Family!

We had our 2nd bigger gathering of our Heemsoth sperm donor family and it was amazing!

A little history first.  My sister and I (full siblings) found our first half-brother on 23andme in October 2014.  Then we found our half-sister.  It was the four of us for a long time.  We became HSC, the Half Sibling Club, named by our creative half-sister.  We all met in California.  Then the other half-siblings started rolling in.  We are now up to 46 half-siblings in our Hank Heemsoth group.  Four of them have passed away.  Some of them haven't responded.  Some of our group are struggling with adapting to this situation and/or have delicate family situations.  Some of us have fully accepted it.

After meeting the HSC, I met three more of my half-sisters.  We had our first big gathering in the summer of 2018, with 11 half-siblings, their families, and quite a few Heemsoths at the gathering.  It was also amazing.  Having the Heemsoths there to share family history, pictures, stories about Hank and the family was invaluable.  It made Hank seem more real.

This summer's gathering profoundly affected me in a different way.  It felt like we were family.  The comfort level grew.  We had Friday night and all of Saturday together...met at a brewery Friday night, hung out at a lake beach area Saturday, and then sat around the campfire Saturday night...12 siblings and our families.  We did things that families do...picnic, some of the next generation went paddleboarding, the youngest kids played in the sand and water, we made smores.  And we laughed together!!  A lot!  It was so much fun.  My brother lovingly picked on me for being "old".  (Remember the age spread of the siblings is 30 years, and our kids have a 31 year age spread and still going.  I am one of the older sperm donor siblings.)  It was a real family feeling.  We missed each other when we parted.  The language changed...we were brothers and sisters, nieces and nephews (without the "half" word preceding it).  We were family!

When we first meet up, we are nervous.  Most of us have expressed that, and I have felt it too.  In a practical sense, we are strangers.  We've never met each other before.  We've only recently connected through the DNA sites and had mostly online conversations.  And yet, something connects us.  We share our paternal genetics.  We look at each other and see who looks alike.  As you would imagine, there is a range of appearances because of the random draw of Hank's genes combined with our different mother's genes.  But there are so many likenesses!  When you look at our baby and toddler pictures, some of us could be twins.  A lot of us have olive skin and hazel eyes, the same nose, etc.  We also compare other traits.  The majority of us are introverts by nature.  Most of us love animals.  There is a tendency for aptitude with science/engineering abilities...

What an amazing gathering of introverts!  We are family!