamed and yearned to get pregnant, give birth, breast feed, and care for your child since day one, then found out for reasons of no fault of your own, that would be impossible without medical intervention, I bet you’d have more tolerance regarding infertility.
I also hate the notion that it’s selfish to undergo fertility treatments when there are thousands of needy children in the world. First of all, it conviently places the burden of “rescuing all the world’s orphan’s” on a category of people you conviently don’t belong to. Why is it anymore selfish for an infertile couple to “ignore” those children than it is for someone who already had a biological child, or two, or three for that matter. The responsibilty of the plight of the world’s children belongs to everyone, not just those who have a medical condition that interfers with conception.
Your argument also ignores some factors that deserve serious attention, such as the issues surrounding the affects of adoption (both for the child and the family), the difficulty with RAD, FAS, unknown medical history, poor prenatal care, and poor care early in the child’s life to name a few, the process of adoption (which is not necessarily easier than IVF), the costs of adoption (which can be comprable to IVF), and the fact that most of the needy children are not adoptable due to various governmental laws and regulations.
You have also not read the anti-adoption blogs that have equated adopting parents with slave owners, Hitler, have labled such adoptive parents as selfish (jeeze, whether it’s IVF or adoption, whatever we do, we’re still selfish. hmmm.) and entitled.
There is also a loss when everyone around you (including the sixteen year old down the street and the crack-addict you see on the street corner) can get pregnant and you can’t. Perhaps you can’t relate, but that doesn’t mean the loss isn’t there. There is also a loss of acceptance by others in our families and friends. A woman at my place of employment was not given a baby shower because “she’s not having a real baby.” She also got five days of maternity leave compared to the six weeks any other woman would have recieved; all because she adopted her child.
As an adoptive family, there are negative stereotypes that are continuously hurled at you and your family (and it is even worse when your child can understand them, and must live in the aftermath). The questions, “Why couldn’t you have a real child? Why didn’t you adopt an American kid? Why didn’t you adopt a poor orphan from China? Why didn’t her real parents want her? Can her real parents come back and get her?” etc. etc. These questions are rude, hurtful, and seemingly never ending. And it’s part of the packaged deal when you adopt. (And I hope that you saw that no matter what you do, be it IVF, adoption, domestic adoption or foreign adoption, someone always has an option, and no matter what you are always wrong.)
Sense you have no desire to have children and because you’ve never experienced infertility, it makes it hard to try to make you understand. I’ll give you my point of few however.
My husband and I struggled with infertility for 11 years before moving on to adoption. We choose to adopt rather than try IVF. Our reasons were simply… do we pay $15,000-$20,000 per try for IVF which has about a 40% chance of working (give or take) or spend $45,000 (yes that’s how much we spent on our adoption) to adopt. We LOVE our son deeply. We couldn’t love him any more if he was biologically ours. HOWEVER, we also never experienced the bonding that takes during pregnancy. We will most likely be faced with issues in the future that come from our son’s stay in the orphanage. We will always wonder if his actions are because he lived in an orphanage or just because that’s how he is…
That being said… do you have any idea what is all entailed in adopting a child? Would you like to have every single aspect of your life examined under a microscope? You have to have your home approved. You have to have your medical history examined and approved. You have to have your fingerprints taken several times. You have to have a background check. You have to have recommendations from several friends. You have to have your income verified. All of this is done and someone, whom you’ll probably never meet, gets to say whether or not they think you are “fit” to parent. This may not sound like much to you, but it gets very intense and very frustrating. I know all of this is done with the children’s best interest in mind, so that is okay with me. I’m only stating this to make a point. Then once you have your child in the home you’d think all of that would be over, but NO! We have three more years of this. We have to have a social worker examine us for three more years! Why should adopted parents have to go through such scrutiny when anyone can have children? This may be a reason people choose IVF over adoption.
I also agree with one of the commenters that everyone should be expected to adopt, not just those who cannot have biological children. AND yes, there are medical reasons people cannot concieve and those medical reasons SHOULD be covered.
Those people who are having quintuplets are not concieving them through IVF and if by some chance there is still doctors out there placing more than three embryo’s in a woman at a time, they should not be allowed to do this. Most people who have several chldren at a time are getting pregnant with a drug that makes them create more eggs at a time. Their doctors should be watching them closely to make sure this doesn’t happen… so shame on those doctors, not the people who are trying to concieve.
Ignorance is bliss… if you haven’t been there, you just couldn’t begin to understand.
I’m sorry that I don’t have time to read all of the comments above but the few that I read have been very eloquent. I’m not sure how much I can add on the subject, but I will try my best. It is absolutely your right to choose not to have children. My sister is the same way–she has no desire to be pregnant and no desire to be a mother. Everyone always tells her that she will change her mind, except me. She knows how she feels and her fiance is the same way. No woman should ever be told that she’s not a “real” woman unless she has borne a child. It’s not fair to those who want to live child-free, and it’s not fair to those who cannot bear a child due to infertility. And beyond that, it’s just not true.
For a very quick background, the cause of our infertility is my polycystic ovarian syndrome (PCOS) and possible endometriosis. We were fortunate enough to have a son biologically after very simple treatments; however, more invasive treatments failed when we attempted to have a second child. We stopped when IVF was our last option for several reasons, which I won’t go into here.
When we considered adoption, it was with many things in mind. First, was it right for us as a family? We have a small (3 1/2 years old) son and we needed to consider his part in the process in a way we would not have needed to do had we gotten pregnant. Adoption is a much more volatile process. If we’d decided to do domestic adoption, either private or through foster care, we could get a call and pick up a child in one day, with no preparation time for our son. Or it could be years, with him uncertain the whole time. In many cases, we might bring home a child whose parental rights had not yet been terminated, and the child might be reclaimed. How would we explain that to our son?
When we decided to do international adoption, we had to look into racial and cultural issues as well. How do we feel about being a “conspicuous family”? If we chose to parent a non-Caucasian child, everyone would know that our next son was adopted, and we would often face intimate questions from perfect strangers. Would we be able to raise a child from another country with a strong understanding and appreciation for the country of his birth? When we decided that was something we could handle and chose to adopt a son from Ethiopia, we had to look into ages and birth circumstances. We’ve chosen to adopt a special-needs toddler, which brings up many other issues. Toddlers are very vulnerable anyway, between communication and independence issues–and we’re going to take a child at that age away from everything he has ever known to live with people who look nothing like him in a country where the weather is different and the language is different and even the food is different. The special-needs brings up even more issues. And, from that beginning, we need to love and raise him to be a strong, loving, black man in a family of white people (though we do hope to adopt more children from Ethiopia in the future).
It’s a lot to ask anyone to consider all of these issues, and to decide that these are all things they can handle. It’s even more to expect to prepare a little boy, who is excited beyond belief to be getting a little brother, for a new family member who very well might be extremely angry and hate everyone and everything he’s experiencing. We’re doing our best to get ready for this situation, but if someone else thought about this and decided that it was too much to handle, I would ADMIRE them for knowing their limits and not making a small child suffer by having a family who wasn’t able to handle it. The emotional and mental issues of adoption are FAR different than those of having a biological child, and no one should go into it lightly.
When a child comes into a family through biological means, the family knows everything about that child from the moment of conception on–they know if mom ever drank or did drugs, if she was well-nourished, if the child met developmental milestones, etc. When a child comes into a family through adoption, they may never know the answers to any of those. Every one of those may lead to future developmental issues. Another concern with adoption is knowing whether something is a true developmental problem or if the child is going through regression due to the adoption (which is very common).
I could go on about other issues, such as financial and physical (and don’t let me get started on the medical irresponsibility that most often leads to high-order multiples births–which would likely be greatly reduced if infertility treatments were covered by insurance), but I’ve hijacked your comment section long enough. I hope that you’ll reconsider your opinion of those undergoing fertility treatments rather than pursuing adoption as “selfish” and maybe think that there’s more going on than you realized previously.
I’ve found this discussion to be very interesting.
My husband and I tried for 2 years to get pregnant – no go. We made a decision at that point to go no further. Neither of us were tested – we have no idea why we can’t get pregnant.
We went straight to adoption. It was the best decision we have ever made.
Is it expensive – yes it can be. (I’ve learned that lawyers are expensive no matter what country they are in!!) Is it hard – you bet ‘ya. It was the hardest thing I’ve ever done – and probably will ever do. Would I do it again – in a heartbeat.
I can not imagine loving someone more than I love my son. He is an amazing kid – and I can’t imagine my life without him.
I’ve watched many friends go through infertility treatments (various kinds) and I just didn’t want to go through that. I saw what it did to them – physically, emotionally, mentally – not to mention what it did to their marriage.
Adoption isn’t certain – and there are lots of things that can go wrong – we just wanted to spend our money and our effort in bringing a child into our house.
I did grieve not getting pregnant – and I still have some struggles with it. It’s hard to explain. I’m ok with not having a biological child – I think I’m going to miss actually being pregnant. My son looks nothing like me – or my husband, (we are both caucasion – German heritage, and our son was born in Guatemala) and we really don’t care. It has opened my eyes to the racism that is everywhere, and it has made me a better person having to deal with it.
We are in the process of saving our money right now for a second adoption that I hope we can start in the next year or so. That said – I don’t have a problem with people choosing fertility treatments over adoption.
Again – thanks for the interesting discussion.
I am infertile, went through three rounds of IVF and ultimately adopted my son. I agree with certain points you make, but I think you take them to the extreme. First, you should realize that there are varying levels of drive to have biological children. There are people like you, with zero drive, people who spend every dollar they have and won’t consider any other option, and many of us who are smack in the middle. I don’t see anything wrong with pursuing treatments, many times it works….and there is something special about creating a human being with another person. I agree that at some point you need to realize it’s not going to happen for you…and I agree that adoption is the next logical step. After all, that’s what I did. I too don’t get why more people don’t “just” adopt, the only reason I can see is a financial one (assuming treatments were covered by insurance to begin with). Infertiles don’t like the “just adopt” thing or the “get over it” thing, because unless you’ve been through it yourself (or even have a desire for children) you really just don’t get what an emotional process it is. Your body is betraying you. Everyone around you has what you have, and some of them don’t (seem) to deserve it.
many of the things you say…but please keep in mind that there are many “normal” folks out there who are affected by infertility and who aren’t ready to make the move to adoption. It doesn’t make them bad people.
I would assume someone as opinionated as yourself could easily resolve the fact the opposition is equally as strong.
Despite the fact, I am an adopted mother who could get pregnant but not interested in getting pregnant sees adoption as a first option to a “perfect” family and may agree it is difficult to understand someone not loving an adopted child the same as a bio child and even one step further- I believe some allow ego to infringe the beautiful possibilities of creating families in a multitude of ways-
I also believe in respecting people’s needs. Some feel the need to exhaust every option to have a baby naturally- If you took a moment to step outside of your position, you may conclude your lack of tolerance & judgemental position of those who have the right to their options is equally hypocritical.
Certainly it is “OK” to have an opinion. I happen to see & agree with some points- I get your point- but the way you deliver your point is “UGLY”
hi again everyone,
thanks once again to those who have commented.
FemSoc – oh yeah, unruly adults don’t please me either.
I think in a way, it’s more the unpredictability of children that makes me uncomfortable, and quite frankly, while the source of the unruliness is bothersome, I reserve my malcontent primarily for the parents who are not doing something about it.
