u/Ok-Purchase-287

Looking for advice from others in open/known donor situations because my wife and I are really torn on how to handle something.

We had our son in March 2025 through an open donor arrangement. He was responsive up until he congratulated us for our pregnancy, but never responded to the birth or any subsequent updates of our son. Completely ghosted after it was real.

Recently, I made my son an Ancestry family tree. Unexpectedly, the donor’s father found the tree and messaged me (now 10 days ago) very kindly saying he noticed a grandmother of his wife on my tree and wanted to compare trees to find more relatives she may not have on hers.

Here’s the dilemma:

- We have no idea whether our donor ever told his family about our son. We’re assuming he didn’t.
- We don’t want to blindside or out him if he intended to tell them himself someday. 
- We would love our son to have a relationship with his bio father if that’s what he wants someday and don’t want to impact that.
- If we DO tell the donor and he says “no, don’t respond. I’ll talk to them” how are we supposed to feel confident that’s happening and not have that door close?
- We also don’t want to lose what could potentially be a meaningful biological family connection for our son.

Would you:

1. Respond directly to the donor’s father?
2. Reach out to the donor first as a heads up?
3. Keep things vague at first?
4. Open the tree/share context?

My baby is 12 months and has 0 words, but he can hold a gibberish conversation. He seems to not like to perform. For instance, one day we got him to learn that the dog says woof, and he did it all day, then the next day he acts too busy to want to tell us what the dog says, and since then ignores the request, BUT when he sees a dog walking he says woof. He communicates with us all day, we can ask him things, say things to him, etc and he responds in gibberish, sometimes with gestures like his hands up like “are you listening??” But he does NOT want to repeat if we say things like “cat” he won’t say it.

Not sure at what point this is concerning? He seems to be talking so much.

Everytime I google my name I find this old YouTube I had with a weird bio that I don’t want coming up when you search me. How do I get the YouTube taken down if I don’t know the email associated to it?

I had an endoscopy on Monday (2 days ago) and since I woke up in recovery to drink water, I’ve been having pain in my esophagus when swallowing. I haven’t been able to eat solid foods without pain and even mashed potatoes hurt. Smoothies are OK, some sips hurt some don’t. Is this normal? They took a biopsy in the middle third of my esophagus. The pain is almost in my upper mid back when I swallow.

My daughter had her 12 month vaccines 8 days ago and randomly got a fever last night (101) and into today. It responds to Motrin. But no symptoms???

I’m trying to figure out what’s going on and would really appreciate any insight.

About a two weeks ago, I suddenly started having intense itching all over my body - arms, legs, stomach, back, etc. The weird part is there’s not much of a rash overall, but I do have some small bumps/spots, mainly on my stomach and arm. Other areas (like my sides) itch just as badly but have no visible rash at all.

The itching is:

- Constant and doesn’t really come and go

- I wake up scratching my sides

- Not really relieved by Zyrtec (I’ve tried them for a few days)

- Also triggered worse by warmth/pressure (like clothing, sports bra, or skin contact)

- History of a few hives after showers

Other context:

- This started a few days after traveling from NY to TX, but I’ve since returned and it’s ongoing

- I have a small lymph node (~1 cm) that’s been there for ~3 months (ultrasound said it looked normal with a fatty hilum)

Recent labs showed mild iron deficiency (low iron + low ferritin) and slightly elevated TSH with low-normal free T4

- No obvious illness beforehand

- I’ve scratched enough in my sleep to cause small blood spots, even in areas without a rash

I’m trying to figure out if this is something like hives/urticaria, a skin condition, or something systemic.

Soooo I wasn’t going to question it until I came on Reddit and saw other people with my TSH not getting prescribed anything. I’ve been more tired recently when I’m usually really energetic, and found out my iron is depleted (not anemic) and my TSH is 4.4 (0.36-3.74) and free T4 is 0.73 (0.76-1.46). Dr said my thyroid is hypoactive and threw me on Levo 50 mcg. Is this premature? Also should mention I have severe health anxiety so I question everything a lot.