Molecular Parenting

This is a guest post by Stewart, aka "Papa":

Max is my biological son.

I know what you’re thinking. Whoa . . . wtf?! I thought Max was Jacob's biological son! But wait, family members, don’t faint just yet.  Max is also Jacob's biological son, and Jacob would beat me hands down in any Jerry Springer paternity test episode.

Okay, now that your universe has righted again, let me explain. When you are two guys planning to start a family via surrogacy, everyone wants to know which one is going to be the biological father. Some people ask directly, and others ask everything about the process except that, hoping that you mention the parentage, since it’s what they really wanted to know in the first place. But even as it’s obvious how badly people want to know, their question is always tempered with: “not that it matters . . .” Indeed, we know several sets of gay parents who have taken this attitude to heart, and actually mixed their sperm together before inseminating their surrogates, so that even they would not know which of them is the “real” father. After all, it just doesn’t matter. Each of the men in these couples are their babies’ “real” fathers, regardless of whose little swimmers won the race.

But, even these couples usually end up finding out the answer through a paternity test when their children are very young (even if, in the spirit of “not that it matters,” they do not divulge the results to others). Because biology does matter in certain respects, right? It can matter legally, as I discovered when our lawyer and I had to go through more hoops than Paul “Dizzy Hips” Blair just to get listed as “mother” on Max’s birth certificate. It certainly matters medically, as we know that genetics affect an individual’s tendency towards such innocuous traits as height, eye color and skin tone, as well as much more serious concerns, such as susceptibility to cancer, alzheimer’s and diabetes. Let’s face it, there is a reason why, if you want to become a sperm donor for an infertile couple, you have to do more than grab a dixie cup and aggravate Christine O’Donnell (so to speak). You also have to fill out a 22 page questionnaire about your family’s medical history. Anyone in your family ever have Mad Cow Disease? You better know the answer (for real) if you want to earn that $200 for your deposit.

So yes, biology matters. But so what? That’s no skin off my back. Because parents who adopted their kids, or whose partner did the donating in a surrogacy relationship (as in my case), are still their kids’ biological parents. How? Because a person’s genes are not solely the result of which sperm met which egg. Parenting also plays a role in the biological make-up of our children. For example, as parents we can literally alter our children’s tendencies towards certain genetic conditions. According to a finding published in Newsweek last year:

In most cases, our genes are only a predisposition; they are not written in stone. And if we have a strong family history for diseases such as prostate cancer, breast cancer, or heart disease -- "bad genes"-- then we may need to make bigger changes in lifestyle in order to help prevent or even reverse chronic diseases. In the centuries-old debate about nature vs. nurture, we are learning that nurture affects nature as much as nature affects nurture.

As parents, we have the power to affect in our children all of the lifestyle choices mentioned in the article: “nutrition, stress management techniques, walking and psychosocial support.” As another example, through parenting we actually change our children’s physical brains. The Toronto Star reported last year that:

Infant brain imaging, baby brain wave studies and even autopsies of infants show the profound similarities among newborn human brains. Adult brains, however, are profoundly different biologically.

In other words, our brains are literally shaped by our lifetimes, and our lifetimes are shaped by our parents, irrespective of how they became our parents.

So, while Jacob and Christie created Max’s biological make-up, as his “papa” I will have the tremendous privilege and obligation to help mold his biology in a positive direction, towards a lifetime of health and happiness -- through guiding him in what he eats, how much exercise he gets, how often is brain is engaged through reading and experiencing the world, and in countless other ways. So yes, Max is my biological son, and is becoming more so every day.