I agree that my sentiments on infertility do not jive with other things I’ve written on this blog. And again, that is the point of the post – to try to eliminate my feelings on infertility. I don’t claim to be perfect, and in fact here have admitted openly that I have some views that I’m not proud of about infertility. And I’m trying to get some help for that from my readers. And it’s working out great.
people – please don’t take this post to be anything resembling an ‘argument’. I simply gathered together my raw feelings about infertility and threw them together in a post in order to try to learn more and overcome my insensitivity. I’m not arguing anything – arguments are carefully reasoned, and what I wrote in my post is certainly not that, just a collection of thoughts that I’m not proud of, and an admission that I need help to gain better understanding.
once again, thanks to everyone for helping me to do that.
Wow.
Let me start by clarifying that infertility IS indeed a health concern, a VALID medical problem. It is NOT a “choice”. Choosing to live childfree, or choosing to have 12 children is a choice.
Infertility is deserving of medical coverage like any other medical problem. Our Canadian Health Care system covers far more than only “life saving” procedures. In fact, under reproductive health issues alone health care covers prenatal care, labour and deliveries, abortions, and in many provinces it even covers(for convenience, not due to medical need) vasectomies and tubal ligations. So for a “fertile Canadian” health care is covering it all in most cases. But beyond that, our universal health care covers many things that are not life threatening, and heck it even covers people for making poor or risky choices, not medical problems per se (break a leg bungee jumping? covered! get a concussion biking without a helmet? covered!).
And by the way our health care system does treat “emotional well being” as it is indeed a part of health care. And true, infertility affects emotional well being. Most major life crises/medical problems affect emotional well being. But I can assure you that infertility is very much related to physical health as well (the majority of infertility problems are physical in nature).
As to why it is so “bloody important” to have a biological child? You are making assumptions about every infertile persons reasons. The reasons people want children is as varied as the people themselves. But the urge to have a child is a normal, natural, human desire.
Being pregnant is something that many people also desire to experience as part of life and growing a family, there is nothing wrong with desiring such a normal life experience.
Creating a child with someone you love is also often about a desire to express the incredible love many share. To watch a child grow with familiar traits can be very special. That doesn’t mean that biology is “everything”. But the reality is biology is an important part of our human bonds. Ask any adoptee who is searching for their birth parents, biology indeed does matter in some ways to them. Does that mean they don’t love their adoptive parents or think those parents are second best, not really their “own”? Usually that has nothing to do with it. And thus, many infertile couples don’t feel that a biological child is “better”, it just is a normal desire they have. It doesn’t mean that they can’t, or wouldn’t think of an adopted child as “their own”, or that an adopted child wouldn’t be as good as a biological child…not at all. They just are two different things.
Adoption can be just as, or more invasive (and expensive) than medical fertility treatment. Adoption also comes with its own set of pros and cons, heartaches and joys. And many couples adopt and use medical fertility treatments (or vise versa). but adoption needs to be chosen for the right reasons at the right time and it simply is not the right choice for everyone.
Infertile couples are not more responsible for children in need of homes than “fertile” people are. People with medical problems are not narcissistic for choosing to treat their medical problem, they are simply like everyone else trying to navigate a serious life crisis and make the best choices for themselves in their situation.
And your judgments that those who are infertile and choose to use medical treatments to treat their medical problem are selfish, closed-minded etc… are just that, your judgments. I find it sad that infertile couples must bear the heartache of infertility and also the lack of empathy from others who think they understand what an infertile couple is thinking and choosing. That really BUGS ME.
My husband and I are infertile.
We have a valid medical problem that should be covered by health care like any other medical problem.
We are not selfish, or closed-minded because we have a normal desire to have children, and choose to treat our medical problem.
We are not just bent on looking to pass on our genes, nor do we think that biology is the be all and end all (but to be honest, I would actually love to see another person in the world who is a part of the husband that I love with all my heart and to see my husband expressed in that child. He is an incredible man). We would like to experience pregnancy and grow our family. That has nothing to do with the value we place on adopted children.
And for the record, I don’t want your sympathy. I don’t need that. Empathy would be nice, but respect would be even better.
So children should be seen and not heard? That’s a very conservative view of things.
You know, unruliness is not such a bad thing.
If our female ancestors hadn’t been so unruly we might never have attained the right to vote, let alone the intellectual freedom to congregate here and discuss our female issues.
Is adoption only the responsibility of those who are infertile?
I have nothing new to add here, you’ve had many thoughtful comments. It seems they’ve broadened your view, I hope so anyway. To say you have no sympathy for someone going through a life crisis of any kind says more about you than it does about infertility sufferers. To assume that adoption is easy is also naive. It’s a very complex issue all around and hopefully your stated wish to understand was sincere and hopefully one of these 72 comments helped achieve that.
I believe feminism is about choice. So the whole premise of your point was a bit lost on me, seeing it on a feminist blog. I believe you have a right to live child free without judgement and I have equal right to pursue building my family in any way I may be able to manage to do so. That would be freedom of choice in my view.
And for the record, I paid every cent of treatments out of pocket as I will also do for my 25K+ upcoming adoption. If that doesn’t show a strong desire to parent, I don’t know what it does show. We are not wealthy. This has been a huge sacrifice on many fronts. Still, I think it is worth it.
I also believe that I can’t help you get over this – in my opinion, infertility and all of the emotions associated with it is something that you don’t fully understand until you’re there yourself.
A couple of things, however, which may jive with some of the prior posts: Infertility IS a medical condition. It affects one out of 8 people. My husband and I could not have conceived without the intervention of medical professionals – both of us required surgery and ultimately in-vitro fertilization. Did I WANT to have all of these procedures? No. But I wanted a family enough to put myself through it.
So what about adoption? Yes, there are many children in the world which need good homes, so at some level it makes sense to say “just adopt” to an infertile couple. Karmically speaking, it seems like a perfect solution.
My husband and I, in particular, were prepared to make adoption our choice if our last in-vitro cycle did not work. I would have mourned not being able to experience pregnancy. But I have no doubt that I would love whatever child comes to us.
The problem with that is it’s not that easy. It requires a significant amount of money – far more than infertility treatments, by the way. And paperwork. And tests. And justification of why you’ve chosen adoption. And homestudies. And immigration papers. And then the waiting: to be chosen by a birthmother or matched to our baby. But the fact is, for infertiles, adoption ISN’T a choice – we’re forced into it by the fact that we can’t have our own children.
And you talk about “so many children in orphanages and the like.” At least in the US, the right to have an abortion which was established with Roe vs Wade killed many of the domestic orphanages. There simply aren’t that many orphaned babies in the US anymore.
About the insurance – I’m surprised at your ignorance on this. You are right – infertility is not a life-threatening medical condition like cancer or heart-disease.
But let’s talk about the fact that right now you are paying for maternity benefits for women who make the CHOICE to have children, even though you have no interest in bearing children yourself. If you live in the State of New York, you’re subsidizing the cost of abortions, even though you may never have one yourself. You’re subsidizing the cost of antibiotics for thousands of children in which you’ll never parent . (And of course we can debate this, but it’s my opinion that doctors overprescribe antibiotics as a matter of course.) You’re paying for stents and angioplasties and high blood pressure medications and diabetes meds for the overweight and obese, which in my opinion wouldn’t be neccessary if people actually took the responsibility to take care of their bodies. You’re paying for joint repair and replacements for people with arthritis, even though arthritis isn’t a life-threatening condition either.
Further, infertility coverage (in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts in the US, I am unfortunately not familiar with the cost of healthcare in Canada) costs less than $10 per person per year.
Bottom line is that I don’t believe you’ll really understand until one day when you wake up and realize that you DO want a family… and then find out that in order for that to happen, you’ll need either treatments or adoption. Until you’re forced to look at the world that way, I’m doubtful that you’ll be able to empathize with infertiles.
Ur, guys?
Thinking Girl wrote this post NOT as a personal attack, but as a way to try to examine her own attitudes on her stances and beliefs.
She didn’t mean it as *personal disrespect*, nor was she aiming her comments at any one person. She fully admitted she thought she was being insensitive, but she also is, *by her own admission*, trying to “soften her heart” about the issue. She had to update her own post about this, and I would hope that people on this thread would realize that a problem that TG might have with a given stance on this issue DOES NOT TRANSLATE as contempt for the people she disagrees with.
I for one applaud TG for having the basic GUTS to think aloud on this issue that too many people pussyfoot around on. Would you rather see someone “veil their vices with virtuous words?” “Smile, and smile, and be a damned villain?”
TG is doing the HONEST thing here, which is to admit a callous attitude, realize that there’s insensitivity here, and then actually LISTEN to people’s positions rather than just pretend a fake solidarity that isn’t earned and isn’t felt. I **applaud her**. That’s why her blog is my favorite on the Net.:)
PS. A thought. Is it really callousness, though, when there’s 6 billion people on the planet that’s overstraining our resources as it is?
Three thoughts:
1. Why are your judgments only aimed at infertiles? Why stop there? Shouldn’t fertile people adopt too?
2. Since you’ve never had children, I don’t imagine you’re qualified to understand the emotional complexities inherent in motherhood/fatherhood.
3. Cost? I live in Massachusetts. My seven IUIs and 2 IVFs cost a grand total (including co-pays) of $4,000. Adoption: much, much more. Unless you’re willing to adopt from foster care, and that takes a temperament that I don’t have.
Thinking Girl-
As a former infertle, I have to reply.
I have two children. Both are biological. My oldest is the product of follicle stimulating drugs and intrauterine insemination. My youngest is the product of intercourse.
Why do we have an urge to have biological children? easy! That is a basic biological drive. All species are born with the drive to procreate. This doesn’t mean that every single member of the speicies will. Studies of primates and birds have clearly shown homosexual behaviors on the same level as humans. A certain percentage of any given species will not have the drive to procreate. (Not that gays/lesbians DON’T want children… just that there is a percentage of any species that don’t procreate)
Humans are lucky. We are endowed with the ability to work through biological barriers. We can choose to have children via medical means. We can choose to avoid pregnancy through medical means.
Given that there is a biological urge to have your own children (something I truly believe), those who feel this urge will want to follow that path. When something is wrong, ie, you can’t easily get pregnant, it is reasonable to research what the issue is. We have the medical resources to help women with PCOS, men with sperm issues, women with egg quality issues. Why should we NOT use these resources?
As for adoption, you have admitted that you don’t want just infertiles to adopt. Thank you. That is import to recognize. Anyone can adopt. But the question is are you ready to?
It is not a question of love. Love is not biology. Love is a human emotion that we experience. I love my husband and we are not related via blood.
But there is a question of how you want to build your family. You appear to be looking at adoption as “oh instead of popping out a kid, just take one that’s already born”.
Let’s look at that.
1) How old is that child? 1 month old? 3 months? 5 years?
Most of a child’s personality can be formed in the first 5 years of life. When you adopt a child, you may not have any idea of how they were raised. There are issues and baggage that you will need to work with. There are many unknowns. Does this mean you should back away? NO! But it is a factor that those who say “just adopt” fail to think of. A child who is neglected for the first year of life will have significant issues with separation and abandoment as they grow. Even with love.
2) As someone else brought up, the child may have serious medical issues. While you don’t get to choose this as a bio-parent, you can’t always avoid this as an adopted parent either. This is a whole other layer ontop of the adjustment for the child. Again, not a reason to not adopt, but something that people may consider.
3) Open adoption/closed adoption. Some people have difficulty with one or the other of these. That is a hard decision too.
4) Adopt a foster child. Most of these children are older. Many people imagine their family starting out with a baby. It takes a huge mental shift to image starting with a 9 year old (I am thinking Baggage (http://baggageand bug.com)) Baggage adopted Bug after fostering her. She loves Bug more than anything, but there are difficulties in raising a foster child that I had never thought of before reading her.
