Millions of people dream of having a baby but struggle for years with infertility or seek other unconventional ways to build a family. In an era of new options in reproductive medicine, many couples are using a third person's egg, sperm, or embryo to conceive. Having a child with another person's genetics is complex. Couples have concerns about how donor conception will affect their future family life, especially their child.Confusion and fear can leave parents feeling unequipped on this path to parenthood. Shame and unresolved grief about infertility create silence around a controversial topic that needs a voice. Secrets can hurt a family. A fertility counselor addresses your urgent questions: -Why should we tell our child we're not genetically related?-How do we tell our child about donor conception? And when is the best time? -What if my child is upset?-What if I don't feel like the real parent?-Will others treat our family differently?-Should we keep the donor a secret?You can learn to overcome fears that make you want to keep a secret-yet maintain your family's privacy. This book offers education and awareness so parents can guide their donor-conceived children through various stages of development with age-appropriate conversations.

I Dreamed of You, the story of an egg donor, tells the story of how the parent and child came to be together. It allows the mother a way to open up this critical conversation and to embrace all of the love, caring, nurturing, and desire she gave to her child from contemplation to birth and beyond. It takes so much love to tell how the child came to be, and this is a love story.

This book serves as a valuable tool to help explain the process of pregnancy loss to a child. This story is gentle and open. It allows parents, or caregivers, to adjust discussions to meet the individual needs of their children.

In On It is the book for the grandparents and best friends, colleagues and neighbors, aunts and uncles, teachers and caregivers of contemporary adoptive families. It offers advice, information and insights into contemporary adoption -- especially for readers who are not themselves adoptive parents. In On It explains the decision-making processes that lead parents to adopt, the adoption process itself, and the important roles of loss and grief in adoption. It offers suggestions for appropriate adoption language and talking about adoption; overviews of transracial, open and older child adoption; guidance for readers who will find themselves representing and speaking on behalf of adoptive families; as well as illustrative anecdotes, suggestions from adoptive parents, and lists of "Ways You Can Help." In On It extends an invitation into adoption--it is a friendly, welcoming and highly useful adoption resource.

If you have experienced a pregnancy or infant loss, you know what it means to carry the memory of your baby within your heart. It is through our hearts that the memory of our babies lives on. We hope the story of the Duck family and their tiny egg supports you in honoring and remembering your babies.

When a couple plans for a child today, every moment seems precious and unique. Home pregnancy tests promise good news just days after conception, and prospective parents can track the progress of their pregnancy day by day with apps that deliver a stream of embryonic portraits. On-line due date calculators trigger a direct-marketing barrage of baby-name lists and diaper coupons. Ultrasounds as early as eight weeks offer a first photo for the baby book. Yet, all too often, even the best-strategized childbearing plans go awry. About twenty percent of confirmed pregnancies miscarry, mostly in the first months of gestation. Statistically, early pregnancy losses are a normal part of childbearing for healthy women. Drawing on sources ranging from advice books and corporate marketing plans to diary entries and blog posts, Lara Freidenfelds offers a deep perspective on how this common and natural phenomenon has been experienced. As she shows, historically, miscarriages were generally taken in stride so long as a woman eventually had the children she desired. This has changed in recent decades, and an early pregnancy loss is often heartbreaking and can be as devastating to couples as losing a child. Freidenfelds traces how innovations in scientific medicine, consumer culture, cultural attitudes toward women and families, and fundamental convictions about human agency have reshaped the childbearing landscape. While the benefits of an increased emphasis on parental affection, careful pregnancy planning, attentive medical care, and specialized baby gear are real, they have also created unrealistic and potentially damaging expectations about a couple's ability to control reproduction and achieve perfect experiences. The Myth of the Perfect Pregnancy provides a reassuring perspective on early pregnancy loss and suggests ways for miscarriage to more effectively be acknowledged by women, their families, their healthcare providers, and the maternity care industry.

This inclusive, straightforward guide to fertility is What to Expect Before You’re Expecting for families outside the heterosexual nuclear family model—perfect for LGBTQ+ and solo parents who want to have kids but don’t know where to start. In Baby Making for Everybody, queer millennial midwives Ray Rachlin and Marea Goodman use their professional expertise to demystify the dizzying process of pursuing parenthood as queer and solo people, offering detailed, gender-affirming, body-positive advice on topics including: Fertility tracking for people with uteruses Choosing a sperm donor, egg donor, or surrogate Legal considerations for LGBTQ+ families Navigating pregnancy and gender identity IUI, ICI, and IVF procedures Foster parenting and adoption Miscarriage and infertility The result is a much-needed compassionate step-by-step guide for every aspect of the complicated, messy, and glorious process of building a family. Combining practical information with personal narratives and first-person community wisdom, this book provides prospective parents with the information they need to grow their families.

