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In 2005, when my eldest daughter was born, I became the first bad mother I've ever met. She was in the American Midwest and the only bads with children she had heard of had generally given birth during a previous heterobadual relationship. My girlfriend and I had to start from scratch.
Since our meeting, we dreamed of having children together. We decided to have four and chose the names. The next step was more difficult.
My girlfriend suggested that her brother-in-law might help. He was receptive, but I took a gay and bad law course offered by my university 's legal department and quickly abandoned the idea of a known donor.
The courts were deemed to have conferred on them the right of custody, clbadifying sperm donation as an act of paternity. When the biological mothers died, the children were brought to live with men that they barely knew.
Fortunately, we discovered a sperm bank in which anonymous donors signed a term legally barring them from seeking custody of the children that they helped to conceive. The company delivered the samples directly to us.
As I was writing my doctoral thesis at home, it was decided that I would be the first baby. We looked for a donor like my mate – up here my wife – by choosing someone of average height and weight, wavy brown hair, who had studied literature and practiced sports.
The donor lists his profession as a writer, musician and taxi driver. My wife and I had imagined romantically that he was refusing to accept a job as a bureaucrat. Instead, he was collecting stories of pbadengers taking his taxi, preparing to write "the great American novel".
There was little additional information about the donor, but the duly completed medical history form allowed us to know more than anything we could know about a casual boyfriend. We have never seen a picture of him.
Getting pregnant at home was fascinating – a national science experiment that I took seriously. The sperms provided are tucked into a liquid nitrogen tank nearly one meter tall and fitted with a return label the next day.
It is necessary to wear gloves to remove the small plastic bottle that cools down first on the dresser, then warms by hand with the body temperature. A small syringe can be used for insemination. Since all that is frozen does not have the same strength as the fresh version, the "resurrected" sperm only lives one day. If the egg does not wait for them, they will die.
Getting the spermatozoon as close to the egg as possible became a solemn monthly ritual. I did insemination twice to cover all possible ovulation windows. After all, it takes five hours of sperm to reach the uterus. I learned this from everything that could be related to the use of sperm from a donor to get pregnant.
Seven months later, I was pregnant with our first child. My wife and I were radiant.
I told my grandparents that we were expecting a baby. My grandmother whispered, "Oh, it'll be born in June!" While my grandfather curiously asked questions about artificial insemination.
We hardly thought of the donor, we thought we never knew him. My wife was particularly hostile to the idea that our children know him – what makes her a family, is the love, and I accepted. But we pay tribute to your literary genes by reading various books for our future reader in the womb.
At Alice's birth, she was perfect.
The idea that the specificity of DNA was not important came from the air. We agreed that we should clone this incredible being that we create with our love. We ordered sperm from the same donor and repeated the whole procedure. My wife gave birth to our second daughter when Alice was 18 months old.
Both share many common characteristics. Knowing that my wife and I were in their infancy, it was a fun pastime to distinguish the features that only girls had: both were remarkably tall and not medium-sized, as claimed by the donor. Both had long, thin mouths, small noses, vibrant eyes that looked like underwater emeralds, and a flawless vocabulary.
But when Alice was three years old, my wife announced that she wanted to separate. There was no conflict in our family and I was shocked, heartbroken. She said that she did not want to talk about it and that I could not do anything to get our wedding back.
I continued to look after girls five days a week for a few years. But when Alice was 10 years old, my ex-wife cut her off by phone and refused to return her younger sister after a vacation.
This is the situation that remains to this day.
The grandparents, uncles, and cousins of my ex-wife's family have not even sent Alice a birthday message in the last two years. She spends her days dreaming of the sister with whom she grew up and fears never to see her again.
Alice knows more than most children that a family is not only genetically constituted, nor by the isolated act of raising a child. The creation did not make her stay her mother. And while genetics was a small part of her family for a decade, she also seemed to be a minor part of who she was.
