This goes out to all the recipients out there. I am considering being a donor and have this burning question I'd love your reaction to.
The clinic I'm talking to only does anonymous donations, yet they want the donors' motivation to be altruistic, not monetary.
As a donor, my intentions WOULD be altruistic. Therefore, I'd like to know if all the shots and hormones and misery I would go through ACTUALLY did produce a successful pregnancy and healthy child. They won't even tell donors that. I wouldn't get a picture, nothing. They just expect me to take my check and get lost.
How does that jibe with altruistic intentions? That seems so empty to me. I'd love to be more personal and involved. I'd love an open donation even, maybe a visit at age 3 or something - with all the legal protection signed of course. I'd want no claim on a child, I just want the satisfaction of seeing the family I would have helped create.
But very few places will do that, and the clinic near me won't unless the recipient brings in her own donor. But in YOUR eyes, is that so much to ask? Meaning, meeting your donor, sending them a Christmas card or two, and having coffee once, when the child is 3? Just being a friend, or at least friendLY? Why does it have to be anonymous?