By Mary C. Tillotson
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| Photo via Wikimedia |
Some things don’t get talked about very often – maybe because they’re too complex for our world of sound bites and pigeon-holing, maybe because they’re uncomfortable topics. Alana Newman knew this and founded Anonymous Us for this reason: to talk about what it’s like to be conceived by a third-party donor.
Anonymous Us is a website for donor-conceived children, sperm and egg donors, surrogates, fertility-industry professionals, and others whose lives have been affected by the fertility industry to share their stories anonymously. Founded in January 2011, the site boasts almost 200 stories that run the gamut of emotions.
“The reason I started my site is people are just too ashamed to come forward,” she said.
Alana and I chatted on the phone about a month ago, and it’s taken about that long for my life to calm down enough so I could write anything about our conversation. As you’ll see from her website, not every story is like hers, but many are.
I was especially interested in Alana’s thoughts on two issues: on a personal level, the complicated emotions involved in third-party reproduction, and on a societal level, the family breakdown that third-party reproduction contributes to. She has experience and knowledge in areas I don’t, so I’ll let her take it from here.
