Building Your Family: The Complete Guide to Donor Conception

by Lisa Schuman LCSW, Leondires MD Narrated by Lisa Schuman LCSW, Leondires MD

Overview

Building Your Family is the first all-inclusive guide by experts to cover both the medical and emotional aspects of becoming a parent through donor conception.

Once shrouded in secrecy, the modern family, built with the assistance of gamete (egg or sperm) donation, is coming out of the shadows. As more people see friends, family members and celebrities use donor conception to build their families, the process has become much more mainstream and accepted. Donor sperm programs and egg banks have grown enormously in the past decade and the news is full of politicians, athletes and entertainers like Elton John, Anderson Cooper, Andy Cohen, Camille Guaty, Pete Buttigieg, and Natalie Imbruglia, who used donor gametes to have their children.

Authors, Lisa Schuman, a licensed clinical social worker and therapist and Dr. Mark Leondires, have decades of experience working with patients as well as their own personal stories of fertility treatment and non-genetic parenthood.

Together they walk listeners through the medical and genetic aspects of donor conception, common ethical dilemmas, managing relationships with friends and family members, ways to tell donor-conceived children about their origins, and strategies to cope with the difficulties of fertility treatment.

In a compassionate and authoritative narrative, they help stressed out parents-to-be find their way forward with confidence and joy.

Editorial Reviews

From the Publisher

"Coming out publicly about my path to motherhood has opened communication between me and others battling infertility. I speak to women everyday who are at different stages in their journey. This book spoke to my past self as well as my life now as a Donor Conceived Parent. At this stage, so many couples are struggling with disclosure. In Building Your Family, Schuman and Leondires help you navigate your family narrative and provide simple, yet necessary ways to tell your child about their origin story. This book is priceless." - Camille Guaty, Actress and Donor-Conception advocate

"This book provides the comfort needed when faced with obstacles and the motivation to know donor conception is possible and can be successful. As the CEO of Family Equality, we ensure LGBTQ+ people have the freedom to form their families whichever way they choose, and donor conception is often one of those choices. With the growing number of LGBTQ+ millennials planning to start or grow their families, it is critical we provide them with the resources required to make what can be an arduous journey easier. Lisa Schuman and Dr. Leondires have done this skillfully and with thoughtful representation of our community." - Stacey Stevenson, CEO, Family Equality

"This is an excellent book, written from the heart, filled with a treasure trove of information, critical to those preparing to build their families with assisted reproduction. A must-read for anyone considering donor conception." - Richard Paulson, MD, past President, ASRM

"In Building Your Family, Lisa Schuman speaks to the reader with a combination of compassion and expertise. The sections on single motherhood by choice reflect her understanding of this new kind of family and of the joys and challenges which SMCs face on their journey." - Jane Mattes, founder, Single Mothers by Choice

"This book is a must-have for anyone looking to simplify the complicated journey of family building." - Broadway Husbands

"I have been a therapist in the infertility field for 35 years and can honestly say that this book is a true gem for all those considering or pursuing building a family through any kind of donor situation. The combination of the authors being a highly experienced therapist and infertility specialist, who both built their families through non-traditional means, brings with it everything an individual or couple needs to know on their family-building journey." - Alice Domar, PhD, researcher, author of several books and leader in the field of Infertility

Product Details

BN ID:	2940160523590
Publisher:	Penguin Random House
Publication date:	11/14/2023
Edition description:	Unabridged

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