But Alice wondered where her ancestors came from. My mother used to tell stories about Cornwall's ancestors to anyone who wanted to hear it. While questioning her genetic makeup, Alice asked for a DNA test kit for her Christmas grandmother at the age of 11. At age 11, Alice asks for a DNA test kit for Natal's grandmother – Photo: Archive "title =" At age 11, Alice asks for a DNA test kit for Natal's personal grandmother "src =" data : image / jpeg; base64, / 9j / 4AAQSkZJRgABAQAAAQABAAD / 2wBDAAMCAgMCAgMDAwMEAwMEBQgFBQQEBQoHBwYIDAoMDAsKCwsNDhIQDQ4RDgsLEBYQERMUFRUVDA8XGBYUGBIUFRT / 2wBDAQMEBAUEBQkFBQkUDQsNFBQUFBQUFBQUFBQUFBQUFBQUFBQUFBQUFBQUFBQUFBQUFBQUFBQUFBQUFBQUFBQUFBT / wgARCAAQABkDASIAAhEBAxEB / 8QAFwAAAwEAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAABAYHCP / EABYBAQEBAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAQCA // aAAwDAQACEAMQAAABIMjTcRtCpOV2fGv / xAAdEAACAgMAAwAAAAAAAAAAAAAEBQIDAAEGERUW / 9oACAEBAAEFAmp j2PLXzfjh9BWlZfUD5C + + HrUxjRBoJ3Ks3zPP / 8QAGhEAAgIDAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAIDEgETIf / aAAgBAwEBPwGetFVTTG2OH // EABkRAAIDAQAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAEDAAIREv / aAAgBAgEBPwFe92Jhcyhn / 8QAJRAAAQMDAwMFAAAAAAAAAAAAAQACAxESMQQTIQUUIjNxkZLR / 9oACAEBAAY / AtRMZGO security 9S4kqFXQHXQHXQHXQHXQHXHQHXQHXQHXUHZUHVoIrSuoSoIlSuoSoIlOrganisme AkoZDj1tmY8Bya2twihJmClGtOODKZjQRMu1EkUgLwhNWbYgeCVgBhjZ9z7Gf / 9oADAMBAAIAAwAAABDpf // EABoRAAICAwAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAERACExcbH / 2gAIAQMBAT8QFAwuQCnsUdz / xAAZEQACAwEAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAEQEhgbH / 2gAIAQIBAT8Q2DpckpuGf // EAB8QAQEAAwABBQEAAAAAAAAAAAERACExYUFRcYH w8f / aAAgBAQABPxCozD2xCEbtCdW5m4U76QKKhFNavtzNiwcRRvEKnYS P6TCkgBmK + + xqdkxJ5K / oK0g5LEcAsHQqg9kBhN7npc8P8 = 9k + c // "/>
"Bryce Gallo: 25% Half-Brother" appeared shortly thereafter.
Of course, I knew it could happen, but it did not seem likely. Before writing a message on the site, I looked for Aaron on the Internet to see what I could find.
There are several Aaron Longs in the world, so I had to work hard to find "that one". I looked for clues in a professional social network. He narrowed his eyes to examine each Aaron Long who appeared, wondering if he would recognize the donor immediately.
One of the bottles of sperm indicates the date of donation (1994), which allowed to limit the year of graduation and birth. There was only one man with a master's degree in literature at the right age, named Aaron Long.
In the picture, he wore an olive silk turban and played the trombone. His profile was that he was working as a communications specialist in Seattle. He was a writer and musician.
In another social network, I discovered a Seattle guy, Aaron Long, who was working in the same place. The profile contained pictures of him at school for several years. There was no doubt. My daughters are doing this same stupid face.
I immediately wrote a message to him on the DNA testing website.
"Hello Aaron, I have two daughters compatible with you (my ex is with my youngest daughter, she is not at the base of the DNA testing site)., We are available."
I used the "Curiosity Sheets", imagining that he would write to see pictures of my youngest daughter. Aaron responded immediately, sharing details that I had already learned from the parallel investigation. He wanted to know if I had any questions and wondered if he was the lowest person in the family. I already knew the answer. It was.
We agreed to become friends on a social network and Aaron sent me a 50-page story telling of his life, which I devoured. He spent several years in a group of the city in which we lived. How many times have we met at the supermarket, I asked myself?
I also wrote to Bryce, who had just graduated. He said he met Madi, a 19-year-old half-sister, who was in contact with other relatives. He further revealed that there were altogether six children of Aaron and that my daughters were those of numbers 7 and 8.
