Talking to Kids About Assisted Reproductive Technology (ART)

Talking with your children about their conception and birth is not a one-time event; it’s a process. Young children who don’t understand reproduction can only absorb the simplest concepts (For example, “Mommy and daddy wanted a baby and a very nice woman helped us have you.”) Even as children grow older and more knowledgeable, the full effect of their origins seems to dawn gradually – perhaps in response to a “family tree” assignment in school, or a remark made on the playground.

At every stage, experts say, the most important thing parents can do is to convey information and answer children’s questions in a loving, factual, and confident way.

Here, Hilary Hanafin, Ph.D., the chief psychologist at the Center for Surrogate Parenting in Los Angeles, discusses how to talk to children of different ages and create a family story you can live with comfortably through the years.
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Rebecca, 18, learned at age 6 that she had been born through surrogacy. Her mother, Jean, starts the story:
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Sometimes the kids themselves help parents keep perspective. Sixteen-year-old Daniel Wilkins and his mother Carole Lieber Wilkins offer this advice:
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“When it comes to telling your children … you do choke up, you do get emotional, you do worry: is this child really going to be mine? I’ve worked so hard and here she is; is she mine? Practicing helps you get through it.”
— Elaine Gordon, Ph.D., Clinical Psychologist

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