As I mentioned in the begining, my oldest was the product of fertility treatments. We did consider adoption if that failed. We also planned on adoption if the second attempt failed. But it is not just as easy as saying “Let’s adopt today” There are many many factors involved.
I hope this discussion is helping you think more about this.
PS- to Scarred, yes, the planet is overpopulated. But humans do balence biology vs phiolosphy. That’s why some people only have 1 child.
Thinking Girl,
I was wondering if you would be willing to write a post describing how, if at all, any of the commentor’s opinions and points made have changed or not changed your opinions.
I wish that you were the only person in this world who has the same “limited understanding” regarding infertility and the “why don’t you just adopt” mentality. Sadly, there are so many others who feel the same way.
One of the hardest things for me related to your opinions is that infertility has been one of the hardest things I’ve ever had to deal with. I’ve cried rivers of tears, and experienced a pain I can’t even describe, nor could ever imagine before the diagnosis of inferilty. It is so frustrating to experience that level of pain to have hundreds of others “not get it”. I don’t begrudge those who don’t understand my pain (Why would they? It’s never something they even thought of most likely.), but I do find it incredibly frustrating when things have been so well described and detailed and for someone to still “not get it.” Maybe you’re opinions haven’t changed, and that’s okay. I’m just curious to what any new thoughts are.
Hey TG.
Here is a thought or two. I have read the comments but it took me two hours to write this one so I may have missed some.
Here is my own perspective, from my own personal experience. I hope it helps answer your question or at least, explain some of what lies behind the reason why people get so hung up on this.
Until very recently, I, like you, didn’t understand why it was “so bloody important for women to have kids biologically”. I’d always wanted children but I’d wanted Mr BC’s children (because he is my soul mate) not anyone else’s. It was a love thing and I wanted to make them with him.
He didn’t want kids so I chose him over having a family. Then after 10 years of blissfully happy marriage, I got pregnant by mistake and suddenly both of us were surprised and delighted. Giggling like kids, wondering what what Mini-Us was going to be called. Then it died. I miscarried at 10 weeks.
Now, I consider myself a rational, emotionally collected career woman. So I was a little surprised by my reaction. At 39 I am learning, now, what an incredibly sensitive subject children and making babies/adopting or whatever is. I am beginning to understand how a sensible, practical woman with a reasonable amount of emotional control can suddenly find herself in a situation where she is hurt by the tiniest of unintentional slights. I cannot begin to describe how it feels to give birth at 10 weeks but it’s a lonely experience. It was as if I was the last surviving human on earth after an all out nuclear war, dying alone of radiation sickness.
So now, I am beginning to understand how seeing a mother displaying love for her child can make a pragmatic, down-to-earth woman want to cry or worse, actually do so. I’m beginning to learn how it wells up like lava, sudden, swift and worse unstoppable – often in public, too. Highly embarrassing. A case, not so much of tears as incontinence of the eyes. And that’s just because I got pregnant by mistake and had a miscarriage. Remember, I’d made a compromise and accepted a life without children. If the counsellors I have seen are right, this is going to be part of what being a woman is for me from now on. For ever. God knows what it’s like for people planning, loving and hoping the dream. So that may be why you’ve ruffled a few feathers with your enquiry.
Never underestimate the power of hormones, biology and love. A potent mix. No matter how much we want them to be, they are not logical. So while I hear what you say and hear your argument I believe that women should be able to have at least one go of IVF on the National Health. I believe it mainly because this isn’t about logic, it’s about human beings and emotions.
Frustrated, unfulfilled people do damage – they’re the kind of people who bullied me at school. Give people a shot at happiness and fulfilment and if it comes off, you will make the world a better place. Deny them hope and you damage them. Bitter and angry people hurt others and more often than not they merely end up needing a different kind of equally expensive treatment later on. So putting the dangers of denying fertility treatment aside for some medical conditions, denying it on insurance, the NHS or whatever our respective countries run is a false economy. For many, this is about deep and irrational thing, it’s about their sense of purpose their reason to be on the planet.
Again, some things just are because we are human and humans work like that. There are times when I’m sure we should aim to get past our humanity but it isn’t always easy and it isn’t always possible straight away or for everyone. Some people are stronger some are not. It’s allowed.
There are times when we just have to accept the limitations of our nature and work with it – or at least at it. I think this is one of them. You can’t make sensible, logical diktats about something which isn’t.
A few years ago, I had a conversation with one of my friends who was having her fifth bout of IVF (not on the National Health they give you one I know – possibly two but don’t quote me on that – and then you’re on your own). I asked her about adopting or just accepting defeat. She tried to explain but halfway through she just told me that nothing she could say would do it justice but that I should buy a book by Ben Elton called Inconceivable. If I wanted to understand, she said, I should read that. So if you really do want to understand why some people move hell and high water to try and make a baby which is part of them, read that book – you have to read the book mind, the film doesn’t work, the book is heartfelt, honest and true… and a real eye-opener!
Good luck.
Cheers
BC
Natural Child (without ART) = FREE
Adoption = >$50,000.
I have read through the posts above and have to say that those who have come before me to point out WHY people pursue IVF or other fertility treatments to bear their own children instead of “just adopting” have all raised good points. In compliance with your comment policy, I won’t repeat any of them but will add one I don’t believe has been mentioned.
My husband’s (extended) family is very, very small because almost all of his grandparents’ siblings and relatives perished in the Holocaust. It has always been very important to him to have genetic offspring; I agree with you that an adopted child would be no “less” of a child to us, but to him, for very personal reasons, having a genetic child (ideally, children) was something he valued highly. While I would have been more willing to consider adoption if our attempts at IVF failed (eventually they succeeded after five heartwrenching failures), I could also respect his feelings.
Adoption is not right for everyone, and each couple (or person) should have the ability to decide to pursue having a genetic child if they so choose. I hope some of the comments and blogs you have read as a result of your post help you see the personal reasons some people might choose not to pursue adoption.
“Thinking Girl wrote this post NOT as a personal attack,” (Scarred)
It may not be an intended or specific “personal attack” but when infertile couples who choose to use medical treatment are called/assumed to be “selfish” “closed-minded” and “narssissitistc” by anyone, it does seem to make things a tad personal. When someone assumes that as an infertile person, I think adopted children are not as loveable, or as good as biological children, or that they are second best, or that it is MY responsibility to care for the worlds needy children ~based solely on my specific medical problem~, that is very “personal”.
It is rather personal when your very significant medical problem is said to not be a valid medical problem worthy of affording you treatment as any other person with a medical problem under our national health care system that I too pay taxes to cover.
Infertility is ~far too often~ dismissed as nothing more than an inconvenience, and that kind of demeaning message being put out to the world is indeed “personal”.
Infertility is a heartbreaking medical problem, a significant life experience and something I wouldn’t wish on anyone. Being criticized publicly by people such as “Thinking Girl” for wanting something normal, natural and reasonable, and for treating a medical problem with medical treatment is something that must be taken personally. She is talking about ME, my husband, my family and my life when she talks about “infertile” people and assumes what she does about them and attacks their personal values, thoughts and motives as if she understood and knows them.
My response to “Just adopt?”(from someone who is adopting):
1. Contrary to popular believe there aren’t millions of children ready to be adopted. Many children, who live in foster homes or orphanages, are actually not available to be adopted by law. And adopting a healthy infant can be nearly impossible.
2. If parents of biological children believe that there is such an overwhelming need, then why aren’t they forgoing their biology to adopt? Is it only the responsibility of the infertile world to adopt?
3. Many people are not eligible to adopt because an agency/country/biological parent has deemed them ineligible because of their age, health (including health conditions related to infertility), weight, education, religion, job, net worth, prior marriages, etc. Many (maybe you the reader?), who have biological children, would NOT be eligible to adopt.
4. Adoption is an incredibly special way to build a family and many, like my husband an I, feel a calling to build our family this way. “Just adopt” undermines the beauty of adoption and treats it as this “thing” people do when they can’t get what they really want. Would you like to be the child brought into a family under this sentiment?
6. In the same spirit, parenting an adopted child creates unique circumstances that not all people want to undertake. For example, parenting a child of a different race, parenting a child where the biological parents are still involved or parenting a child who spent their first ten years in an orphanage. For parents who have biological children, think about adding these issues on top of your current parenting dilemmas.
7. Adoption is hard, long, unreliable, stressful, complicated and expensive. Many couples will forgo $75,000 in fees with no guarantees that they will bring a child home (and many won’t).
I challenge anyone who thinks adoption is so easy to see for themselves. I guarantee you, your belief on what adoption entails will completely change.
I’m a little vague on why you said that ECH insulted you when she repeated your exact words back to you?
I agree with most posters that a real feminist would allow for women to make their own choices, the right to choose to adopt, the right to pursue treatment for a medical condition like infertility, the right to choose childfree living.
My husband and I have been through 4 IVF transfers, 2 fresh and 2 frozen. We have had 2 positives and 2 negatives and the positives turned in a miscarriage and an ectopic. Since we used an ovum donor I guess I wouldn’t be selfish since the genes weren’t my own. Or would you consider me to be more selfish?
Another thing I’d like to point out is that infertility is 40% female factor, 40% male factor, and 20% a combination or unexplained. There are lots of men who have to undergo surgery to cut open their testicles and remove tissue to obtain sperm. Although my husband gratefully didn’t have to undergo that procedure lots of men do so you really can’t say that men only have to have a visit to the masterbatorium.
To respond to Thinking Girl’s blog-
I’m not sure I understand your point. You first state that you know what you are about to say is wrong and want to change that, yet you proceed to try to justify it in about 20 different ways with analogies and such.
First, you either feel that way or you don’t. It’s wishy washy to state that racism is wrong and that you want to change it, then proceed to throw out racial epithets. If that’s the way you feel, fine- you are entitled to your opinion. But in many ways it is even more insulting to hear you ask for help to change how you feel.
Second, have you ever broken a bone or sustained an injury? Ever had shots or surgery for carpal tunnel. These are not life threatening, for sure, but necessary for me nonetheless. If you were born with cleft palate, would you agree that it should be fixed? I was born a certain way, and unfortunately part of that makes it a challenge to have children. I needed a little “help” in that area and received fertility support. Did you ever have braces or anything like that? Why? It wasn’t life threatening- why wouldn’t a person just leave their teeth crooked?
As a true feminist, you are contradicting yourself in every sense of the word. As a woman, I am proud of my body and I decide what will happen with it. Bearing children was MY decision, and I needed support to make that happen, and it was one of the most incredible experiences I have ever had. Ok, so you don’t want to have that experience. That’s fine- it’s your decision. But why should you get a say in what medical procedures I choose to have or if I should be allowed to have children?
As a true feminist, I should hope you might take a little time to look at what that means- and rethinking that perhaps being a feminist is celebrating women for who we are- flaws and all. I’m not the perfect child-bearing machine- but I am one terrific mom, and I thank my doctors for giving me the chance to find out.
Well as a women who struggled and still does with infertility unexplained at that the desire to have children biologically eats at you and for me I knew in my heart how much I wanted children and so did my husband, that does not mean we would not of considered adpotion if all the roads we tried were not successful but we wanted to try all that we could before pursuing other avenues. Infertility is a hard road with many ups and downs and it is not a road I would ever wish on anyone!!
After trying a few treatments I never thought I would have to indure IVF but we did and we paid out of pocket and for us it took 2 fresh cycles before we were successful and are now proud parents and dealing with this has made me such a better parent as I know how hard it was for us to conceive.