Wendy Kramer, founder and director of the Donor Sibling Registry, and Naomi Cahn, family and reproductive law professor, have compiled a comprehensive and thorough guide for the growing community of families with donor-conceived children. Kramer and Cahn believe that all donor-conceived children’s desire to know their genetic family must be honored, and in Finding Our Families, they offer advice on how to foster healthy relationships within immediate families and their larger donor family networks based on openness and acceptance. With honesty and compassion, the authors offer thoughtful strategies and inspirational stories to help parents answer their own, and their children’s, questions and concerns that will surely arise, including: How to support your children’s curiosity and desire to know about their ancestry and genetic and medical background. How to help children integrate their birth story into a healthy self-image. How to help your children search for their donor or half siblings if and when they express interest in doing so. Finding Our Families opens up the lives of donor-conceived people who may be coping with uncertainty, thriving despite it, and finding novel ways to connect in this uncharted territory as they navigate the challenges and rewards of the world of donor conception.

In this deeply moving and myth-shattering work, Ann Fessler brings out into the open for the first time the hidden social history of adoption before Roe v. Wade - and its lasting legacy. An adoptee who was herself surrendered during those years and recently made contact with her mother, Ann Fessler brilliantly brings to life the voices of more than a hundred women, as well as the spirit of those times, allowing the women to tell their stories in gripping and intimate detail.

This is the story of Wendy's journey as the mother of a donor-conceived profoundly gifted child, Ryan, whose relentless curiosity—under the tenacious guidance and support of his mother—eventually led to his reunion against all odds not only with his biological father, Donor 1058, but also with 19 of his donor-conceived half-siblings scattered across the continent. Their experience—like the experience of so many of the Donor Sibling Registry's members—illustrates how this brave new world of donor conception is stretching our understanding of the evolving nature and possibilities of "family." This memoir, written with warmth and humor by Wendy herself, reminds us with story after story that there are few things more fundamental than the human need to know where we come from, nor more beautiful than the triumph of truth over shame.

Aged thirty-seven, single and having experienced two miscarriages, Genevieve Roberts found out that her fertility levels were dwlindling. On hearing this news, she made the courageous decision to embark on motherhood solo and eventually became pregnant using a sperm donor. Genevieve describes her initial fear of the prospect of birth without a partner, and the trepidation she felt towards all the responsibility she has taken on. She recounts all the milestones of pregnancy and motherhood that most women share with their partner -- going to NCT classes alone, taking part in birthing workshops with her sister-in-law, her amazement that two people in her pregnancy yoga class are following the same path as her. But ultimately what triumphs is Genevieve's excitement at meeting her daughter. She recalls the first months of parenthood, navigating the love, worry and tiredness of life with a newborn without a partner. She describes the beautiful simplicity of the relationship between herself and her daughter, as she gets to know Astrid without having to consider a partner. Going Solo is for anyone whose life has taken an unexpected twist; for people who are interested in modern families and for those who want to take control of their life and follow their dreams of parenthood. It celebrates the fulfilment that comes from following what makes you happy, and reminds us that beauty may be found when life offers a surprise or a deviation from convention.

The Very Kind Koala is a charming picture book for young children which provides an introduction to surrogacy through the simple story of a koala bear and her husband who needed the help of a very kind koala to carry their baby in her pouch.Parents can begin reading this story to children as young as 3 years of age to begin the dialog about their own helpful surrogate.

Oliver, a young kangaroo whose mother becomes a surrogate for the Bouncing-Hopalots and delivers their baby to them, narrates this heartwarming tale and shows what the gestational surrogacy process is all about from start to finish.

Geared to readers from preschool to age eight, What Makes a Baby is a book for every kind of family and every kind of kid. It is a twenty-first century children’s picture book about conception, gestation, and birth, which reflects the reality of our modern time by being inclusive of all kinds of kids, adults, and families, regardless of how many people were involved, their orientation, gender and other identity, or family composition. Just as important, the story doesn’t gender people or body parts, so most parents and families will find that it leaves room for them to educate their child without having to erase their own experience.

Love is baking a special cake. Love is lending a helping hand. Love is reading one more book. In this exuberant board book, many different families are shown in happy activity, from an early-morning wake-up to a kiss before bed. Whether a child has two moms, two dads, one parent, or one of each, this simple preschool read-aloud demonstrates that what's most important in each family's life is the love the family members share.

