Dear Friend of The AFA,

Like, hi, from the West Coast!

For the first time in, um, oh, ever, I’m away from my home, my family and my job for three weeks. I’m in San Francisco working my butt off in a rigorous course for certification as a sexologist and sex educator. Yes, it’s fun, interesting, challenging, intriguing. It’s also important. It’s my first step on the road to getting a Ph.D. in public health and sexuality, two areas of growing importance to The AFA. More about that in a minute.

Right now I just wanted to tell you how strangely exhilarating it is to be in this city, sip my morning coffee and see The AFA’s Resource guide for the LGBT community, the first in the country, mentioned in an extensive San Francisco Chronicle article about fertility treatment and gay and lesbian family-building. As I said in that piece, the desire for children is a sure sign of the maturity of the LGBT community.

It made me think of the parallel growth of The AFA. I’ve watched this collective child of a few dedicated founding members mature into a organization with an expansive, embracing approach to fertility, infertility, reproductive, sexual health and sexuality. These core elements that define us as human beings, no matter what our cultural roots, no matter what our sexual orientation, are at the heart of The AFA.

As we build from our center – infertility, its causes, treatments and the personal, social and political education and advocacy we undertake to help people overcome obstacles to reproduction-- it’s become clear that sexual health and sexuality are the areas that get shorted. Yet they desperately need to be addressed.

Here at the Institute for Advanced Study of Human Sexuality, I’m learning from some of the top sex educators in the country, some of the most cutting edge thinkers in human sexuality. I’m just beginning to understand this piece of the human psyche and how it affects our behaviors, all our behaviors. I’m just beginning to appreciate the ramifications of trying to separate our own sexuality from our whole bodies and indeed in many cases our lives.

I’m learning that consequences of being disconnected from such a crucial element of the essential, primal self can sometimes push people to either extreme, promiscuity or absolute denial.

Now how does this relate to The AFA’s mission? Well it’s quite direct. When people have trouble conceiving and seek medical help, we as physicians, caretakers, and patients work hard at separating out our sexuality from reproduction. It’s too painful. Too uncomfortable. We do everything we can to isolate sexuality in these circumstances, stripping couples of release, pleasure and intimate warmth that can help hold them together when the going gets rough. And we all know, the going will get rough. We are finely tuned to the stresses marriages endure, all the complicated feelings that can arise while taking our sexuality and baby-making into the laboratory.

The AFA is increasingly aware of the necessity of safe sex to protect reproductive health and preserve fertility in order to avoid STI-generated infertility.

And the fact that people don’t talk about sex is why precisely why we are calling our safe sex-sexual health program “Let’s Talk About Sex.” We are determined to end the legacy of preventable infertility, infertility that is the offspring of silence and denial.

So while I wrap up the most exhausting and exhilarating three weeks I can remember, I’d love for you to browse this issue of Connections. You’ll find news briefs that touch on everything from the HPV tempest to ovum freezing, and features that take on the shifting landscape of international adoption, talking to teens about sex and a first person account of donor siblings meeting. You’ll find world-renowned bioethicist Adrienne Asch tackling the thorny issue of informed prenatal testing. It’s a small feast of critical information and opinion.

Hearty appetite. Until next month

With fond regards,

Pamela Madsen
Executive Director