It is hard to tell someone who does not know what it is like or never had to deal with IF but until you do than you will understand why so many people try and pay to have their own child it has nothing to do with them not wanting to adopt it is about creating a person out of love with your partner and knowing that you carried this beautiful child of yours and that you and your partner made this little person and that will never change no matter what! I did not ask for anyone to cover with treatmens and you know what I believe they should be as it is a medical problem and why is abortion covered????
And regarding adoption there are many people out in this world that have lots of kids that never dealt with IF who could adopt just as well.
susan, i am resisting the urge to be snarky about this, because i know that that’s not the tone TG intended this thread to have. however, i think there’s some cognitive dissonance going on when TG takes pains to point out that she *knows* her opinions are narrow-minded and insensitive, and yet you persist in acting like she has written a personal diatribe about YOU. you’re entitled to your frustration over her perspectives, but i’d say it’s unfair to acutally claim she’s maligning you personally.
also, i am truly (non-snarkily) puzzled by something you wrote. you said, “[Infertility] is not a “choice”. Choosing to live childfree, or choosing to have 12 children is a choice.” I find this a little misleading. Because it’s fair to say that infertility per se is not a choice, but isn’t IVF a choice? the post concerns people who choose to undergo IVF, and i think it’s valid to put that on par with other reproduction-related choices.
Kate,
When I am in a group that is being maligned by her statements (even if she *knows* her opinions are narrow) it is pretty hard to not take that as personal (I am infertile, I choose IVF, she called that selfish, narcissistic and she suggests that my medical problem is not a real medical problem worthy of health care coverage). Would you say that if someone had made a statement maligning gay or lesbian people (don’t take it personally)? Would you honestly suggest to an African American person that she should not be offended or take a racist comments personally if the author of those statments admitted to having racist views and was trying to gain more insight into why people of color did what they did, lived as they did, thought as they did (that she disapproved of and judged openly)?
Calling infertile couples who choose medical treatment or who don’t choose adoption over treatment as selfish and narrsiccstic is rather personal don’t you think? She is making judgments about all infertile people. How is that ~not~ personal? (and I am not being snarky one bit here).
And as for your question.
Yes, IVF is a medical treatment choice for those dealing with infertility. However, the post is not just about people who undergo IVF, from what I read it was about people who undergo fertility treatments over adoption.
Adoption however is not really about ~reproductive~ choice, despite the constant refrain of infertile couples should “just adopt”. Adoption is about what happens after someone has a child and chooses to place that child up for adoption, or about growing a family though alternate means (for anyone). Adoption has nothing to do with the process of physical reproduction working or not, or the choices related to medical intervention for a medical problem of infertility.
Adoption is a beautiful thing (in my opinion-not everyone agrees by the way, there are some that feel adoption is immoral) that can be a wonderful way to grow a family, or provide a child a home when the biological parent(s) can not do so, but adoption has nothing to do with my medical problem. Adoption is an option to parent, grow a family, and help a child find a home.
The reason I say infertility is not a choice, is because it is dismissed as one.
Thinking Girl wrote:”Fertility treatments are not medically necessary – it is not a health concern to be infertile, …”
That sounds very much like the implication is that it isn’t a “real” problem, and thus it is more about choice since the attitude is that treating it is an “option”. But if I want to have the reproductive choice to have a child, then treatment is ~needed~ for me to be able to simply have that ~choice~ due to my medical condition.
My first gut instinct was to leave you a very angry response about how ignorant and insensitive I think you are. But I slept on that.
And I guess now what I will say is that I don’t think you need worry about trying to understand it. It’s something that you can not understand if you have not been there. I too am someone who used to think this way – “why would you ever do fertility treatments; why would you put yourself through that / spend the money, etc.; why not ‘just adopt’.” But here I am, pregnant with twins after 6 IVF cycles and donor eggs. And I will simply say that there is NO WAY you can understand this unless you have been through it. If you have not dealt with this – then you are not qualified to offer an opinion on the subject. (and having a friend who has been through it does not even come close to going through it yourself)
So Please – to you and all of your commenters who agree with you – just don’t even try. Just walk away from this discussion. If you have not been through this – then you can not understand. I don’t expect you to understand. I just ask that you don’t offer an opinion on something that you can not understand.
There are probably choices you have made in your life that I would not agree with. But they are none of my business. It is not my place to judge your personal choices. And it is not your place to judge mine. I don’t ask that you understand my choices. I just ask that you respect them. And I will respect yours – whether or not I understand or agree with them.
I would like to add though – that I think the vast majority of infertiles are very, very open to adoption. I very much disagree with the commenters who believe that people choosing to go through fertility treatments are not willing to consider adoption – the truth is quite the opposite. I think most of us just want a child – biological or not – we just want to be parents. People who think it’s easy to ‘just adopt’ are being ignorant and naïve. Most of us have considered adoption, very seriously considered it. Very early in our infertility treatment journey, my husband and I looked very seriously into adoption – we talked to an attorney who specializes in this, we talked to an agency, and I did tons of web research. And I have many other infertile friends who have done the same thing. What we learned was that adoption was 1) no less invasive to your life, 2) no less expensive, 3) no faster, 4) potentially no less heartbreaking than fertility treatments and 5) fraught with its own set of unique and challenging issues. Many infertile people choose to pursue adoption, but we weighed the many options open to us at the time, and decided that for us, continuing to pursue the medical route was the right choice. But this does not mean that we are not open to adoption – it just did not feel like the right choice for our family at the time.
Finally – regarding whether this is a medical condition that insurance should pay for… What about a women who has a total mastectomy due to breast cancer? Do you think that her reconstructive surgery should not be paid for? That’s not medically necessary – she could go through life with no breasts. Birth control pills are not medically necessary, but they are paid by most insurance. Viagra is not medically necessary. This is a very slippery slope conversation – there are lots and lots of things covered by insurance that are probably not ‘medically necessary’ in some people’s opinions. And there are lots of things that aren’t covered that maybe should be. Again – I think – not something most of you are qualified to discuss, because you are not informed about the vast factors that go into making these kinds of decisions. Granted – in the US our insurance is not tax-payer funded. My company pays for my insurance as one of my benefits of employment, and I feel very fortunate to have insurance that helped pay for some of our medical expenses related to infertility treatments. My company also has benefits that would have helped pay for some adoption expenses. So I can’t specifically relate to your concern in Canada about your tax dollars paying for this medical treatment that you don’t agree with. But I certainly can relate to the broader question – there are lots and lots of things that our tax dollars in the states pay for, that I do not agree with.
TG,
I have read your post several times and I can’t get to the bottom of what you’re bothered by.
You write that there is an immense social pressure on women to have children. You also state that you take exception to the fact that infertility treatment is invasive to women. From those two statements, you conclude that you “have hardly any patience or sympathy for people who have fertility problems”.
What is it, exactly, that you are opposed to? The societal pressures? The medical industry? Or the couples who want to get pregnant? Or is it all of the above?
You state that your words are not meant as a reasoned argument, rather your post is thoughts thrown together in an attempt to understand your insensitivity, yet you also ask that people attack the argument not the person.
If you’re going to post something so inflammatory, please make sure that your position is clear.
Whew! I just read through all of the comments (so as to follow the rules), just to make sure that my situation had not been addressed.
There always seem to be a lot of assumptions when it comes to infertility, especially if one has not had to endure it. Be grateful. I’ll try to touch on the things that jumped out at me as I read the comments, (and I took ‘notes’) but they may seem to be in no particular order.
Fortunately, I guess, I have never been made to feel that my societal value is tied to whether or not I have children. My desire to have children is just that – MY desire. Why I have the need/urge to have children is unknown. I just do. I work full time in a male-dominated profession and am successful at that, so I have a fulfilling life.
Thinking Girl: (First, I applaud you for being so honest in stating your feelings and beliefs. I don’t begrudge you them, and I don’t intend to change them. It is how you feel and there is nothing wrong with that). You stated, “Would these infertile people really love another child less than “their own”? If so, I just don’t think these are people who should be parents in the first place.” I believe that people who adopt consider their child “their own.” I know that I would. And I would love him or her the same as if they carried my own genes. The people I think should NOT be parents are those who abuse and neglect their children. THEY are the ones who should (and often are in the courts) be judged and should not have been parents in the first place.
It is hard to describe what it’s like to undergo infertility treatments while watching your underage, unwed nieces pop out babies with different daddies (yep, another one is due this month!). It’s hard to read stories of babies dumped like garbage into the trash. I would have LOVED to adopt those babies. However, due to our situation (husband’s health issues and age) we most likely wouldn’t be candidates, and I know we’d be excluded from international adoption. We wanted to, but there are so many rules, and yes – it’s intrusive. A good friend is still on the waiting list for international adoption….if ONLY she were a celebrity, she’d already have her child.
When you said, “re: multiple births – many couples end up having multiple fertilized eggs implanted in an effort to maximize their chances of one of them taking.” ***Note to ‘Natalie’ on this point also*** How I wish that they “implanted” the embryos, but they can’t. All they can do is transfer them and hope that at least one of them does implant in the correct place and result in a healthy baby. It really bugs when people use the term “implant” when they really should say “transfer.” It’s just more accurate of the situation and the odds.
With regards to multiple births, most, if not all, of those are a result of treatments that are not – in my opinion – managed properly. If monitored correctly, the doctor should know not to proceed with an insemination, or instruct the parties not to have sex. This does not happen often with IVF. I’ve had two friends get pregnant with triplets. Both were advised to ‘reduce’ the pregnancies. One did and has healthy twins…one did not and lost all three. It is something that is discussed up front, but a doctor cannot MAKE someone reduce her pregnancy. Thank God I was not faced with that decision.
I don’t want to go into our long road to parenthood. Briefly, it started with male factor infertility and we basically had to wait for technology to ‘catch up’ to our situation. By then I was over 40, so now MY fertility was also a factor. We did several cycles of IVF, and even threw in a couple of donor IUI cycles for good measure. As I said earlier, we were more than willing to adopt to get off of the infertility roller coaster. Infertility consumes your life and I would not wish it on anyone. I’m still not sure we would have been approved for domestic OR international adoption. We did one last cycle, and here’s the important part to note: we used BOTH donor sperm and donor eggs. It seems that everyone so far has assumed that IVF involves being selfish enough to want to reproduce yourselves. What we wanted was a family. What I wanted more than anything else was to be pregnant (it’s not for everyone),. to give birth and breast feed a child. We were fortunate that it worked, and our daughter just turned 3. I was 45 when I got pregnant and 46 when I delivered….and had a trouble-free pregnancy. The delivery was fast and easy and surprised everyone. My OB said I should have another, and I’d love to. Yes, I’m 49, but am in good health and most people think I’m much younger than I am. We love our daughter as much as if she carried our genes. She DOES have some of my personality traits, which could lead to a good discussion of nature vs. nurture, but I digress. She DID have my blood coarsing through her body while I carried her, so we shared something very special.
As far as the burden and loss of independence, we obviously were up for it or we wouldn’t have spent so much of ourselves (emotionally, physically, financially) in trying to conceive. Our daughter was baptised at 5 months old on our 23rd wedding anniversary. We’d had plenty of years with just us two to take trips, eat dinner at fancy restuarants, etc. I would have given that up years ago just to become a parent. However, I believe things happen for a reason and we were meant to have OUR daughter. My husband is now retired and gets to spend time with her that other dads can only envy. Since I was older when I had her, I will get to retire with a great pension when she is only 8 years old. Has it been worth it? You bet! Would I do it again? Gladly!