From surrogacy and adoption, to transgender pregnancy and finding child care, parenting as an LGBTQ person is complex. This book is an authoritative, comprehensive, and easy‑to‑read guide to parenthood and family building for LGBTQ people. The path to becoming a parent is complicated for LGBTQ people. Some LGBTQ people don't consider parenthood because of stereotypes and barriers, while others are interested in parenthood but unsure about the first steps or overwhelmed by the path to take. Still others are discouraged by the attitudes of their family, community, or religion. This book provides LGBTQ parents and prospective parents with the detailed, evidence‑based knowledge they need to navigate the transition to parenthood, and help their children thrive. Dr. Abbie E. Goldberg, psychologist and researcher, uses the results of her LGBTQ Family Building Project to help challenge traditional beliefs that have often been weaponized against LGBTQ people to prevent or discourage them from becoming parents. Dr Goldberg walks readers through the various steps and decision points in becoming a parent, describes key research findings on family building, and offers key questions and reader-friendly checklists to easily enable readers to evaluate the LGBTQ friendliness and overall “fit” of adoption agencies, health care providers, day cares, and other institutions.

While on a drive in Los Angeles, on a seemingly average afternoon, Kerry Washington received a text message that would send her on a life-changing journey of self-discovery. In an instant, her very identity was torn apart, with everything she thought she knew about herself thrown into question. In Thicker than Water, Washington gives readers an intimate view into both her public and private worlds—as a mother, daughter, wife, artist, advocate, and trailblazer. Chronicling her upbringing and life’s journey thus far, she reveals how she faced a series of challenges and setbacks, effectively hid childhood traumas, met extraordinary mentors, managed to grow her career, and crossed the threshold into stardom and political advocacy, ultimately discovering her truest self and, with it, a deeper sense of belonging. Throughout this profoundly moving and beautifully written memoir, Washington attempts to answer the questions so many have struggled with: Who am I? What is my truest and most authentic self? How do I find a deeper sense of connection and belonging? With grace and honesty, she inspires readers to search for—and find—themselves.

What is a "normal family," and how do you go about making one? Chrysta Bilton's magnetic, larger-than-life mother, Debra, yearned to have a child, but as a single gay woman in 1980s California, she had few options. Until one day, while getting her hair done in a Beverly Hills salon, she met a man and instantly knew he was the one she'd been looking for. Beautiful, athletic, artistic, and from a well-to-do family, Jeffrey Harrison appeared to be Debra's ideal sperm donor. A verbal agreement, a couple of thousand in cash, and a few squirts of a turkey baster later, and Chrysta was conceived. Over the years, Jeffrey would make regular appearances at the family home, which grew to include Chrysta's baby sister. But how much did Debra really know about the man she'd chosen to father her daughters? And as a single mother torn between ferocious independence and abject dependence—on other women, alcohol, drugs, and the adrenaline of get-rich-quick schemes—what secrets of her own was she keeping? It wasn't until Chrysta was a young adult that she discovered just how much her parents had hidden from their daughters—and each other—including a shocking revelation with far-reaching consequences not only for Debra, Chrysta, and her sister, but for dozens and possibly hundreds of unsuspecting families across the country. After a lifetime of longing for a "normal family," can Chrysta face the reality of her own, in all its complexity? Bringing us into the fold of a deeply dysfunctional yet fiercely loving clan that is anything but "normal," this emotional roller coaster of a memoir will make you cry, laugh, and rethink the meaning of family.

This groundbreaking, up-to-date fertility guide from trusted queer and trans midwife Kristin Liam Kali is perfect for every queer family seeking pregnancy. It’s also the first evidence-based, transgender inclusive, and body-positive fertility resource for our community. Here, queer prospective parents will find sound advice about every step of the baby-making process: · Creating a timeline · Fertile health for every body · Preconception tests · Identifying ovulation · Sperm donors, egg donors, gamete banks, and surrogacy · Methods of insemination including IUI, IVF, and reciprocal IVF · Miscarriage and infertility · Navigating early pregnancy and preparing for infant feeding, including lactation induction for trans women and other nongestational parents This book is for all LGBTQ+ readers interested in creating family through pregnancy: anyone who identifies as queer, lesbians, gay men, bisexual people, trans and nonbinary people, couples, single parents by choice, poly families, and coparents. It’s an antidote to a culture and medical system that all too often centers heterosexual couples experiencing infertility while overlooking our unique needs. Also contains sidebars with guidance for reproductive healthcare professionals.

