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"For my August column in Glamour I wrote about whether I should stop taking my Gleevec&amp;#8212;the drug that&amp;#39;s saving my life&amp;#8212;in order to have a baby, and it&amp;#39;s sparked quite a debate among Glamour readers. I&amp;#39;ve been getting tons of phone calls, e-mails and letters (one note came interoffice from one of our company&amp;#39;s phone operators!). Some are supportive and sweet, like the operator&amp;#39;s and the one from a fellow patient who wrote: &amp;quot;It makes it so great for my girlfriends to read about YOU and your quest for kids so they better understand my situation.&amp;quot; But many of them say, &amp;quot;Just adopt, you idiot!&amp;quot; OK, they&amp;#39;re actually not that harsh, but they do have that general P.O.V. One woman wrote, &amp;quot;Frankly, it disturbs me that you value your own life, and your husband&amp;#39;s lifetime commitment, so little that you would risk everything you have accomplished so that your eggs may be fertilized. How selfish.&amp;quot; That hurt. It made me cry, actually. I was so upset I forwarded it to Nick. Here&amp;#39;s what he had to say: &amp;quot;Tell her your husband is forcing you to do it against your will. Say he needs a natural-born heir to his enormous Flint, Michigan, fortune. You can also throw in that a girl won&amp;#39;t work&amp;#8212;I need a masculine child.&amp;quot; It was just the wiseass response I needed. I laughed out loud (there is no Flint, Michigan, fortune, to say the least) and got on with my day. Other letters were a little nicer. &amp;quot;Erin, you do not have to risk your life to be a mother,&amp;quot; a woman from Arizona wrote. &amp;quot;I am in the process of adopting a beautiful, precious little girl from India and I have a biological son who is the light of my life, but I will be no less a mother to her than I am to my son, and I can honestly say that what my children need most in life is ME.&amp;quot; I so appreciate everyone&amp;#39;s taking the time to weigh in on my story&amp;#8212;and tell me bits of their own&amp;#8212;but it&amp;#39;s hard to hear people questioning me when I don&amp;#39;t feel like I&amp;#39;m really in a place to defend myself. I&amp;#39;m scared and not 100 percent sure what I&amp;#39;ll do yet. Last night Nick and I talked about the letters (with a little more seriousness) and he said, &amp;quot;Babe, it&amp;#39;s our life, don&amp;#39;t sweat it.&amp;quot; Easy for him to say. I&amp;#39;m convinced that part of the reason he wants to try to conceive is all the sex we&amp;#39;ll have! But seriously, I am sure that I want to at least explore having a baby on our own. I&amp;#39;ve been mulling this over basically since I was diagnosed, and Dr. Mauro has agreed to help us with the process (and assured me that he doesn&amp;#39;t think I&amp;#39;m totally crazy for wanting to do it). Adoption is a wonderful option for many people&amp;#8212;and ultimately may be for me&amp;#8212;but right now, it&amp;#39;s not where my head or my heart is. I can&amp;#39;t really say why; it&amp;#39;s just a feeling I have, and for the time being I&amp;#39;m going with it.\n&amp;#8212;Erin"^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
<http://www.glamour.com/story/the-baby-debate>