And I hope to do it again….we were fortunate enough to have some embryos that made it to freeze. Thank GOODNESS that the clinics, as one commenter wrote (sorry, can’t remember who) cannot decide what to do with them. Clinics are not the ones who decide to destroy them or donate the embryos to research. I am in a unique position on that one, also, as my husband has Parkinson’s disease. Thankfully it’s slow-progressing. We’ve got embryos that might give us another child, or MIGHT give someone (years from now) relief from this disease. Who, but the parents, should decide that? By saying they should be given to research is a very scary proposition. If that were so, soon the government would be able to dictate all sorts of things (remember involuntary sterilizations?) NOT a good choice, in my opinion.
We are open to donating the embryos to another infertile couple, but the government has again stuck their nose in and made it near impossible. (We feel differently on this point, and I know many couples who say they could never donate their potential children to be raised by someone else. Who am I to judge? Maybe it’s easier because they are not our genes?) Yes, it would be nice to see “us” reflected in “her,” but we’re past that. It does hurt when people say she doesn’t look like me, etc. Oh well. She’s probably lucky – LOL!
kate.d – you said, “this post concerns people who choose to undergo IVF.” Just to clarify, Thinking Girl titled it, “intolerance and infertility,” NOT “intolerance and IVF.” There’s a huge difference. The lack of knowledge and the assumptions on the part of “the general public” are some of the most frustrating things about dealing with infertility. Not all infertility treatments entail IVF.
I know this was long and for those who are bored, sorry. I don’t want to convince TG (or anyone else) of anything, just explain why we chose the path we did. Just as living child-free was not an option we were comfortable with, undergoing fertility treatments isn’t for everyone. Just last week a friend said she knew she had problems, but didn’t want to endure the emotional pain of IVF and would adopt instead. Good for her. At least she knows what SHE can handle.
For those of you who have not experienced infertility, you are lucky. You will also never understand what it’s like because you’re not us. Just as I cannot understand the pain of a friend who lost one of her twins, or those who have suffered miscarriages, I CAN have empathy and not discount their feelings as invalid.
Maybe you might be able to understand a little bit of where we’re coming from, though you still might not agree with my choices. That’s okay. Having kids is not for everyone. I respect your choice not to have children. But please respect our choice to have children. I don’t know why I couldn’t be happy living child-free. It’s hard to put into words the deep ache and longing for a child. I just don’t know, other than I have always wanted to be a mother.
susan, in sum, it “being personal” and you “taking it personally” are two different things. i can see your point about how it’s very difficult not to do the latter, but i don’t think that makes it the former. this is perhaps just a matter of minced words and semantics at this point, but i think it’s a fair distinction to make.
you and IVF Veteran are correct – i should have said “fertility treatments” instead of “IVF.” that is my own ignorance of the specifics talking, but “fertility treatments” is what i actually meant. so, that being the case, maybe it’s just late, but i’m still a little lost trying to follow your choices argument. so because fertility treatments are necessary for you to be able to make the choice to reproduce…does that negate the fact that the treatments are a choice as well? i’m not saying i’m against it being a respectable choice necessarily, just that it should be put in context. the treatment of infertility (for the sole purpose of being able to reproduce, not to fix other health problems) *is* technically not medically necessary (i.e., necessary for survival), which doesn’t negate some people considering it a “problem,” but means we should consider the subsequent decision about whether or not to have fertility treatments in the context of pure choice.
honestly, i’m not even sure where we’re going with all this anymore. it makes my head hurt a bit. but TG, thanks for starting the convo, because i’m appreciative of hearing the dialogue regardless.
Regarding infertility treatments being covered by insurance, I really want to emphasize that if the government covered these treatments, they would actually save taxpayer money. I live in Canada and it really angers me that that the government cannot see the bottom line on this issue and continues to waste my tax dollars. Twin and HOM(high order multiple) births are costing tens of millions of dollars in NICU and ongoing health-care. This number has risen tenfold since ART treatments came to be used because of incidence of these types of birth have risen in the same manner. As others have pointed out, when people are paying out-of-pocket for their treatments, they tend to take risks to increase their chance of success. For example, if you are paying $12 000 for an IVF cycle and the doctor says you have a 30% if you transfer on embryo, but a 40% chance if transfer two, and perhaps a 50-60% if you transfer three, well, most couples go for the more-bang-for-your-buck option and go for two or three, and all of us pay the price. Our precious health care dollars are spent on NICU stays and society continues to pay the price as families suffer financial hardship, emotional duress, days of lost work, or one of the parents being forced to leave the work force completely, etc. In places such as NZ, Australia and several European countries, the goverment has done the (very simple!) math and are paying for IVF to mitigate these costs. Saves money and creates a healthier population.
BTW, I will also mention again here that HOMs of quads, quints and higher are generally the result of a very irresponsible doctor and/or the use of medications to increase ovulation. If IVF is funded, people would not have to use these cheaper methods to try get pregnant, so again there are savings monetarily and emotionally.
I have a copy of a independent study carried out here in Canada a few years ago that gives pretty solid proof that by year 8 of goverment-funded IVF, the goverment would be saving tens of millions of dollars. Email me if you would like to see it.
NG
hi, just stumbled upon this, hope you don’t mind me adding something.
as someone who doesn’t really like children (and babies scare me) i thought pretty much the same things as you, and for the most part, i still agree. i never ruled kids out though, because i am young, things change.
i recently found out i probably can’t have children. i’m 21, and my mother was told this at a similar age (and i’m an accident that happened when she was 38. talk about change…)
even though i don’t want children right now, and i’m not sure i will, it’s the choice that’s taken away from me. i think that people who want their own kids should be more than willing to adopt, and i am too. but other people get to choose, and it hurts that i don’t get that choice, because my body is broken. i didn’t break it, but i have choices taken away as a result. and it hurts.
that said, i wouldn’t get all those medical treatments. any medical treatment i get will be to take away all the physical pain and disability. but i would never waste all that time and money for something i don’t need, because i can adopt.
it’s a little confusing, but basically what i mean is that even though i’m not sure i want kids, having no choice over it hurts. even though it hurts, i’m willing to accept it, and move on, because i do have other options too. i think some people are hurt like me, but can’t get past accepting it, and moving on to adoption, or fostering, etc. i think in this case, it’s a fairly sad socialization encouraging one’s own children.
I come to this from a very, very different place than a lot of others. I grew up in a family where there was no expectation that everyone would have children. I knew many, many adoptees growing up – all with various degrees of acceptance within themselves. (None of them seemed different than any other member of the family.) I knew women who could not, and women who chose not to have families. Due to having food allergies, I am also used to not having my health concerns taken seriously. And that is very relevant to this discussion.
I am infertile, and, I have a potentially, life-threatening illness – food allergy. First, I’ve dealt with food allergy and its isolation since I was 18. I have had the misfortune of already knowing what social isolation is because of something outside of my control. In some ways, this prepared me for finding myself infertile and all of the baggage that came with it. Honestly, my first (failed) IVF was a breeze compared to dealing with my particular food allergies. (Not the mood swings, but the actual practicalities.)
How is this relevant? Infertile men and women feel incredibly isolated from everyone around them. Those with children seem to dangle their “prize” in front of the infertile couple; and, those who wish to remain childfree seem to condemn the infertile for their desire to have a child. One of the more unique features of infertility is that it is something that many of us are reminded of every 28 days – that our bodies have failed us.
Getting back to my story. I never engaged in unsafe sex. Somehow, however, I managed to get PID without it being diagnosed and ended up with a bilateral hydrosalpinx. This means I can never get pregnant without IVF. Here is the thing about the bilateral hydrosalpinx diagnosis, many private insurers in the US – in Canada, Ontario, I believe, until recently also- would pay for reconstruction of the tubes. This has a 4% lifetime (I think) chance of conception and almost a 90% chance of resulting in an ectopic pregnancy which will endanger the life of the woman. (In countries where all abortion is illegal, many, many women die due to ectopic pregnancies.) In every civilized country, it is the consensus of the medical establishment that IVF is safer and more cost effective than tubal surgery due to this fact. Even though, in some cases, IVF only has a 20% success rate in tubal factor infertility, it is SAFER.
Ok, let’s take this a step further. How did I get a bilateral hydrosalpinx? Part of it is because women’s health is woefully underfunded worldwide. I don’t care if you are in the US, Canada, or Japan – it is underfunded. I remember an adolescence filled with extreme menstrual pain. The worst part? I was told it was a sign of fertility. Yep, that’s right. No one bothered to actually do a diagnostic to make sure everything was alright. Why? Women just have pain. And, when I started asking why I wasn’t getting pregnant of my OB/GYN – and asked for medical help – I was put off for 3 years. I went from 34 to 37 – this makes a HUGE difference in how successful you will be in treatment. I believe that a part of this was due to the fact that insurance coverage is so rare for this MEDICAL disorder. The worst part? We had coverage all along. (A dirty little secret is that there is a much shorter shelf-life to fertility than we have been led to believe. I know I am not the only woman to feel betrayed by a certain element of the feminist movement who emphasized career over all else.)
Until recently, endometriosis, for instance, was not considered worthy of treatment by many physicians with anything other than the option of “take it all out.” Excuse me? Endometriosis is a disease which can be mitigated with fertility treatments – including drugs that are used in fertility treatments. Because those drugs were developed as part of fertility treatments, they are not covered under many insurances – in the US and Canada both. (I live in a border state and get CBC news. Plus, I know about US Citizens having scammed [wrongly] the Canadian healthcare system.)
Research into infertility in the USA has been almost exclusively privately funded by women for women. Two very, very good books that can really open someone’s eyes to the economic impact of fertility include The Baby Business and Pandora’s Baby. They talk about how and where funding came from. (The Baby Business also addresses societal and economic impact surrounding IVF and adoption.) Even in England, it wasn’t exactly “kosher” research when they accomplished it. Many of the treatments that have been established for treating infertility have improved women’s overall health because women need to be as healthy as possible to get pregnant.
Something that not too many people have discussed is the overall economic impact of not covering infertility treatments. When infertility treatments are covered, there is a lowered cost of birth because couples – and this is a couples’ disease (whether hetero or homo) – will take more risks when they have more of their own money on the line. If you have insurance you are going to be more willing to go for a singleton birth which would normally mean no need for the NICU which has ongoing socioeconomic costs for society – let alone the insurance bill! The cost savings are actually quite remarkable.
As to number of IVF attempts? The first IVF can really be thought of as a “diagnostic” test for some women – if there is no history of IUI (as in tubal disease). On average, it takes between 3 and 7 IVFs to be successful – the last time I checked. And, believe it or not, that is cheaper than the cost of keeping one higher order multiple (HOMs) in the NICU for an extended period of time. This is very common with HOMs.
The first RE I saw gave me a very, very devastating diagnosis known as “High FSH”. For many REs, this means “I will not cycle you because you will lower my success rates.” (The way these are calculated are mostly bogus due to population skewing. And, instead of concerning themselves with cures, the REs have to concern themselves with their PR.) You immediately get the donor egg speech. Nothing in my lifetime prepared me for the devastation of that speech. NOTHING. Due to the lack of funding (and some very ignorant politicians), much of the research to help women with my diagnosis is not available (or illegal – not for legitimate reasons). I was barely able to function for weeks. I’m a highly educated woman who could not function due to being miseducated about fertility, and being ignored by medical doctors when this could have possibly been corrected or even avoided altogether. (Of course, medicine is very dynamic and there may have been nothing to be done.)