Bryce stated that he had been brought up with a sister younger, but that Madi, her only daughter, would be interested in Alice's relationship?
Alice had to be convinced to write her story for Aaron. Getting to know her parents DNA was only slightly exciting for her.
She suffers the loss of her sister. I try to say that she has a special mission to "keep" these people, to know them and to keep them so that her sister can know them. However, she would rather have her sister.
A few months later, Bryce and Madi plan to visit Aaron in Seattle. Alice was curious to see if the brothers and Aaron looked like him. I agreed to let her attend the meeting.
Bilingual children gathered to visit Aaron in Seattle – Photo: Personal archive
Aaron held a party at which he invited several colleagues, school friends and his ex-girlfriends with their new partners and their children were also invited.Everyone would camp on the terrace and celebrate with his biological children.I quickly saw that Aaron did not have a only friend who would not be welcome in his
We visited the local sculpture garden, played a game about "nature or creation" with surprising similarities and made a trip to participate in an art festival.
Despite Bryce's initial reaction, Madi and he fought for Alice's affection. During the holidays in which they met, the three went to dinner. Alice came back with an ice cream in her hand and a pizza in the other. Later, Bryce sent him a Star of David. Madi sent an amethyst. Both are symbols of things that she has in common.
A few years ago, I went out with a man who also called Aaron. During our vacation, donor Aaron suggested, flirting, that there had been damage in the Valentine's Day department. I smiled and hesitated.
I was already in a relationship and I knew that the donor Aaron was an important person for my children, but not someone who should necessarily be part of my life. I did not want to ruin everything.
When my relationship with the other Aaron ended, I wondered if the person who counted for my children could also fit into my life and if Seattle would be a place to stay for us during our discovery. The kindness of Aaron and his good relations with his ex-girlfriends have convinced me that it would be prudent to try his luck.
One night we went through the neighborhood and sat in a local cemetery to talk about DNA, how the kids were and our dreams.
When two heterobaduals meet, meet, and get married, they often look at each other with devotion and think that it would be wonderful if small people look like them. I had spent a decade with these little people.
I had my first meeting with Aaron to talk about it. I knew him already and I knew it was just like those people I love more than anything in the world. He was familiar in many ways. You have the same smile and the same color as my youngest daughter. Your empathy and your sociality? My oldest.
It is difficult to say whether DNA played a role in our relationships. I know that I am attracted to Aaron for all the reasons that seemed to me wonderful when I chose him in a catalog of sperm donors many years ago.
He is attentive, persistent and studious. He is pbadionate about words. He is understanding, versed in stories about people and the strange things that they do sometimes. He does not care much about what is expected of him. He usually plays his own music. At your own pace. Sometimes wears a turban.
How many people think that a music taxi driver and writer can make up the ideal genetic material?
Alice and I moved to the Aaron Cooperative in the summer of 2017. The building is so large that there was enough room for her other biological children. Madi, from the east coast, found the way to captivate the captivating left of Aaron (and Seattle) and went to live with us this spring.
We even joined a group of Girl Scouts with another biological daughter of Aaron, who has the age of my youngest daughter and lives about an hour away.
I soon discovered that as a mother, I would willingly accept the half-brothers of my daughters, I would prepare the midday meal, do their laundry and would take care of them forever. They are brothers of my daughters, aunts and biological uncles of my grandchildren.
I do not create them, but I feel an inexplicable desire to feed them. Some look a lot like Alice. Others look like my youngest daughter. Not everyone has the traits of Aaron, but they are undeniably alike.
Aaron's elderly mother also moved in with us, with her cat, Bill. By forming a family along different paths over the years, I learned more about the meaning of family that everyone would like.
DNA became much more important than when I first chose a donor on a website. But he has not yet conquered the belief that families are built by love and not by genes. To be open to this love is what ends up forming a family. Everyone can be welcomed and united. There is room for many types of relationships.
Who knows how many of Aaron's biological sons there are more – he estimates that there could be up to 67. The building will eventually be small to accommodate all of them, but I have sandwiches and the doors are open.
Filmmakers Matt Isaac and Craig Downing make a documentary about Aaron Long and his biological children, entitled "Forty Dollars by Pop".
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