This post is taken from the weekly newsletter “Darons Daronnes” on parenting, which is sent out every Wednesday at 6:00 p.m. To receive it, you can register for free here.
You know how you love certain WhatsApp groups, how happy you get when you see that little notification icon pop up? Well, I have a WhatsApp group of friends that does that to me. There are four of us in it, sharing our little and big news, while we wait to see each other around a plate of pasta.
Last year, around this time, one of us posted a photo of a letter written by her eldest son, who was then 14 years old. She is the mother of four children: two older ones, from her first marriage to her ex-husband, and two younger ones, born from her union with his wife. The latter two were carried by his wife. They went through a sperm bank in Denmark: they had started their procedures before French law authorized AMP for everyone in 2021 and they wanted both children to have the same donor.
In this letter, the teenage son addressed the magistrate who was to decide on the full adoption of the youngest – let’s call her Simone – by my friend. In a scathing letter, he pleaded: “I support my mother’s adoption of Simone. I consider them both as mother and daughter, my mother loves Simone deeply and takes care of her as she took care of me. I myself consider her my little sister and I take care of her. My mother loves Simone and Simone loves my mother and she is a wonderful mother.”
Waterfall Adventures
Of course, we opted for our heart and little tear emojis. At the time I followed it from a distance, without fully understanding the legal intricacies of the matter. It was while watching a series on Arte.tv, patience my love, by Camille Duvelleroy, then speaking to a reader who had written to me, I began to see it more clearly. In the series, a couple of young mothers are forced to prove that the mother who did not bear the child is fulfilling her role as mother. She is furious and wants to send her seven-year bank statement, listing purchases of small flexible spoons and erasable markers, before her wife ends up reassuring her a little: an objective letter and some testimonies from relatives will suffice. Like the famous letter from my friend’s son, who also experienced many adventures along the way: letters sent back and forth because the edges of the notarized documents were not the right color, a summons to the police station where the police asked her if the one who put her child in pajamas was there, etc.
You have 60.01% of this article left to read. The rest is reserved for subscribers.
