Birth Mothers? Book readers, how did that work?

I don't know that it was ever stated how they were impregnated nor where they got the sperm.

Strangely, it seems as if the birth mothers start having babies as soon or shortly after they are assigned the job, which in the book is at the Ceremony of Twelve (twelve-years-old). They have three babies, one per year, while living in luxury in the Birthing Center. After giving birth to their three babies, they were transferred to some other labor-intensive field.

As for the family units, men and women each apply to live with someone else. The Elders determine the personalities and match a man and a woman. After a few years, they can apply to raise a child or two. During the annual Ceremony, they get assigned a newchild. All of this is asexual. No one had sex. In the book, upon entering puberty, when they got the stirrings, which in Jonas' case was a dream about trying to bathe Fiona, they had to take a pill that suppressed those feelings.

Bob

In the fourth book the story follows a birth mother. They're artificially inseminated and don't ever get to see their baby (they give birth wearing a mask and the baby is taken away straight away. They live completely separately from the rest of the community in birthing units with other birth mothers. They have something like 1 baby a year starting when they're around 14 and then get reassigned when they've had three babies, usually to either the farmlands or the fish hatchery or labour. Basically jobs where they didn't need to begin training at a young age and they're kept separate from the rest of the community.

Being a birth mother was a also considered a lowly and undesirable job (for obvious reasons, one of the biggest being that they are seperated from the rest of the community and can never have a family unit). I think if I remember correctly the girls who are picked to be birthmothers are the ones who show zero promise at being good at anything else-- or at least anything else important.

Thanks for all of the replies. Based on the movie it appears this was a sexless society, am I right. No one had sex....ever. Even those family units, it appears the man and woman are just roommates. A coaching team for the kids. Am I correct? No one had sex or am I wrong?


Was ist der Sinn des Lebens?

There are two other books in the series. Gathering Blue, which is about a girl in a tribal setting who escapes her community it's not immediately apparent how she fits into the giver until the 3rd book. The Son which centers around Gabe's birth mother. She is unable to cope with the feelings of the loss after they take Gabriel away. Who she never sees because they put a mask on the eyes of the birth mother so they cannot see the baby. Anyway she escapes the community much like jonas and eventually finds her way to jonas and is reunited with her son.

It's a children's book.