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Recently in Salon Mothers Who Think

Giving in to Ritalin
I hate it, but my son needs it.
By Karen Shoemaker
[11/30/99]

Till death do us part
Is it a promise of love or a life sentence? Our readers weigh in with advice.
By Jennifer Foote Sweeney and Amy Benfer
[11/29/99]

Buy flowers! Buy new drapes!
A touch of consumerism and a lot of realism will make this one work.

[11/29/99]

She jokes, he sulks
Kids! Cut the posturing and hostility!

[11/29/99]

Close the door on open marriage
Read our lips, say readers: Open marriages don't work.

[11/29/99]

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By Jane Smith

Dec. 1, 1999 | My partner, Louise, insists that the whole baby thing was always on the agenda, that we first discussed it only a few weeks after we met. Strangely, I have no such recollection. The conversations about foreign travel, career ambitions, the house we would buy and renovate -- yes, I remember those with utter clarity. But I don't recall any mention of a baby.

That was back in 1992 and as it turned out, the year that followed was filled with our careers, travel and adventure. We took time off to travel through Africa; returned to London and bought a new house to fix up; spent our excess wealth on dinners out and spontaneous weekend trips to Paris. Life was a dream come true.

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When pressed, I had to admit that I had always imagined my life with children in it. I just hadn't ever given any serious thought to precisely how those children might be conceived. Through my teens and 20s I had serious relationships with men, although they were never quite as serious as the ones I enjoyed with women. In my mind's eye, I suppose I imagined a lifelong partnership with a woman but a fling somewhere along the line with a willing, able and totally perfect specimen of a man to provide my designer baby. In other words, I hadn't really thought very realistically about it at all.

Louise felt strongly that the biological father should be completely and utterly anonymous, which, barring a one-night stand blindfolded, pretty much ruled out having sex with anyone. Artificial insemination with known-donor sperm wouldn't help since her main concern focused on the difficulties that would be introduced into our relationship by the intrusion of a third parent, and if the donor was known then there was always a chance he'd be on our doorstep every Saturday morning with a football under his arm.

Better a father who is unknown, she argued, than one who interferes -- particularly given that I would have no biological connection to the child and he would. It all sounded potentially problematic for Louise who, early on, dismissed the possibility of finding a suitable donor among male friends.

This proved to be the first and perhaps highest hurdle for me to overcome. It wasn't so much the thought of Louise and me heading off to the sperm bank that got to me, although I did find the idea pretty distasteful. My reservations were all to do with what the child might feel 10 years down the road.

It was one thing for us to protect our relationship from a meddling sperm donor. But was it fair to a child to deliberately, for our own selfish reasons, deny him or her any knowledge of the biological father? I thought it was more than selfish and unkind. I thought it was wrong.

I was in turmoil. I wanted to believe that I could live with whatever Louise felt was the right decision for herself and her biological baby. But I would be this child's other parent and I would always have to bear some responsibility for these important decisions.

More than that, I was worried about any child that I might decide to have. I already knew that Louise would not happily accept my preferred method of impregnation, with a man I cared for, or even loved. Help. How does one integrate that fact into a happy, committed lesbian relationship? If I loved a man enough to want his baby, she would say, I should just marry him.

Louise's 40th birthday came and went. We had been together for three years and we were in a stalemate. The baby issue had been discussed so much that the only thing I knew for sure was that we both wanted one. Beyond that, everything seemed unworkable. I thought a lot about life, my future and the potential for happiness in a relationship with a woman who had critically different ideas from me. I loved her with all my heart. But on a sunny day in August 1995, I decided to leave.

The separation was short-lived. When it came down to it, I preferred to forget about having children rather than to live without Louise. Miraculously, Louise felt the same. The issue was dropped. We went back to lives filled to bursting with careers, travel and over-expenditure. Until we heard the news. It was April 1996 when we got the call.

Next page | The doctors ignored Emily's wish not to have surgery in order to save the baby's life