Becoming a Parent: More Than DNA

It’s so much more than DNA

Becoming a parent is so much more than sharing the same DNA with your child.

Being a parent means that you dedicate the rest of your life to raising a child. Whether that child enters your life from birth, or you come along when he’s 10.

Being a parent means you open your heart, your life, and your mind to the child who calls you daddy, or mommy or maybe she just uses your first name.

Being a parent means you kiss away the boo-boos, read bedtime stories, and make memories.

Being a parent means you will guide them, love them, and nurture them for as long as you’re alive and understand that it doesn’t end when they’re 18.

Being a parent means it doesn’t matter how they became your child; through traditional pregnancy, egg donation, sperm donation, surrogacy, adoption, through marriage, or some other way.

What becoming a parent doesn’t mean:

Becoming a parent has nothing to do with DNA. It does not take sharing the same DNA to parent a child.

There is a moment that you will look at your child and not remember life as it was before they entered yours. The love you feel and the lengths you would go for your child is what makes you the parent.

Many parents in the world have used egg donation, sperm donation, embryo adoption or surrogacy to make their dreams of being a parent come true. Often parents do not share the same DNA as their child but under no circumstances does this make anyone less a parent than one who does.

Love is not about who’s DNA you share.