The Daddy/Donor Question

The Daddy question is one I’ve struggled with from the very start. In terms of sharing donor-related information with my daughter, I'm going with the early and often approach. Being a single mom family, she’s going to know pretty quickly that “Daddy” is missing from the equation. I hope by introducing the idea early it will just be a part of life.

When I made the decision to become a single mother by choice and began perusing the profiles of dozens of potential donors, I was clear about one thing: I planned to use an open donor. I’d heard stories about kids who yearned for details about their biological parent, and I wanted to make sure that she’d have the information she needs. I will tell my daughter that her donor is her donor, but ultimately, I don’t know who she will decide her donor is to her. I have no idea what it is like to be a donor baby, nor how my daughter will feel about it someday. I felt I’d rather err on the side of choice. I will not encourage her to find the donor nor discourage her from it, but if she decides it’s important to her, I will have kept that option open for her.

On this note, I joined the sperm bank's donor sibling registry. I have met a few other women online who’ve used the same donor and I’ve seen pictures of some half-siblings.  I went so far as to get in touch with the mom's of some of the siblings and have seen pictures of the kids. The mom's all seem very positive and open about sharing information which is good. Some have gone so far as to get the kids together - I don't know when or if I'd ever be ready for that, but the opportunity is there. I'm curious about them, and any similarities there might be, and more importantly want to open that door for a free interchange of information, so that it's available for and if my daughter should want it.

I know I’ve chosen a complex path, but in the end you make the best decision that you can. Any choice that I make as a single mom to have a family comes with a myriad of decisions and heartwrenching decisions that frankly, it just sucks to have to make. No doubt there will be more issues and insecurities over the years, but I'm happy and at peace with the decisions that I've made and I'll work through them the best way for us. While my daughter may ultimately disagree with some of the decisions I’ve made, I hope that she can understand why I made them and find peace in the fact that she was and is so, so very wanted.