My DE kids are teens - AMA

[Anonymous]

I know there people on this forum who are hesitant about pursuing pregnancy with donor eggs (as was I at first). I only agreed to DE when a planned adoption failed.

My twins are 13. I have a 15yo who was conceived via IVF with my own eggs. I was 40 when I had the twins.

Ask me anything.

[Anonymous]

Do your kids know? Will you be supportive if they want to reach out to the donor when they are adults?

[Anonymous]

Op here.

I deliberately chose a donor who was open to outreach from the kids. Of course, she can always change her mind, but if the kids want to connect with her, I hope they can.

The boys know they are donor conceived. When they were 3, I explained that it takes a mom's eggs and a dad's sperm to make a baby. I told them that my eggs were sick so I used another lady's eggs. As they got older, I provided more and more details. Now they know everything. They have seen the file with her photos, the photos of her child, etc. They are really not that interested though. The subject only comes up when we talk about inherited traits.

[Anonymous]

Do you feel closer to your 15 yo or have a stronger connection than with your twins?

[Anonymous]

Op here. I definitely don't have a stronger connection to the 15yo.

They have such different personalities and I enjoy each aspect of their personalities. The 15yo is bookish and an intellectual. I have political and philosophical discussions with him. Twin A is very competent. He can cook well and he can fix anything, so I love having him around to help. Twin B is the fun-loving one. Always playful and always smiling.

They are all wonderful in their individual ways and there is never a thought in my mind that the 15yo is different than the others in terms of my connection to him.

[Anonymous]

Did your twins ever get teased or treated differently by other kids or families due to their DE status? Was it ever a thing? I have a DE child; I worry sometimes not so much about my own kid, with whom I have a very close connection, but how other kids might treat my child as 'different' ?

[Anonymous]

Hi OP, thanks for doing this! I’m a former donor and I wonder about my recipient family(ies) all the time and hope they are happy and well. So, for one of my donations, the clinic inadvertently discharged me home with a form that had the intended father’s name and address on it. I still have it in a file cabinet somewhere. This was from about 15 years ago when anonymous donations were the norm and semi-anonymous or open donations were pretty much unheard of. Would it be horribly intrusive and unwelcome to send a letter just saying “Hello, I might be your child’s donor. I’m open to contact, but please disregard if you prefer not to hear from me”?

I should probably have shredded it a long time ago and pretended I never saw it, but I’ve held onto it all these years. I believe the recipients were a same sex couple or possibly single father. Any thoughts?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Hi OP, thanks for doing this! I’m a former donor and I wonder about my recipient family(ies) all the time and hope they are happy and well. So, for one of my donations, the clinic inadvertently discharged me home with a form that had the intended father’s name and address on it. I still have it in a file cabinet somewhere. This was from about 15 years ago when anonymous donations were the norm and semi-anonymous or open donations were pretty much unheard of. Would it be horribly intrusive and unwelcome to send a letter just saying “Hello, I might be your child’s donor. I’m open to contact, but please disregard if you prefer not to hear from me”?

I should probably have shredded it a long time ago and pretended I never saw it, but I’ve held onto it all these years. I believe the recipients were a same sex couple or possibly single father. Any thoughts?

I am a bystander here (no personal experience) but I wanted to mention that genetic genealogy makes it very likely that any kid who goes looking will be able to find some people related to you and start working the chain.

This is kind of a tough issue because situations 15 years ago were a lot different. It could upset this likely parent person or they may be glad to receive your note. No way to know. It does look bad for the clinic, for sure.

I think what's most important is that if a child wants to be in contact with you, and you are open to it, that you are findable.

I suggest you wait until such kids are about 25, then put your test on Ancestry.com. Anyone looking hard will be likely to find you. Anyone who is not looking, probably doesn't have an emotional need.

[Anonymous]

Thank you, PP. That’s a really good idea. I’ll probably do the Ancestry thing. I’ve registered on Donor Sibling Registry as well, but so far no matches. I would be so delighted to hear from recipient families at some point!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Did your twins ever get teased or treated differently by other kids or families due to their DE status? Was it ever a thing? I have a DE child; I worry sometimes not so much about my own kid, with whom I have a very close connection, but how other kids might treat my child as 'different' ?