From one of the world's leading experts, this absorbing narrative history of the changing structure of modern families shows how children can flourish in any kind of loving home. The past few decades have seen extraordinary change in the idea of a family. The unit once understood to include two straight parents and their biological children has expanded vastly—same-sex marriage, adoption, IVF, sperm donation, and other forces have enabled new forms to take shape. This has resulted in enormous upheaval and controversy, but as Susan Golombok shows in this compelling and important book, it has also meant the health and happiness of parents and children alike. Golombok's stories, drawn from decades of research, are compelling and dramatic: family secrets kept for years and then inadvertently revealed; children reunited with their biological parents or half siblings they never knew existed; and painful legal battles to determine who is worthy of parenting their own children. Golombok explores the novel moral questions that changing families create, and ultimately makes a powerful argument that the bond between family members, rather than any biological or cultural factor, is what ensures a safe and happy future. We Are Family is unique, authoritative, and deeply humane. It makes an important case for all families—old, new, and yet unimagined.

The fertility journey is not easy, especially when the path isn't clearly marked. Tamara took many long hikes along her own fertility journey which is why she wrote this book through the analogy of a walk. Fertility walk serves as a walking tool and it guides patients and couples through the fertility process. This book is a starting point for those beginning the fertility journey. Working with so many patients and couples who have struggled with infertility, Tamara wants to tell patients and couples that there is HOPE. Chapters in her book use many ultrasound images to help explain procedures. There are also "Trailhead Tips" throughout which are actually nurse tips to questions she so frequently hears in practice. Lastly, "Rest stops" are included as a journal section at the end of each chapter, because it is so valuable to stop and take a breath, to see how far you've come. Truly a labor of love, proceeds from this book benefit Fertility Walk Hope Fund, a non-profit organization Tamara developed to provide grants to those who need fertility treatment but are financially restricted. To learn more about Fertility Walk Hope Fund, please visit: fertilitywalk.com To keep up to date on current fertility news, follow Fertility Walk on Facebook

"This isn't a book about conquering infertility. This is a book about surviving it." I felt like a babyless freak. No matter what we tried, I couldn’t get pregnant, even after standing on my head after sex. I was pretty sure I was the only woman on the planet going through infertility, certainly the only one jamming needles into my butt on commercial breaks during my favorite TV shows. Everyone was getting pregnant around me and no one was talking about what happened if you couldn’t. After my experience, I wanted to write a book for other infertile women and couples who feel alone, the book I wish I’d had when I was going through it, filled with dark humor and illustrations of quirky ovaries and whimsical sperm. If you’re like me, you want blunt, honest conversations about all the crazy stuff you’re going through with someone who’s been there and understands at least some of what you’re dealing with and how you’re feeling. And if it can somehow give you permission to laugh without diminishing the pain you’re feeling? Even better. This is the funnest book you’ll ever read about the worst thing that’s ever happened to you. Each chapter covers a different challenge with infertility and is broken into sections, a little of my story and concerns, a blurb from my husband, Alex, kind of a window into his dudely brain, and practical tips on how to cope. Read it yourself, read it as a couple, and if you’re struggling to explain your feelings to friends and family, hurl a copy at them and run away. I really wish you didn’t need this book, but since you do, come on over. You’re not alone.

Author Elena S Hall, of Through Adopted Eyes and Through Adopted Hearts, addresses younger adoptees and their families in this children's book. May this provide yourself and your family with a guide to start conversations around the complexities of adoption.

Reveals the candid thoughts and feelings of those most directly involved in adoptions: adoptees, adoptive parents, and birth parents. Adoption Unfiltered authors Sara Easterly (adoptee), Kelsey Vander Vliet Ranyard (birth parent), and Lori Holden (adoptive parent) interview dozens of adoptees, birth parents, adoptive parents, social workers, therapists, and other allies—all sharing candidly about the challenges in adoption. While finding common ground in the sometimes-contentious space of adoption may seem like a lofty goal, it reveals the authors’ optimistic aim: working together with truth and transparency to move toward healing. Healing isn’t possible, though, without first uncovering the hurts—starting with adoption’s central players: adoptees, who are so often in pain, suffering from what the latest brain science validates as the long-term emotional effects of separation trauma. By encouraging others to vulnerably share their stories, the authors discover that adoptees aren’t the only ones in the adoption constellation who are hurting. Birth parents regularly shut down after being shut out by adoptive parents. Adoptive parents often struggle with unique parenting challenges and hidden insecurity, feeling the need to hide the fact that they are not the Super Parents they led the agency to believe they would be. Across the industry as a whole, misinformed and even unethical practices abound. Adoption Unfiltered models the importance of adults in adoption working together in the spirit of curiosity and empathy—to better support adoptees and their first and adoptive families.