Now, for societal reasons, I have to keep this pretty close to my vest. Really, even the reaction to not being able to have their favorite food can cause people to become irate – but the response the general public seems to have to infertility is astonishingly hostile. Personally, I believe that there is something about infertility that is very threatening to others in today’s world of scientific wonder. There is a misconception that IVF is the solution – but IVF has its limitations and the research in this area is difficult due to society’s opinions.
In no way shape or form is infertility not a medical condition. (There are some undergoing infertility treatments who are technically not infertile, but that is outside of my experience.)
Others have already gone over how adoption is often more expensive than even multiple rounds of IVF – and the other varied issues surrounding it, so I will not revisit that.
One last point that no one has addressed is that all of us who undergo IVF – or other infertility treatments – tend to be slightly wealthier than the average person. This is unfair. The first IVF baby born was born to a working class family in England, yet, today, you need to be upper middle class to afford it! For many men and women, this financial hardship precludes them from ever having children because they have to save and save until their natural fertility – what there was – is gone. Some have spoken of donor egg and donor sperm. Donor egg runs at around $75,000, I believe. If you are over 40 and have a bad FSH score, an RE will push you to donor egg – except in Japan where it is illegal, I think. Think about this. Because a couple is poor and insurance won’t cover a good chance of pregnancy they save until they reach an age when they are told that her eggs aren’t viable and thus they have to come up with $60,000 more? That seems rather classist to me. Everyone who wants a child deserves a reasonable chance at having that child.
I realize that infertility is very hard for someone who has no desire for children to wrap his or her head around. I’m in the throes of it and I can’t really wrap my head completely around it.
Pax,
MLO
Kate,
Yes, medical fertility ~treatments~ are a “choice”. A good portion of medical treatments have nothing to do with “survival” and everything to do with quality of life. But to be honest, I am really lost as to what your point is since ~all~ medical treatment options are based on choice (even those needed for survival can be chosen/refused).
I am wondering as to how you have determined that infertility treatment:
“*is* technically not medically necessary”.
In what way exactly do you mean?
Do you consider cataract surgery to be “medically necessary”? How is an improperly working reproductive system different from improperly working eyes (vision)? You don’t need to see to survive (but we can agree it is a “problem” like infertility is). Do you consider medical treatments (such as cataract surgery) to be pure choice in the same way as you do infertility treatments and thus are also not medically necessary? If you do, then I can agree with the fact that all medical treatment options are not “necessary” and are choices like fertility treatments are (but I do agree that some medical treatment can be necessary for survival in life threatening conditions).
I disagree that it is not “being personal” to call infertile people those things, even if exploring ones feelings and not saying it to one person in particular. I am in the group that Thinking Girl has made sweeping harsh judgments and assumptions about. How do you think it ~should~ be taken by someone who is in the group that she is talking about?
I’m wondering if any of the people who made hurtful comments earlier, such as “people who wouldn’t adopt must be bad parents”, and all the other judgements, feel that they’ve become more enlightened about this issue after reading the thoughts and experiences of people who are living with it.
Because the longer the thread continues *without* anyone putting up their hand and saying “yes I can see another side to this now”, the more I suspect it was not so much about *understanding* the issue, but rather creating a space for like-minded people to bitch about those of us who in some sub-cultures are referred to in a derogative way as “breeders”.
At the very least it can’t be denied that the way was paved for expression of some very mean-spirited sentiments.
I also can’t help but note the irony of asking(or telling more like it) people not to take any of it personally, when the people responding on behalf of or in defense of TG, are clearly doing so for personal reasons.
I’d also like to know just how many of the people taking the moral high ground and tut tutting about the many needy children in the world, would be prepared to adopt a few of them themselves.
I’m guessing none.
I have found that infertility is truly one of those things people don’t understand unless they’ve lived it. Same goes for adoption. Ergo, while you may not be able to perceive it, your opinion is full of ignorance. I was the same way until I had the misfortune to walk the walk.
In the US, adoption is often more expensive than fertility treatments. Not only is the cost lower, tax breaks for medical expenses are more generous than the $10,000 credit for adoption. So there is little financial incentive to undertake adoption especially considering all the additional obstacles of the process. If society wants infertiles alone to bear the responsibility caring for parentless children, they’re going to have to make it more affordable.
Second, adoption is not psychologically benign. My father is adopted. My brother is adopted. As adults they struggle with self-esteem and identity issues. Yet, they had parents who loved them, just not biological parents. People don’t think about the long term psychological effects of adoption, but they must be addressed for the sake of the child.
My husband and I looked at adoption very seriously, but between the costs, the mercurial and exploitative nature of international programs, and the lack of young children in the US,as well as the psychosocial issues adopted children face, we did not feel we were ready. Nor can we afford $30-45K for international adoption which means we would have to adopt an older child domestically. Older children who’ve been in the ’system’ for a few years often have complex issues that require really strong parenting skills and social services.
I have a friend who is a psychiatrist specializing in foster kids and I have talked to her extensively because we would like to adopt, but want to ensure we are the parents our children will need us to be. Interestingly enough, she fully supports and recommends that we have our own bio kids first and look at adoption later with the idea we will then have the background to provide a stable home to a child.
Adoption isn’t a quick, easy fix or the McDonald’s drive thru of infertility. Adoption is a unique family building experience that requires substantial financial, social, and psychological resources. The cavalier ‘just adopt’ attitude minimizes and ignores these complextities and creates inaccurate stereotypes of what adoption is and is not.
Plus you would be surprised how discriminatory the various adoption programs are. I’m too fat for Korea and getting too old for them too. I’m probably not healthy enough for China either. Guatemala is closing their program. There _are_ people trying to adopt, but can’t because they aren’t judged ‘good enough.’ Would you pass muster? What’s your BMI? Because apparently, the ability to parent is dependent on looking like Paris Hilton. It helps if you’re her age too.
As for fertility treatments, my pregnancy may be therapeutic for my long term health. It may even ‘cure’ my infertility (although I’m not holding my breathe). It is definitely therapeutic with regards to reducing my cancer risk. I have hormonal imbalances that prevent ovulation and this affects more than just my fertility. It’s to my benefit as well as society’s to optimize my health.
And whatever happened to choice? It’s my body, my life, my money, and this is my choice.
I find it ironic that someone who is very clear she doesn’t want any children, thinks it necessary to tell other people how they should have theirs. I’m not telling you what to do with your choice, why would you presume to do so to me?
M
[...] a changed heart Jump to Comments For over a week now, I’ve been reading responses to this post, both on my blog and on other blogs and online forums. I wrote that post to try to gain a better [...]
I took up the suggestion made by some of you to write a post about how this dialogue has changed me views on infertility. the link is in the comment just above this one.
a couple comments:
susan – careful about the “it’s normal to want children.” does that mean not wanting children is abnormal? what’s “normal,” anyway? better to be highly critical of what society deems is “normal,” I think.
I don’t take issue with anyone, yourself included, taking what I’ve said personally. Of course you would. I’m a “the personal is political” feminist, so I think I totally understand where you’re coming from with that one. I don’t think it’s wise to pretend that we are separate from a group that we belong to. It’s not possible to be neutral and objective, I believe. Ever.
FemSoc – again, I didn’t open this discussion up in order to simply bash infertiles and people who have or want children. I did so to gain insight from differing perspectives, to learn, to become a better person and feminist, and to hear from people who know more about it than me. If it was an attempt to produce an echo chamber, why would I have published all those comments from infertile people? If I wanted to revel in the nastiness of my former views, why provide space for people who experience infertility to speak and be heard? I have no desire to remain friends with my own narrow-minded opinions. Please, quit trying to pin that on me.
I realize you and many others don’t agree with the way I approached this. I chose to display my ugliness on the subject, in order to pick at it like a scab and hopefully expel it from my psyche. was that the best way to go about it? In retrospect, I probably would go about it differently if I did it over, but I can’t, so there it is. I’m grateful for the chance to expand my understanding, but I am sorry that it came at the expense of the feelings of so many people who are already hurting about their infertility. But, that goes to show you just how insensitive I was about the subject.
“susan – careful about the “it’s normal to want children.” does that mean not wanting children is abnormal? what’s “normal,” anyway? better to be highly critical of what society deems is “normal,” I think.” (Thinking Girl)
Something being “normal” (as in a perfectly normal, natural desire that a human CAN have and that many do) does not mean then that another choice automatically is “abnormal”.
Seems you are the one who has made out what should be normal or abnormal. Such as choosing to use infertility treatments over choosing adoption is “abnormal” since it is (in your view) selfish, closed-minded and narcissistic and adoption is the choice that ~should be made~ if one has a medical problem around their fertility.
I think you assume far too much here that it is “societal pressures” at play in this what can be a ~perfectly normal desire~ to have biological children. “Societal pressures” are really not a huge factor in my and my husbands desires to have children (despite the assumptions expressed by many-such as the notion is seems that we really are duped and don’t realize how much we are influenced by society). Does society (societal pressures) play a ~part~?…of course they do.
I posted this about 5 this morning, but I think it didn’t come through. Giving it another shot.
I think most of the other infertiles have really commented on the emotional aspects of what I would have to say, so I’ll just brush those lightly and then get into what I really want to add.
I see you say that you think that fertiles should adopt just as infertiles should. Do you also think that fertiles who choose not to are “narcissistic” and “selfish?”
There are points where I can understand where ignorance of the full situation would certainly lead to your original thoughts, but that particular one makes my teeth grind a bit.
As for why we (infertiles) want to have our own biological children… well… for the same reasons that fertile people do. That doesn’t seem so complicated.
Honestly, wanting children AT ALL is sort of a crazy choice. (Biological, non-biological but home-grown, adopted, whatever.) They are messy, disobedient, expensive, and all leave you in the end. And I can’t WAIT to be annoyed as hell.
The desire for this illogical choice has nothing to do with fertile vs infertile. We’re just crazy. We believe that the love will outweigh all of the bad stuff.
Not to get too far off track, but why do people want dogs? They smell, pee on your carpet, chew up your belongings, steal your food, escape and piss off the neighbors, and are ultimately fairly expensive. Yet I wouldn’t trade a moment with my dog. It’s my choice because the love and companionship he provides outweighs everything else.
I’ve seen many, many references to “just adopt”ing. My problem isn’t with the question “why don’t you adopt?” It’s with that “just” part.
There is NOTHING “just” about it.
The short answer to the question is the honestly, MOST fertility treatments are cheaper, quicker and far less invasive than adopting.
This is going to get sort of technical. Feel free to skip on by this part.
There a lot of options depending on what your diagnosis is. A great number of women who don’t ovulate regularly have PCOS. It’s the #1 diagnosed “infertility” diagnosis. (I quote that because PCOS can be a very severe medical problem. The short explanation is that you end up with LOTS of cysts on your ovaries. You can imagine that’s quite painful, and they can burst (both the cysts and/or the ovary) and that REALLY hurts, and in the case of the ovary, well, you would die w/o help.)
In this case, infertility is a symptom, not really the disease. PCOS is very closely linked to insulin resistance. I won’t get any more medical than I already am, but basically your ovaries have insulin receptors on them and if you are not processing insulin properly, things go haywire.
The treatment? A diabetes medicine. Costs about 5 bucks. It has some not-so-pleasant gastrointestinal side effects when you start it, but it also drops your risk of developing diabetes later by a significant amount. (You don’t have to take it forever. Just a while.)
