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What is a parent?
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What is a parent?
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It's not an easy question.
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Today we have adoption,
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stepfamilies,
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surrogate mothers.
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Many parents face tough questions
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and tough decisions.
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Shall we tell our child
about the sperm donation?
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If so, when?
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What words to use?
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Sperm donors are often referred
to as "biological fathers,"
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but should we really
be using the word "father?"
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As a philosopher and social scientist,
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I have been studying these questions
about the concept of parenthood.
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But today, I will talk to you
about what I learned
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from talking to parents and children.
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I will show you that they know
what matters most in a family,
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even though their family
looks a little different.
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I will show you their creative ways
of dealing with tough questions.
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But I will also show you
the parents' uncertainties.
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We interviewed couples
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who received fertility treatment
at Ghent University Hospital,
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using sperm from a donor.
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In this treatment timeline,
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you can see two points
at which we conducted interviews.
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We included heterosexual couples,
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where the man for some reason
did not have good-quality sperm,
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and lesbian couples who obviously
needed to find sperm elsewhere.
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We also included children.
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I wanted to know
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how those children define concepts
like parenthood and family.
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In fact, that is what I asked them,
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only not in that way.
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I drew an apple tree instead.
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This way, I could ask abstract,
philosophical questions
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in a way that did not make them run off.
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So as you can see,
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the apple tree is empty.
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And that illustrates my research approach.
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By designing techniques like this,
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I can bring as little meaning and content
as possible to the interview,
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because I want to hear that from them.
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I asked them:
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What would your family look like
if it were an apple tree?
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And they could take a paper apple
for everyone who, in their view,
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was a member of the family,
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write a name on it
and hang it wherever they wanted.
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And I would ask questions.
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Most children started
with a parent or a sibling.
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One started with "Boxer,"
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the dead dog of his grandparents.
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At this point, none of the children
started mentioning the donor.
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So, I asked them about their birth story.
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I said, "Before you were born,
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it was just your mom and dad,
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or mom and mommy.
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Can you tell me how you came
into the family?"
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And they explained.
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One said,
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"My parents did not have good seeds,
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but there are friendly men out there
who have spare seeds.
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They bring them to the hospital,
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and they put them in a big jar.
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My mommy went there,
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and she took two from the jar,
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one for me and one for my sister.
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She put the seeds in her belly --
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somehow --
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and her belly grew really big,
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and there I was."
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Hmm.
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So only when they started
mentioning the donor,
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I asked questions about him,
using their own words.
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I said,
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"If this would be an apple
for the friendly man with the seeds,
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what would you do with it?"
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And one boy was thinking out loud,
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holding the apple.
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And he said,
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"I won't put this one
up there with the others.
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He's not part of my family.
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But I will not put him on the ground.
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That's too cold and too hard.
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I think he should be in the trunk,
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because he made my family possible.
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If he would not have done this,
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that would really be sad
because my family would not be here,
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and I would not be here."
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So also, parents
constructed family tales --
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tales to tell their children.
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One couple explained their insemination
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by taking their children to a farm
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to watch a vet inseminate cows.
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And why not?
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It's their way of explaining;
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their do-it-yourself
with family narratives.
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DIY.
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And we had another couple
who made books --
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a book for each child.
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They were really works of art
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containing their thoughts and feelings
throughout the treatment.
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They even had the hospital
parking tickets in there.
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So it is DIY:
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finding ways, words and images
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to tell your family story to your child.
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And these stories were highly diverse,
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but they all had one thing in common:
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it was a tale of longing for a child
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and a quest for that child.
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It was about how special
and how deeply loved their child was.
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And research so far shows
that these children are doing fine.
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They do not have
more problems than other kids.
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Yet, these parents also wanted
to justify their decisions
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through the tales they tell.
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They hoped that their children
would understand their reasons
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for making the family in this way.
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Underlying was a fear
that their children might disapprove
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and would reject the non-genetic parent.
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And that fear is understandable,
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because we live in a very heteronormative
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and geneticized society --
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a world that still believes
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that true families consist
of one mom, one dad
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and their genetically related children.
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Well.
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I want to tell you about a teenage boy.
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He was donor-conceived
but not part of our study.
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One day, he had an argument
with his father,
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and he yelled,
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"You're telling me what to do?
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You're not even my father!"
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That was exactly what
the parents in our study feared.
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Now, the boy soon felt sorry,
and they made up.
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But it is the reaction of his father
that is most interesting.
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He said,
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"This outburst had nothing to do
with the lack of a genetic link.
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It was about puberty --
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being difficult.
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It's what they do at that age.
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It will pass."
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What this man shows us
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is that when something goes wrong,
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we should not immediately think
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it is because the family
is a little different.
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These things happen in all families.
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And every now and then,
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all parents may wonder:
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Am I a good enough parent?
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These parents, too.
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They, above all, wanted to do
what's best for their child.
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But they also sometimes wondered:
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Am I a real parent?
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And their uncertainties were present
long before they even were parents.
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At the start of treatment,
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when they first saw the counselor,
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they paid close attention
to the counselor,
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because they wanted to do it right.
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Even 10 years later,
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they still remember
the advice they were given.
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So when they thought about the counselor
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and the advice they were given,
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we discussed that.
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And we saw one lesbian couple who said,
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"When our son asks us,
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'Do I have a dad?'
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we will say 'No, you do not have a dad.'
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But we will say nothing more,
not unless he asks,
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because he might not be ready for that.
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The counselor said so."
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Well.
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I don't know; that's quite different
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from how we respond
to children's questions.
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Like, "Milk -- is that made in a factory?"
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We will say, "No, it comes from cows,"
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and we will talk about the farmer,
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and the way the milk ends up in the shop.
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We will not say,
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"No, milk is not made in a factory."
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So something strange happened here,
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and of course these children noticed that.
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One boy said,
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"I asked my parents loads of questions,
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but they acted really weird.
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So, you know, I have a friend at school,
and she's made in the same way.
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When I have a question,
I just go and ask her."
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Clever guy.
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Problem solved.
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But his parents did not notice,
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and it certainly was not
what they had in mind,
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nor what the counselor had in mind
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when they were saying how important
it is to be an open-communication family.
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And that's the strange thing about advice.
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When we offer people pills,
we gather evidence first.
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We do tests,
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we do follow-up studies.
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We want to know, and rightly so,
what this pill is doing
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and how it affects people's lives.
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And advice?
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It is not enough for advice,
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or for professionals to give advice
that is theoretically sound,
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or well-meant.
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It should be advice
that there is evidence for --
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evidence that it actually
improves patients' lives.
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So the philosopher in me
would now like to offer you a paradox:
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I advise you to stop following advice.
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But, yes.
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(Applause)
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I will not end here with what went wrong;
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I would not be doing justice
to the warmth we found in those families.
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Remember the books
and the trip to the farmer?
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When parents do things that work for them,
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they do brilliant things.
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What I want you to remember
as members of families,
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in no matter what form or shape,
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is that what families need
are warm relationships.
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And we do not need to be
professionals to create those.
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Most of us do just fine,
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although it may be hard work,
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and from time to time,
we can do with some advice.
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In that case,
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bear in mind three things.
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Work with advice
that works for your family.
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Remember -- you're the expert,
because you live your family life.
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And finally,
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believe in your abilities
and your creativity,
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because you can do it yourself.
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Thank you.
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(Applause)