Op here. My kids' friends and our casual acquaintances don't know the kids' DE origins. In fact I didn't tell my parents because I worried they would not accept them. Both of my parents passed away without knowing, but they absolutely adored their three grandsons.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Hi OP, thanks for doing this! I’m a former donor and I wonder about my recipient family(ies) all the time and hope they are happy and well. So, for one of my donations, the clinic inadvertently discharged me home with a form that had the intended father’s name and address on it. I still have it in a file cabinet somewhere. This was from about 15 years ago when anonymous donations were the norm and semi-anonymous or open donations were pretty much unheard of. Would it be horribly intrusive and unwelcome to send a letter just saying “Hello, I might be your child’s donor. I’m open to contact, but please disregard if you prefer not to hear from me”?

I should probably have shredded it a long time ago and pretended I never saw it, but I’ve held onto it all these years. I believe the recipients were a same sex couple or possibly single father. Any thoughts?

This is the OP. I always wonder whether the donor thinks about the kids and wonders whether they are loved and well cared for. I would love to put the donor's worries at ease and tell her how intensely grateful I am to her for giving me those boys. I feel I owe it to her to make sure that they are cherished because she took a huge risk in entrusting me with her genetic offspring.

[Anonymous]

Hi, OP! I’m the donor PP. Thank you so much for your reply. I’m so happy to hear that you had a positive experience with donor egg treatment. I hope you and your children get to meet your donor someday if that’s something they choose.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Did your twins ever get teased or treated differently by other kids or families due to their DE status? Was it ever a thing? I have a DE child; I worry sometimes not so much about my own kid, with whom I have a very close connection, but how other kids might treat my child as 'different' ?

Op here. My kids' friends and our casual acquaintances don't know the kids' DE origins. In fact I didn't tell my parents because I worried they would not accept them. Both of my parents passed away without knowing, but they absolutely adored their three grandsons.

NP here also with one OE and one DE kid. I love both my kids equally but the DE kid looks a lot like the egg donor and takes after my DH while the OE kid looks like me. I marvel at seeing my face in my OE kid's face and I miss not seeing that in my DE kid but I tell myself that he could have easily taken after his dad facially. Like PP we never told the grandparents for the same reasons. DE kid knows that "another lady helped us" as we were taught to do during the required counseling so that there is never a bombshell moment. He also knows that this is private medical information that we don't reveal to other people.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Did your twins ever get teased or treated differently by other kids or families due to their DE status? Was it ever a thing? I have a DE child; I worry sometimes not so much about my own kid, with whom I have a very close connection, but how other kids might treat my child as 'different' ?

Op here. My kids' friends and our casual acquaintances don't know the kids' DE origins. In fact I didn't tell my parents because I worried they would not accept them. Both of my parents passed away without knowing, but they absolutely adored their three grandsons.

NP here also with one OE and one DE kid. I love both my kids equally but the DE kid looks a lot like the egg donor and takes after my DH while the OE kid looks like me. I marvel at seeing my face in my OE kid's face and I miss not seeing that in my DE kid but I tell myself that he could have easily taken after his dad facially. Like PP we never told the grandparents for the same reasons. DE kid knows that "another lady helped us" as we were taught to do during the required counseling so that there is never a bombshell moment. He also knows that this is private medical information that we don't reveal to other people.

OP again. You experience is like mine. My OE son looks like a blend of me and his father. The DE kids don't look like me - at all. The funny thing is that I see aspects of my personality in them.

I have also told the boys that their origins are their private medical information. I really don't think that they think about it much, though. There is no evidence that it is something that concerns them. But they are still young and that may change.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Did your twins ever get teased or treated differently by other kids or families due to their DE status? Was it ever a thing? I have a DE child; I worry sometimes not so much about my own kid, with whom I have a very close connection, but how other kids might treat my child as 'different' ?

Op here. My kids' friends and our casual acquaintances don't know the kids' DE origins. In fact I didn't tell my parents because I worried they would not accept them. Both of my parents passed away without knowing, but they absolutely adored their three grandsons.

NP here also with one OE and one DE kid. I love both my kids equally but the DE kid looks a lot like the egg donor and takes after my DH while the OE kid looks like me. I marvel at seeing my face in my OE kid's face and I miss not seeing that in my DE kid but I tell myself that he could have easily taken after his dad facially. Like PP we never told the grandparents for the same reasons. DE kid knows that "another lady helped us" as we were taught to do during the required counseling so that there is never a bombshell moment. He also knows that this is private medical information that we don't reveal to other people.

Yes, you never know what OE kids will look like. My two boys take after their dad so strongly. I contributed some feature softening but it's quite subtle. Only my older son's eyebrows are recognizably more similar to me. Their baby pictures look like they could have been identical triplets.