Sometimes that drug by itself will kick start ovulation. Sometimes you can combine a drug called Clomid with it. Costs about $25 for 5 pills. Sounds expensive until you find out you only need 5 pills (max of 15) per month. It increases your risk of twins to a little less than 10%. The usual chance is about 3%, so it does go up, but not to a crazy level. And a risk of triplets is a little less than 1%. Again, negligible. And a proper doctor is monitoring you to make sure you’re not releasing too many eggs anyway. The pregnancy rate for Clomid is about 40% in three months.
Clomid has been in existence for decades. I’m not sure it’s inception, but it was at least in the early 70’s as I have friends who are a product of it. I have gotten pregnant (and miscarried, unrelated to my infertility) on it twice. With one baby, for the record.
We combined the Clomid with IUI. My husband’s swimmers suck so the hope was to get as many swimmers as possible as close to the egg as possible. (I ovulate on my own, but not well, hence the Clomid.)
IUI is a relatively inexpensive treatment as well. Basically, my husband does his business in a cup; they send the semen through a “wash” which strips the semen and just leave the sperm. The sperm is deposited via catheter into my uterus.
It sounds awful, I know. But honestly, it doesn’t really hurt that much. I had a painful one a few months ago (I’ve had 4 total, resulting in our 2 pregnancies.) but the last one.. I didn’t even know she’d put the cath in. It’s really not torture. No more invasive than your average pap smear.
As for cost? It depends. The IUI itself is probably 2-300 bucks. (These are all US dollars, btw.) If they do a follicle scan (ultrasound) you might add another 2-300 for that.
(I live in a state with infertility coverage, and the insurance company doesn’t pay nearly that much. Not sure how much you know about American insurance, but the out of pocket cost is NOT what an insurance company pays. usually a small percentage, actually. For example, I’m “billed” $183 for an ultrasound. My insurance pays $50. The doctor’s office writes off the rest because they are contracted for a certain amount through the insurance company.)
Anyway, so, completely out of pocket, a Clomid/IUI cycle is probably 5-600 dollars, max.
Now, if Clomid doesn’t work to make a woman ovulate or doesn’t succeed, you can move on to bigger and better drugs. They are also MUCH more expensive – in the range of probably a thousand dollars per cycle. So let’s say a cycle of that is approximately $1500. They’re also injectible, and let’s be honest- needles suck.
The success rate of IUI is hard to state because a lot of it depends on what your diagnosis is. It’s usually quoted at 20%/cycle, but that’s sort of misleading.
For us, our odds of IUI were quoted at around 10-15% to start off with. The sperm issues really drop it, so they weren’t great. And sadly, there wasn’t anything they could do for my husband to increase his chances. They couldn’t find any “reason” for his count to be so low so there wasn’t anything to fix, really.
We lucked out and my husband’s sperm washes well. Meaning that the treatment they give it for the IUI usually doubles his motile count. As I’ve mentioned, our pregnancy rate is 50% in 4 months currently.
IVF for my area would be about $12,000. With my age and diagnosis, success rate is about 45% per cycle.
It is FAR more invasive, yes. Lots of shots, lots of monitoring, and ultimately a surgery to retrieve the eggs. There’s very little chance we’ll need to do it because we’ve proven that IUI will get us pregnant. But with our original diagnosis, IVF was our most likely chance at pregnancy so we certainly looked at it.
At one point you said:
“This makes perfect sense to me. I’m all for reducing the invasiveness of fertility treatments. My question, though, is: repeating the cycle, isn’t that going to be just as if not more invasive? how to balance out these options?”
The answer is not necessarily. If you respond as you should for an IVF, you’ll probably get around 10 eggs. Those eggs are then fertilized and you wait and see. If things go well, you might end up with 7 or 8 fertilized eggs. The (usually) 2 best are transferred back with hopes of implantation 3 or 5 days later, depending on how well they’re growing. That leaves maybe 5 fertilized eggs still growing. maybe all 5 still look good at the 5 day mark. Maybe 1 or 2 do, but certainly, most people have a few still good. Those are frozen.
Now what happens is that if the transferred embryos don’t take hold, do take hold but don’t make it, or if they do and you then later decide you’d like more, you can do a FET. (Frozen Egg Transfer.) That means much less invasion because you don’t have to go through the egg retrieval again (which is the worst part.)
Here’s where coverage for infertility can make things less invasive (and less costly, which I think is part of your problem with all of this.)
A woman paying for these options out of pocket is looking to up her odds of getting pregnant.
I’ll use me as an example. I’m a healthy 30 year old. Odds are, if you put an embryo (1) into me, it will implant and grow. But if I’m laying out 12k, I want to up those odds a bit. So they’ll put 2 back just to make sure. I might only HAVE enough money for 1 cycle, so my eggs are LITERALLY in one “basket.”
This means a few things. First, I’m now much more likely to have twins. Multiple gestation pregnancy is expensive. The risk of complication goes up exponentially. That means hospital stays for the mother. $$$$. They are often born early, which means hospital (NICU) stays for the babies. $$$$$
All of which you’re already paying for. No debate.
Secondly, it means fewer eggs are left to try for a FET later. Which means starting the IVF process from scratch all over again.
There have been a number of studies done showing that IVFs/FETs with less embryos put back cost far less over the long run than those with more. But the difference is that people just plain can’t afford to do it less. They may only have enough savings for one shot, so they can’t hold out for a FET.
Now, I know I’ve gone on FOREVER here and probably bored you to death, but I think that often the problem is ignorance about infertility treatments. People see a 60 year old woman or a woman birthing 6 babies on the news and they become the face of infertility. When, in fact, they are no more an accurate representation of infertiles than O.J. Simpson is of African Americans. They make the news because they’re ODDITIES.
I just wanted to add some adoption facts to the discussion.
Domestic adoption of an infant costs a minimum of about 25K (averages closer to about 40k) and takes 2-3 years. It is fraught with disappointment and invasion. Sometimes even physical invasion just like infertility. You’ll have to prove your health. Plus the invasion into your home, past, finances, etc.
International adoption is even MORE expensive. I did some research into it last year and the cheapest fee was around $6400 (Columbia & Mexico.) That’s the fee to the agency. That does not include travel, paperwork, visas, hotel stays, etc etc etc. By the time it’s all said and done, it’s usually in the 30k range. Not to mention all the time off required. Countries like Russia require two trips to visit with a lengthy stay each time. That requires a lot of time off from work, which isn’t a fee, but is certainly a cost.
I had someone ask me recently why I didn’t just adopt because I’m so disappointed when a cycle fails. As though adoption is better.
Domestic adoption is the worst as far as emotional risks because in many states, the birth mother has up to a YEAR to change her mind. You think I’m disappointed in a negative pregnancy test? Imagine what I’d be like holding a baby in my arms for 6 months only to have to give it back.
Then there is adoption through the foster care system. It’s pretty cheap fee-wise most of the time. Sometimes only a few hundred dollars, depends on the age of the child and some other factors. However, as a previous poster pointed out, adoptable kids actually aren’t that readily available.
A friend waited several years for a placement of a toddler aged child who was “probably” going to be available for adoption.
What this meant is that she took a developmentally delayed, behavior issue filled toddler into her home. His birth mother comes to visit. To their home. This is a woman who has had her child taken from her. Let’s just say she’s not the usual houseguest my friend would have. Talk about invasive. My friend is responsible for taking the child to get togethers with his extended family. And the aftermath of those visits isn’t pleasant. It’s upsetting for the child in many ways.
Never mind the costs involved with his therapy. It is currently being covered by the state because he is still their ward, but eventually it will become their responsibility IF the birth mother REALLY terminates her rights as she keeps promising. And the mother may not. My friend could ultimately lose the child anyway.
So, a breakdown.
Basic infertility treatment: $500/month Success rate: ~40% in three months
Upgraded infertility treatment: $1500/month Success rate similar to basic.
IVF: $12k/cycle success rate: from 30-50% per cycle depending on age/health of the woman.
Adoption: $25k-$50k Success rate: Not sure on this one. Probably somewhere close to 100% as long as you’re approved. (I can’t find any good statistics on this, I’m sorry.) Average time to adopt: 2-3 years.
In the end, my point is that there are NO easy solutions. There is no “just” in any of it. As for being selfish.. I can’t imagine how you could possibly be selfish and choose ANY of them because they’re all difficult.
For us, we thought we’d try the easiest, cheapest way first- Clomid/IUI. That the child will be biologically ours is a benefit. YES. A BENEFIT. It isn’t a non-negotiable benefit, but yes, I do dream of looking into my child’s eyes and see their father looking back at me. If it wouldn’t ultimately work, I’d love the eyes looking back at me no matter what, but the ideal situation is, indeed, a biological child.
We made our choice, just as you make yours to remain child-free. I don’t think that makes either of us selfish.
Anyway, I apologize for being so verbose. It’s just something I feel strongly about and quite frankly, I talk a lot anyway.
This has been a fascinating (and mostly respectful) discussion. Thanks for making all of us, including yourself, open wider, Thinking Girl.
For my children, I want to address the unstated assumption that adoption is a “last resort.” Here’s what I wrote not long ago in my blog:
I had long struggled with the idea of adoption as a second choice — pregnancy being the default setting and thus, first choice. After all, I had ended up in exactly the right place. I wouldn’t want my family to be any different than who we are. But how to explain this to my children, who are likely to ask questions in the coming years?
Through the Barren Bitches Book Brigade, I came across Melissa at Stirrup Queens (stirrup-queens.blogspot.com), who addresses the term “second” as a chronological term rather than an ordinal term.
Was Rob my first choice as a husband? Well, considering I kissed a few frogs before I even met him, Rob wasn’t chronologically my first choice. I wonder how my life would be now if I’d ended up with Alan, the boy who helped me collect worms one day when we were 8. Or Doug, the disk jockey turned radio-mogul, or Brad-the-farmer or Clay-the-slacker or Iain-the-commitment-phobe.
Rob was definitely my best choice. But I meandered to get to him. The meandering is what made me worthy of him and appreciative of him.
It’s oddly coincidental. Tessa (6) developed her first crush this week during Vacation Bible School. She is smitten with a boy double her age, a 6th grader named Cory. She dressed for him, had me braid her hair for him, talked incessantly about him, and dreamed of him. She claims she’ll marry him.
Not very likely. Cory may be her first, but what matters is the last. That’s the keeper.
Just like Tessa, and just like Reed (4). My meandering to them is what makes me worthy of them. The process of our family forming was absolutely the best choice, even if we started out not knowing that.
http://weebleswobblog.blogspot.com/2007/06/in-adoption-last-means-best.html
i haven’t read a single comment, only your original post, so forgive me if i am repeating what has already been said.
you don’t want children, and so i can appreciate and respect your viewpoint.
i got married to the man i love and wanted to have a family with him. i can’t imagine growing old together without one. four years and countless fertility treatments later, we still do not have a child.
the heart wants what the heart wants. my dream was to create a life with my husband. i can’t explain that urge. it’s just there. it’s primal, i suppose. eventually i gave up my genetics and tried donor eggs. that didn’t work either. we will move on to adoption as a way to make our family. i will love that child as if he/she were my genetic child, it doesn’t matter to me.
the thing is, there are very few ang*lina j*lie’s in the world. i would guess that 75% of the people who adopt do it at the end of a long, hard road of infertility.
the question i ask of you is this: why because i am infertile, do i suddenly become responsible for saving the starving orphans of the world? why am i the selfish one? when i was first married, if i had gotten pregnant the old-fashioned way, i am certain you would not have pointed at my belly and asked, “why didn’t you just adopt?” if you are so concerned, then why don’t you adopt? i don’t say this disrespectfully, but only so that you can see the other side.
i find it interesting that as an infertile woman doing everything she can do to get pregnant, i am selfish. but suddenly, when i start telling people about our adoption plans i become the noble, selfless one. i’m not noble. i’m desperate and i’ll do anything to have a child. adoption is the next step. if i “save” a child in the process, then terrific. but it wasn’t on my mind at all on my wedding day. i put “save” in quotes because adoption isn’t all puppies and daisies. there is heartbreak on one side. there is no utopia when it comes to building a family the hard way.
i hope that my perspective is of interest to you and that perhaps you can understand the other side. i’ve never read your blog but was alerted to your post by another board.
peace.
