Father's Drug Use - Effect on Fetus

You have asked a simple question that I have to answer in steps. Why? You've presented a complicated situation that I must take into consideration in my answer. Please read each part of my answer and take in the suggestions and the well-meant positive energy that I am sending your way.

Part One
You are a young mother who has the most incredible job in the world: caring and raising a new life. Your baby looks to you, while she is in your stomach, to nurture her, keep her safe, and help her grow into a healthy, strong baby. She also needs you to feel safe, be nurtured, and remain strong for her. In order to do these things, you need to look at your life and ask yourself if you can give your baby safety, security, love, and nurturance in an environment that is surrounded by drugs. I know that you know the risk factors of drug use and violence, as well as the risk factors of drug use and ill health. But there is more to it than that. Your baby's development, safety (as an infant surrounded by drug affected adults), and even growth into a strong, capable person can be affected by parental drug use. I am not saying all of this to lay any type of guilt on you. I think, judging by your letter to me, that you are a strong woman who is already thinking about the safety of your baby. Go further. Think about your baby at age fourteen and ask yourself would you want her to be in the environment that you now face. I bet you want more from life. What dreams do you have for yourself? Your baby? How can you make them happen? What can the father of your baby do to help you and your baby? Ask yourself these tough questions and reach out to others in your family or community who can help. I don't know if you live with the father of your baby or with your family. Regardless of where you live, you have to protect your baby and yourself.

Part Two
Your question about your baby's health is actually two different questions. One question has to do with your baby's growth from the moment of conception, with your egg and your partner's sperm. The other question has to do with the safety of your baby while you have had sex with a person who is taking many different drugs. Let's examine each question separately.

Whoever told you that there have been few studies done examining drug-taking fathers and the health of their babies was right. A large number of the published parental drug use studies actually focus on the mother's drug use, and reports from the mother about the father's drug use. In these studies, very little testing of the father's drug intake, and the effect this intake has had on his sperm, has been done. Instead, researchers have had to depend on anecdotal stories from the mother about the father's drug taking, type of drugs used, and frequency. This is hopefully about to change. Scientists are realizing that fathers are the forgotten quotient in drug testing and questioning in order to create true family dynamic studies. It may be easier to talk to and work with women who give birth in facilities or go to see practitioners (as it sounds like you have done.) Yet, it is hard to work with partners who may not show up at appointments or even come to their baby's birth. Having said that, I must state that fathers are not in any way exempt from being responsible for the health and safety of their babies. As is the case with all babies, regardless if a mother and father are actively together, we still need an egg and a sperm to make a baby. And, everyone should be as healthy as possible. Intentionally taking a lot of different drugs will not make someone healthy. So, even though we do not have a lot of studies that conclusively tell us whether a father's sperm can be damaged, and how that will affect his unborn baby, we do know that people can be damaged from drug use. We also know that drug use often goes hand in hand with other factors: abuse, violence, low self-esteem, mental disruptions, unemployment...and the list goes on. These things are not an indication of chronic drug use, but are conditions that can set the stage or be affected by chronic drug use. You must consider how this instability will affect your baby and yourself.

The second part of your question deals with having sex with someone who is a chronic drug user. This brings up some of the concerns of chronic drug use: unprotected sexual encounters, possible encounters with multiple partners, exchanging sex for drugs, experimenting with more and more dangerous drugs to chase the high, and becoming exposed to HIV or sexually transmitted diseases. Viruses or bacteria cause sexually transmitted diseases. You can become infected with an STD by having sexual intercourse, or other types of sexual contact, with a person who is infected with a specific virus or bacterium. Sexually transmitted diseases are infections like hepatitis B, HIV, herpes, chlamydia, gonorrhea, and syphilis. Each one of these diseases can harm your baby, causing a range of problems from life-long acute illness, blindness, pneumonia, premature birth, anemia, and even stillbirth. If this list sounds scary, it should. Numerous people have STDs and never even know it. How prevalent are they? The United States government estimates that there are 3 million cases of Chlamydia alone each year.

I wish you nothing but joy and good thoughts as you embark on a new life-long journey of parenting. But, I need you to do something. I need you to look within yourself and see the beauty and the strength that resides within you. Then, I want you to imagine that same strength living within your baby. The two of you need each other. And, the two of you deserve a whole, healthy person in your lives as your baby's father and your partner. If you need help to achieve this kind of change in your family, reach out to people in your community or your close kin. Utilize the resources available and harness the positive energy that others can send your way. You, your beautiful baby, and even your partner (as he struggles with chronic drug use) deserve nothing less.

Before I end my remarks, I must remind you that sometimes we have to let others heal themselves. This may be the case with your baby's father. He may not want to change or get better. If that is the case, you need to seriously consider whether you can have him in your life as a drug-affected adult. Life is hard enough without inviting hardship, trauma, and instability into your home.

And finally, please have a safe birth. I hope it will be one surrounded by healthy, loving people in your life.