"Birthdays may be difficult for me." "I want you to take the initiative in opening conversations about my birth family." "When I act out my fears in obnoxious ways, please hang in there with me." "I am afraid you will abandon me." The voices of adopted children are poignant, questioning. And they tell a familiar story of loss, fear, and hope. This extraordinary book, written by a woman who was adopted herself, gives voice to children's unspoken concerns, and shows adoptive parents how to free their kids from feelings of fear, abandonment, and shame. With warmth and candor, Sherrie Eldridge reveals the twenty complex emotional issues you must understand to nurture the child you love--that he must grieve his loss now if he is to receive love fully in the future--that she needs honest information about her birth family no matter how painful the details may be--and that although he may choose to search for his birth family, he will always rely on you to be his parents. Filled with powerful insights from children, parents, and experts in the field, plus practical strategies and case histories that will ring true for every adoptive family, Twenty Things Adopted Kids Wish Their Adoptive Parents Knew is an invaluable guide to the complex emotions that take up residence within the heart of the adopted child--and within the adoptive home.

The White Fragility for transracial adoption--practical tools for nurturing identity, unlearning white saviorism, and fixing the mistakes you don't even know you're making. If you're the white parent of a transracially or internationally adopted child, you may have been told that if you try your best and work your hardest, good intentions and a whole lot of love will be enough to give your child the security, attachment, and nurturing family life they need to thrive. The only problem? It's not true. What White Parents Should Know About Transracial Adoption breaks down the dynamics that frequently fly under the radar of the whitewashed, happily-ever-after adoption stories we hear so often. Written by Melissa Guida-Richards--a transracial, transnational, and late-discovery adoptee--this book unpacks the mistakes you don't even know you're making and gives you the real-life tools to be the best parent you can be, to the child you love more than anything. From original research, personal stories, and interviews with parents and adoptees, you'll learn: What parents wish they'd known before they adopted--and what kids wish their adoptive parents had done differently What white privilege, white saviorism, and toxic positivity are...and how they show up, even when you don't mean it How your child might feel and experience the world differently than you All about microaggressions, labeling, and implicit bias How to help your child connect with their cultural heritage through language, food, music, and clothing The 5 stages of grief for adoptive parents How to start tough conversations, work with defensiveness, and process guilt

The second edition of the essential guide for reproductive professionals is now available in a Clinical Guide and a Case Studies Guide, presenting the most current knowledge on counseling diverse patients amidst rapidly advancing modern technology. Follow an in-depth presentation of clinical concepts in this Clinical Guide for a foundational understanding of the medical and psychosocial experience of fertility treatment. Explore the areas of reproductive psychology, therapeutic approaches, assessment and preparation in assisted reproduction, addressing the needs of diverse populations, and clinical practice issues. Featuring new topics such as transgender ART, recurrent pregnancy loss, post-partum adjustment, and the pregnant therapist. Then in Case Studies, discover the accessible, real-world experiences and perspectives as leading international practitioners share their stories applying clinical concepts to treatment practice. An essential aid for medical and mental health professionals, this comprehensive guide allows clinicians to develop and refine the skills required to address the increasingly complex psychosocial needs of fertility patients.

This second edition of the essential guide for reproductive professionals is now available in a Clinical Guide and a Case Studies Guide, presenting the most current knowledge on counseling patients with diverse needs amidst rapidly advancing modern technology. The Case Studies guide relates the accessible, real-world experiences and perspectives as leading international practitioners share their stories applying clinical concepts to treatment practice. Chapters cover current, unaddressed and emerging areas in reproductive mental health including consequences of direct-to-consumer DNA testing, racial and cultural sensitivity and tele-mental health. Among the new topics are transgender ART, recurrent pregnancy loss, post-partum adjustment, and the pregnant therapist. For an in-depth presentation of clinical concepts, discover the Clinical Guide, which provides a foundational understanding of the medical and psychosocial experience of fertility treatment. An essential aid for medical and mental health professionals, this comprehensive guide allows clinicians to develop and refine the skills required to address the increasingly complex needs of fertility patients.

Unspoken is a long-overdue anthology, gathering the voices of twenty-nine writers whose lives have been affected by infertility, pregnancy loss, and infant death. From the chronicle of a father's love for his lost daughter to poetry exploring the journey of a woman supporting her wife through IVF, from the terror of losing a pregnancy to the heartbreak of twins born too early to survive, from an essay on loss across the generations of one family to the impossible choices and impossible choicelessness of modern prenatal care, the stories and poems in these pages give voice to the many heartaches of childbearing loss. Written to comfort those affected, and shared as a call to empathy for the rest of the world, this collection is an invitation to connection, where isolation has so often prevailed.