"Selecting a baby’s sex, and therefore, saddling that child with it’s parental gender expectations is perhaps the greatest burden a child could live with." Disagree wholeheartedly. The greatest burden is betrayal.
I was adopted as an infant. My adoptive parents wanted a child to love, and they adopted me and later my sister. My biological parents were in their mid forties when I was born; they were engaged, each had children in their twenties, and they thought the best route was to give me up for adoption. Both sets of parents treated me with love.
My wife is also adopted. She was chosen to be given away from among a gaggle of their children by two parents. Betrayal. She was adopted by two parents with very different motivations than mine. Suffice it to say that the pedophile was the better parent. Betrayal again. She just turned 70 and her life remains affected.
There are many burdens far worse than living with parents' selection of your sex.
Fair enough. It reminds me that before we can disagree on a point, we need to agree on what the words mean.
Burden in this case is meant to be a psychological burden, and what you are describing is a situation I had not considered, mainly because I am neither adopted nor adoptive. But point well made.
As far as family pedophilia and child molestation, that too was present in my childhood. I classify those scars not as burdens, but actual physical and emotional scars.
Being as the feelings of abandonment and betrayal must be present in the situations you describe, I believed I was writing about the feelings about gender and sex I imagine one experiences upon learning that their biological parents consciously and at personal cost and inconvenience specifically chose a specific sex. The complicated emotional manifestations of that choice would obviously impact a child's self-identity for a lifetime as well.
As the circumstances you relate have for you and your wife.
my bio-dad became a sick man, tormented by his demons, and his sickness caused a lot of damage. My step-dad was the exact opposite, and has been my father for several decades, and has been a great husband to my mom.
I am mindful of the fact too, that one person's bio-dad is often another person's step-dad. And the same person can be both the worst dad ever and the best dad ever. Just goes to prove, one's point-of-view is always the difference in opinions.
"Selecting a baby’s sex, and therefore, saddling that child with it’s parental gender expectations is perhaps the greatest burden a child could live with." Disagree wholeheartedly. The greatest burden is betrayal.
I was adopted as an infant. My adoptive parents wanted a child to love, and they adopted me and later my sister. My biological parents were in their mid forties when I was born; they were engaged, each had children in their twenties, and they thought the best route was to give me up for adoption. Both sets of parents treated me with love.
My wife is also adopted. She was chosen to be given away from among a gaggle of their children by two parents. Betrayal. She was adopted by two parents with very different motivations than mine. Suffice it to say that the pedophile was the better parent. Betrayal again. She just turned 70 and her life remains affected.
There are many burdens far worse than living with parents' selection of your sex.
Fair enough. It reminds me that before we can disagree on a point, we need to agree on what the words mean.
Burden in this case is meant to be a psychological burden, and what you are describing is a situation I had not considered, mainly because I am neither adopted nor adoptive. But point well made.
As far as family pedophilia and child molestation, that too was present in my childhood. I classify those scars not as burdens, but actual physical and emotional scars.
Being as the feelings of abandonment and betrayal must be present in the situations you describe, I believed I was writing about the feelings about gender and sex I imagine one experiences upon learning that their biological parents consciously and at personal cost and inconvenience specifically chose a specific sex. The complicated emotional manifestations of that choice would obviously impact a child's self-identity for a lifetime as well.
As the circumstances you relate have for you and your wife.
thanks!
Hi Ric - questions- how was your biological father and your stepdad towards you?
my bio-dad became a sick man, tormented by his demons, and his sickness caused a lot of damage. My step-dad was the exact opposite, and has been my father for several decades, and has been a great husband to my mom.
I am mindful of the fact too, that one person's bio-dad is often another person's step-dad. And the same person can be both the worst dad ever and the best dad ever. Just goes to prove, one's point-of-view is always the difference in opinions.
thanks for the comment