Synopsis
This is the essential guidebook for lesbians in the UK who are creating their own families free from male and medical control. It includes the experiences of birth mothers, co-parents, children, and donors. There are chapters on fertility awareness, inseminating, screening, anonymous vs known donors; singles and couples; the children's perspective; the law in Britain; when SI isn't working; donor insemination through clinics. First published as Getting Pregnant Our Own Way in 1986, Challenging Conceptions was rewritten and published by Cassell in 1994. This self published version was updated in 1998.
"synopsis" may belong to another edition of this title.
About the Author
I am a health writer and author of the books:
Challenging Conceptions - Planning a Family By Self-Insemination (1998)
What About the Children? Sons and Daughters Of Lesbian and Gay Parents Speak About their Lives (Cassell 1996). I give talks and advice on self insemination and lesbian motherhood. I am a lesbian mother with a daughter conceived by self insemination, living in a step-family. For the last 5 years, I have developed, organised and facilitated workshops for lesbians thinking about having children.
Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.
Self insemination (SI) is a way for fertile women to get pregnant without sexual contact with a man and without medical intervention. It is technically very simple, needing no training and no medical equipment. The procedure is so simple that it can be explained in one page but the social and political consequences of self insemination are what fills this book.
Most of the women who consider and practice self insemination are lesbians along with a smaller number of single heterosexual women. This book is written for all these women with an emphasis on the experience of lesbians. It gives a mixture of practical advice and personal experiences to explore the many issues raised by choosing self insemination. It is intended not only as a guide to help women with the mechanics of getting pregnant but as a way of sharing experiences of the consequences of self insemination -parenting and co-parenting, single parenting, splitting up and staying together, relationships or not with donors, communicating with the children, not getting pregnant, telling others, the risk of infection and disease, and the legal position of all the people involved.
The book starts with a chapter on donors. In the section 'Anonymous or Known', women share their experiences of deciding on the type of contact they wanted with a donor and how they found the right man. I interviewed four men who have been donors and included their accounts throughout the book with one section focusing specifically on their reasons for and their experiences of being donors ('Being a Donor'). A leaflet is written for men explaining what self insemination is all about and what is required of them should they agree to be a donor ('Advice to Donors'). This can be photocopied and given to men who have been asked to be a donor.
The chapter on 'Screening' includes up-to-date information on the risks of HIV plus other sexually transmitted diseases as well as guidelines for checking your own state of health. There is a sample questionnaire for donors.
In Chapter 3, 'Getting Pregnant', you are guided through the four steps to getting pregnant. The first step is to learn how to identify when you are fertile. The second step is getting the donor to ejaculate and then taking simple measures to keep the sperm alive until you can do the third step - inseminating during your fertile days and at least twice in a cycle. Finally, there is the two-week wait.
Many women doing self insemination start off or end up doing it on their own and their experiences are covered in 'Doing in on your own' in Chapter 4. In 'Doing it Together', the experiences of co-parents or non-biological mothers has been made visible. The perspectives of co-parents appear alongside those of biological mothers in many chapters throughout the book but this chapter focuses on the issues for women in couples.
As a result of more years of lesbian parenting, I have been able to bring in the children's experiences in Chapter 5. 'Communicating with the Children' is a section with full accounts of children's reactions and mothers' experiences of explaining to their children about self insemination, about being lesbian, about donors and about different kinds of families. In the section 'A Few Words From the Children', a 12-year-old boy and girl tell what it has been like for them.
In Chapter 6,'The Law', I explain what we need to know about the Children Act 1989 and the Child Support Act 1992. The Children Act has made major changes to the rights of the donor, and potentially to that of the co-parent while the Child Support Act affects those women claiming benefits. The Human Fertilisation and Embryology Act 1990 is explained in Chapter 9 'Donor Insemination Through Clinics' (see below). It has not affected the legal position of self insemination but is important in its influence on clinics offering donor insemination.
Sadly, self insemination does not always lead to a baby or it may take many months or years of trying before success. The experiences of those women who have done self insemination but did not get pregnant or who are still trying is as much a part of the process as the experiences of those who now have children. Their voices are heard in chapter 7, 'When SI isn't Working'.
Having a child is such a public matter that telling others cannot be avoided. The strategies and experiences of women telling their family, friends and doctors are covered in Chapter 8, 'Telling Others'.
Although this book is primarily about self insemination, I have included a chapter on 'Donor Insemination Through Clinics' (Chapter 9) as this is still a valid option for lesbians and single women. There are clinics in the UK which do not discriminate against lesbians and single women.
This book is about getting pregnant but is not a pregnancy book. It doesn't attempt to cover the experience of pregnancy, your childbirth options or to prepare you for possible tragedies such as stillbirths and cot deaths. There are many other books available on these subjects which are relevant to any woman getting pregnant. This book focuses on what is specific to lesbians and single women having children by donor insemination.
For this book, 33 people contributed their personal experiences. Eighteen of them appeared in Getting Pregnant Our Own Way, the first version of this book which was published in 1986. Seven of these women were re-interviewed to give their perspectives six years on. Except for the children's stories, each person's account is divided up, with sections in different chapters. All the names are pseudonyms.
These accounts are snapshots of a moment in time. They are not stories with a beginning, middle and end or even a clear plot. Each story is simply the way that woman perceived events or how she wanted to present herself at the time I interviewed her.
"About this title" may belong to another edition of this title.
