All families are complex. A tangled web of good and bad relationships, marriages and divorces and separations, half siblings and step siblings, and love.
The traditional definition of a ‘nuclear family’ applies to very few these days – and ‘family’ no longer just means those who you are biologically related to. With IVF, sperm donation and adoption now being options for many more women (and men), families are made up of more threads than ever before.
This week’s SBS’s Insight set out to explore the topic of sperm donation, speaking to a number of men who had donated sperm over the years – as well as children conceived by sperm donation.
24-year-old Alexis was one of the young women to appear on the program, speaking about her experiences of being a ‘donor kid’. Her father Simon and biological father Paul also appeared on the program.
Alexis knows and has a relationship with her biological father, as well as some of her half-siblings. She spoke to Mamamia in greater detail about what having a big, complex family means to her.
Alexis says that she can’t remember being told that Paul was her donor dad – it was just something she had always been aware of. “My parents introduced him into my life when I was just a baby,” Alexis says, “I’m sure my parents started with something euphemistic like ‘he helped mummy and daddy create you’.
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I'm 15 and just found out that I was a sperm donor. I had thought I was adopted (my mum is 5'4 and my dad is 5'5 and I'm 6'2) so I knew something was wrong. I think as long as you tell your kids that they were conceived via sperm/egg donation. Thay should be fine.
I felt this show was incredibly biased and failed in a very big way to present the very real concerns male donors may have with children knocking on their door 20 years later.
It glossed over it a bit but cut back to one of the donors on stage saying it was the best thing that ever happened to him. I guarantee not all donors would feel that way.
Having met a pretty imbalanced girl who knew she was conceived through sperm donation I can't imagine being overly happy with her wanting to insert herself into my life.
This program was obviously attempting to shine light on the topic to help donor numbers, but I feel that by its omission (or perhaps selective editing) that it would put none of the serious concerns many men would have about the whole thing to rest.
What options would a man who DOESN'T want to be contacted have? I don't know. I believe not many, but this show made NO MENTION of it and has probably put off as many people as it has inspired.
There's a very real reason why, out of a country of over 11 million men there are less than 50 men who are donors: men weigh up the risks and to be perfectly honest the concern of an 18 year old turning up on my doorstep when I'm trying to get my possible future children off to school frightens the hell out of me.
Until these concern are actually acknowledged and addressed, the donor numbers won't swell to any great numbers because the risks to donors far outweigh the perceived benefits.
You can't imagine wanting that girl to insert herself into your life because she's not your child though. As disturbed as she may be she is his child, his daughter, a member of his family. She is a cousin to his nieces and nephews and she is granddaughter to his parents, niece to his siblings and she is the sister of any other children he has whether he raised them or not. She's his. In fact he may be the one person on earth who understands her or can identify with her particular brand of crazy. She is not your family so you can't imagine loving your own child regardless of their flaws? I know these guys get conned into thinking that all they give up is sperm, which is true at the moment but they still become biological fathers when their children are born so there is nothing really different going on there than anytime a guy gets a girl pregnant. It's all pretend. They just pretend not to be fathers as a service.
That's what I mean. You're saying that men need to just accept that the children born from their donation can and may show up at any time, regardless if they're unstable psychopaths or even pedophiles.
There's absolutely NOTHING in place to protect the donor in any situation, but there SHOULD BE.
There should be an assessment done on the donor child to ensure that they are psychologically ready and do not pose any risk to the donor father or his family.
The donor father should also be advised that the child has been advised about his identity, the name (at least) of the child should be provided to the donor father alerting him to the fact that his donor child may be seeking him out.
While we're on that topic, why are donor fathers given the right to know the names of their donor children once those children turn 18? Would it be because perhaps the children were unaware they were donor conceived and it might upset their lives? Oh, but we can give donor children information the other way around because there's no way donor children would ever upset the lives of donor fathers...
Andy, Hi. I actually am a reunion search angel and I help LOTS of donor offspring search for their family through the details in their profile sheets and by triangulating their kinship position in DNA Databases like FTDNA and 23 and me. A man who is a donor is a human being no different than anyone else. He has as much protection against a cookie relative as anyone else does, as you or me. If a relative or anyone for that matter harasses him he has every right to file a restraining order of course. If a relative or someone else breaks the law they can be convicted and sent to jail certainly. Was there some reason you think that they would need special extra protection from being contacted by a relative? If we just don't like some of our relatives the cops won't send a guy to guard your door at Thanksgiving, its our problem unless our relative does something to warrant issuance of an order of protection. Does that satisfy your concern? It's equal to what everyone else has, no more, no less. One relative is just as likely to be an irritant as another, the fact that their father happened to be a donor does not increase creepiness or anything. I'd say your concerns could apply equally to any family member.
Andy I am not sure I understand why you would treat the kids he had under contract different than the kids he may have had with his spouse. They are just people. They are all equally related to him. They could be total nut jobs but then so could the kids he's raised or maybe his Mom is a nut job and it skipped a generation. Once he starts talking to them he can decide if he likes them or not. He does not have to continue to talk to them if he does not want to. The important thing to remember though is that he does not dictate how other people in the family feel. Often times their grandmother, aunts uncles and cousins siblings and nieces and nephews will keep up contact even if the estranged parent turns out to be nuts or just is not interested in having a relationship with them. It won't mean that his other kids won't be contacted. He's only in control of what he does. He should not be in a position to control what the rest of his family does. He's not. If I run into a parent who is not interested in contact I move on to the next relative. Very rare but it's happened and its fine. The parent ultimately gets over it. The family gets passed their initial shock that their relative kept their family from them and then they move forward.