Potties and donors

Okay, two diverse topics, but both on my mind today.

On the potty front, dear goddess I don't want to jinx it, but it looks like we actually made some progress this weekend. I had held back off a little with training in the last week or two. I wasn't putting Brendan in underwear unless he wanted to be in them, which he mostly didn't. Yesterday after lunch he told me he wanted to take off his pull-up and wear his green Wiggles underwear. He was so excited to have it on and was dry the rest of the day, even though I had to take him to the potty. Today he couldn't wait to put on the blue Wiggles underwear. He told me this morning "I don't need diapers anymore." And several times he told he wasn't a baby, that he was a big boy. He was dry all day until about 5:30 when we were in the kitchen and he suddenly told me "I got to go to the potty" and then about 3 seconds later completely wet himself. But I was soooo happy about this because it was the first time he told me in advance that he needed to go, he just waited too late. I think he really does want to start training now. He may not want to pull down his undies on his own but at least he wants to keep them dry.

As for donors, this was an interesting few days on the donor contact front. Two women on the SMC lists had contact from their "anonymous" donors. I believe one posted to the DSR and the other was contacted directly by the bank. Coming so soon on the heels of the Washington Post article, I wonder if this will be just a limited phenomenon, men who may have read the article and decided to try and make contact. Or is this going to be a regular occurrence? Aside from the fact that I believe very few families would choose to have the donor become a regular part of their lives, I really do worry about the legal ramifications from all of this. What if there are enough families who do have contact with the donors, who start familial relationships, that a court could rule in favor of ending all anonymity. That cuts both ways, not just allowing the children access to the donor, but vice versa. That scares the hell out of me.

I have no idea how I'd react if the donor tried to contact me. I do have our contact information on the DSR because I would like to find sibling matches but until recent contact by the anonymous donors, it honestly never occurred to me that a donor would be the one to initiate contact. I can't possibly imagine meeting this man or breaking anonymity in such a way as to create a situation in which there could be a possible custody issue. That was the one great benefit of anonymous DI, the surety that this couldn't happen. It amazes that not even 4 years after I chose a donor that we're at a point where we're even having discussions about what to do if a donor contacts you. Never imagined it could happen. I think for me the ideal situation would be that the donor compromises his anonymity (I didn't use an identity release donor) and provides his name and contact information so I could have it for Brendan later on if he has interest, but that he in no way has any idea who we are. Then again, I guess that this wouldn't be ideal since I'd really have no way to be sure that this really was Brendan's donor. As someone else on the SMC list pointed out, there's nothing to prevent any weirdo out there from registering with the site and claiming to be a donor. Although I guess I could ask the donor questions about what he wrote on the long profile and I do have the audiotape so I could check out his voice, although I don't really have any desire have a phone conversation with this person.

And enough for the weighty thoughts and back to devouring Harry Potter.