Hi,
just wanted to say I often check in on your blog, and I hated reading the ridiculous mean comments about your “insensitive” views–especially as you mentioned them first off.
second: I was so glad to read this; I know that’s already been said a lot, but I have often had difficulty accepting the idea that people “need” to have their “own” children. It’s such a selfish, privileged desire, in my opinion. Just wanted to add my kudos to the others.
hoLEEE!
So much written, so little time. Papi is pulling up with the little boy from another family who is shaping into an okay playmate for Stinkapee.
sigh…
I’ve got thoughts…
They’re mushed together as usual. So, bear with me as I do a gentle vomitation.
Okay, first thing:
I think that the root of our ageism at both ends is a profound fear and hatred of the opposite poles of life – childhood and old age.
People are uncomfortable, fearful, impatient with children and with elders.
We behave as if interacting with children whether it’s through having them or babysitting them or welcoming them into our homes is an option, something we can poo-poo or blow off if we so choose.
Of course we forget that we were once children and that children actually live in our homes and occupy our lives, because children still live on inside us.
Armchair, pop psychiatry alert!
Whether we have children or don’t, our choices betray a profound inability to come to terms with childhood. Aversion or fascination, childhood remains a motivating factor in the decision to have or not to have children.
Another thought, this time about adoption?
Papi and I have thought about and discussed adoption a child from the caribbean. We talked about someone around Stinkapee’s age. Problem? Adopting a child well past babyhood means that the child has encountered torment, abuse and other issues that will start to unfold as it grows up…in our care…without us knowing what actually happened…without the child being able to put words to what happened…without us being able to prepare for what will come…without us being able to stop the inevitable interplay of that child’s issues with Stinkapee’s and Shmolee’s issues.
I’m a control freak. That sounds like emotional mess and muddle I can’t say I would willingly sign on for.
Adoption.
Queer writer, sometimes pornographer, name, image all over the net, probably not suitable candidate…in the eyes of uber conservative social workers.
I thought about artificial insemination…and about genetically modifying these cute mixed race babies…that look like parents of two different cultures/races. I always wonder if people actually sit down and plot out the exact shade baby they would like to create. I always wonder if they fully think through what it means to purposefully genetically mix up a baby and hope that it comes out like an exact mix rather than as a little too much of one or the other. How odd. Still more playing god/dess.
I’ve always wanted children. What I didn’t want was motherhood, patriarchal control, the erasure of self, the silence, nuclear family and the isolation.
What I have is:
-my issues and buttons being pushed fairly often as I’m forced to come to terms with my own childhood as I make decisions or sometimes fuck things up;
-What I have is me avoiding the wimmin who don’t think it’s possible to parent without being enveloped by the “mother”;
-What I have is daily struggle with a male partner who was inculcated by a male parent who was completely clueless and violently abused by one of his brothers while his feminist mother watched and did nothing;
-What I have is the articulation of self achieved at all odds while others cluck their teeth and define me as “bad” mama;
-What I have is an unwilling nuclear family established once I realized that the folks who I thought would question the way “things are” actually expected me to follow through with our collective programming and “behave”;
-What I have is absolute isolation as I struggle to raise myself and my children while others shocked, awed and amazed at the choices I make either attempt to hinder me or simply stand back and claim the right to do nothing at all.
So, basically, I’m like: Thinker, don’t want children? Don’t have them. But realize whether you have them or just watch from a distance while others have them, you have a child who lives with you, who wants you to raise her.
Meanwhile, the struggle continues for many of us salmon who went upstream who are now floundering and questioning, even as others struggle to make sure things remain the same.
Hmmm…talk about a load of words signifying nothing in particular.
Cheers.
darkdaughta – thank you for your wise words. my best friend (who loves your site, by the way) and I talk about parenting our inner children quite a bit. No matter our relationships with our own mothers and fathers, we still need to parent ourselves most importantly.
and that’s hard sometimes. maybe I need to allow myself to be a little girl for a while, to love the childish impulses that still reside in me, to feel safe with myself.
food for thought – thank you!
Great discussion! I noticed that while the topic of overpopulation came up a couple times, IMO it wasn’t addressed very well. It’s definitely something that has weighed on my mind as I’ve approached the decision to try to procreate, which was never a “given” in my mind.
I study immigration. While I’m not an expert (yet), I do see several global trends that have bearing on this discussion.
Populations that achieve low infant mortality rates, low maternal mortality rates, and longer average life-spans follow a demographic curve where birthrates also drop significantly after awhile. This is why certain European countries and Japan are experiencing negative population growth – more people are dying than are being born.
The implication here is that the best way to address overpopulation of the world is to address public health issues, women’s reproductive rights, and economic justice for those populations where these are not realities (I’m probably not saying anything you don’t already know). Meanwhile, international adoption is a “drop in the bucket” alleviation of population pressures in certain parts of the world – it’s pulling babies from the (metaphorical) river without trying to find out who is throwing them into the river in the first place.
Meanwhile, countries with declining populations become destination sites for immigrant labor, in part because of labor shortages within the country. While this also (like “just adopt”) seems on the surface like a “win-win” situation for employers and laborers alike, both capitalism and racism end up creating situations of exploitation and inequality… it’s not so simple.
While this topic seems tangential to the original discussion of infertility and adoption, what I want to suggest is that adoption (domestic or international) is not necessarily a cure-all solution to global overpopulation, and the argument from over-population is glib.
Having said that, I do agree that having no more than two children seems like a reasonable approach, if everyone would follow that guideline… I’m thinking of the woman in the news recently who just bore her 17th child…!
hi elizabeth -
you might find a couple of my old posts interesting, in light of your interest in immigration and population. they are both academic papers I wrote. One is about environment and population control, and the other is about nationalism and gender. if you have a chance, let me know what you think.
Thinking Girl – First of all, I’m VERY impressed with your dedication to asking for advice and then reading all the comments and taking time to reply! Thank you for doing so.
MLO – I completely agree with you that women’s health (reproductive in particular) is underfunded and completely misunderstood.
Now.. just a few points I don’t think I saw covered Thinking Girl:
First – You seemed to generalize “fertility treatments” into one big group that is all expensive and difficult. In actuality, most people undergo a series of much less expensive, less invasive treatments and diagnostic procedures before the going gets difficult and they face the decision with whether to proceed further in the conception journey. For example, two common first steps are a semen analysis for the male (and even though they don’t go through as much physically, this is still somewhat demeaning and hard for them), and various bloodwork for the woman, along with a possible rx of clomid to try to induce ovulation if she is not ovulating. Sometimes it’s as simple as the fact that her tsh is too high, meaning she has hypothyroidism, and she will need to go on something like synthroid to regulate it, which will then regulate her cycles. Of course this was NOT the case for me unfortunately…
This leads me to my second point. You said this in an above answer:
“Infertility isn’t life-threatening in the same way as heart disease or cancer.”
The really really sad thing about all of this is that reproductive disfunctions ARE health threatening. It’s just that our society and medical community often still treat them as if it’s still just part of that “hysterical” woman problem, (Remember how the term “hysterectomy” came about?) and throw a women suffering from various maladies on birth control without actually trying to discover her problems. I know this was somewhat addressed in other comments, but I thought I might have something to add.
I definitely think that at least the diagnostic aspect of fertility issues should be covered by insurance. If not for the fact that we were trying and failing to conceive a child, I feel I would have never been diagnosed with the problems I have now. I have been dealing with chronic fatigue, depression, anxiety, high LDL, Low HDL, high triglycerides, crippling periods that come maybe every 3 months, and horrible mood swings for most of my reproductive life. For 6 years of that (since I was 23) I’ve been trying to get doctors to help me find out what was wrong. It wasn’t until I went to a reproductive endocrinologist that I discovered that I have Polycystic Ovarian Syndrome (PCOS), and Hashimoto’s Thyroiditis (hypothyroid. It was misdiagnosed for years). Now I’m awaiting a laparoscopy to determine if I have endometriosis.
All these disorders are a result of problems with the hormone system. It’s very complicated, but since hormones control our entire bodies, an imbalance of that magnitude naturally affects everything in them. Take PCOS for example. Simply because I have PCOS, I face a much higher risk than the general population in developing:
*Diabetes
*Heart Disease (due to my body’s inferior capability of regulating my blood lipid levels)
*Fibromyalgia
*Ovarian Cancer
*endometrial cancer
(and don’t even get me started on the lesser annoyances such as hirsutism & acne)
PCOS and endometriosis aren’t even properly understood yet and the only true “treatment” is to eat similar to how a diabetic would, eat whole foods as much as possible and be sure to live an active, healthy lifestyle. I have to be very very vigilant about what and how I eat in order to keep all these factors in check. If I had never been diagnosed, the doctors would still be scrambling around, trying to treat each of my symptoms as a separate problem and failing miserably. I stand a better chance now that I know.
Some women even have clotting factor problems as part of their “infertility” diagnosis that lead to very dangerous loss of blood during menstruation or delivery.
So no, infertility in itself is not necessarily life threatening because that is simply a term that encompasses the many many disorders that men and women face. What ARE potentially (and I suppose often indirectly) life threatening are the disorders and diseases that cause the infertility.
I’m sorry it’s so long, but it’s something I care desperately about. So many women labor so long with horrible problems that their doctors tell them are “normal.” Or they’re brushed off with birth control pills, when if they just had the proper diagnosis, they might stand a chance at bettering (and perhaps lengthening) their lives.
Thanks so much for reading this. I’m passionate about women’s health and education.
I’m a fairly androgynous – uncommitted person gender wise in this society. I rail against the idea that procreation is the only children we can have (rather than our ideas or art). I have been pregnant – and aborted because I was unprepared and surprised – as my friends’ said “you can’t be pregnant, you’re like a guy”. I’m heterosexual despite all indications to the contrary. Being pregnant – besides the overt horror – I found I had no problem with it – hormones are strong and I knew if I decided to keep it I wouldn’t regret it. I’m adopted and my brother (natural child) – his wife-has undergone numerous painful and expensive treatments to conceive. I wonder why they don’t adopt.
But being adopted – I know the perhaps archaic sentiment of blood. My family does not look like me. Having never given a thought to pregnancy or family I was surprised I took to it. I took notes. I see both ways – but, if a family wants a child – they don’t care where it comes from – I know it’s that intense.
oh shit – I should have read more of the comments before trying to post. I probably sound flippant and romantic. I don’t mean to be.
Apologies if I’ve offended anyone. I’ve had a good adoption experience (myself). But I do understand trying to have your own. I (very unqualifiedly – is that a word) worked for a perinatal advisory counsel for about a year. Jeez.
I already felt suspect and marginalized being female.
Some women – can’t breast feed and then beat themselves up for that. There are a lot of self-esteem issues associated with procreation. I had the cutest man come in and say he was ok with his wife not being able to breast feed because it gave him the chance to bond with his child at feeding time. The challenges don’t stop at conception…..
…but angry women scare me…