Who's Your Daddy?

posted by Laura Ingle at 4:18 pm ET
June 15, 2006

As we approach Father's Day this weekend, many children whose mothers conceived with the help of a sperm donor, are wondering just that. "Who is the man that helped make me?" "Is he tall?" "Is he funny?" "Does he like the same sports and music that I do?"

Hundreds of children who know that they were created this way, have by and large been kept in the dark about the origins of their fathers, because the "rules" of sperm donation, usually involve anonymity. Men make a donation, fill out some forms, answer medical questions, get a few dollars, and walk away.

Sperm banks have been around for decades of course, but there seems to be a new movement of sperm donors who are curious to find out just how many babies they helped create and to possibly get in touch with the kids. Kids who are curious themselves are also wanting to meet or at least e-mail their donors.

Our At Large team traveled to Colorado and to Michigan to bring you the story from both sides of this issue, spending time with both a teenage boy who is the product of a sperm donation and a sperm donor, who by his count, might have as many as 2,000 children roaming around. Most likely he has around 432 children!

First to Colorado:

This is Wendy Kramer and her son Ryan when he was just a toddler. Wendy Kramer is the founder and operator of a website that helps track sperm donors and children created by them: www.donorsiblingregistry.com.

Wendy started the website to help her son Ryan track down his biological father, after at a very young age he started asking a lot of questions. Age 2!

Wendy says she has always been open and honest with her son about where he came from, and felt like it was her duty as his mom to try to help him get the answers that he was looking for. Since they started the website, over 2,000 half- siblings have found each other, and almost 100 donors and offsprings have hooked up as well.

An estimated 40,000 children a year are born in this country with the help of sperm banks. Ryan has spent years trying to track down California Cryobank sperm donor #1058. So far, he hasn't had any "hits" on the website that allows people to log on and match up numbers and information. He did however, come close to meeting two of his half- siblings two years ago, when he was contacted by the mother of the children. But it ended up being a disappointing situation. Ryan at first was so excited that he found two half- sisters. Apparently, the mother of the two saw Ryan on T.V. doing a story about sperm donors, and he looked exactly like her girls.

The mother reached out to Ryan's mom, but just a day later, she e-mailed the Kramers to say that despite the fact that they came from the same sperm donor, she and her husband weren't ready to reveal to their daughters that they were donor conceived, and decided against telling them. That decision of course, led to pulling the plug on Ryan's excitement about meeting his half- sisters.

Today, Ryan and his mother Wendy, live in a wonderful area just outside Boulder, Colorado with their two dogs, in an amazing cabin-like mountain home.

I should mention here that most of the stories done on Ryan are about how smart he is. He is the most amazing teenager I think I have ever met. He graduated high school early, and at age 16 is already in his third year of college! He is considered a mathematical genius, and has been studying aeronautic engineering.

What I really liked about Ryan was how easy going he was, and how open he is to the idea of finding his biological father. He's not looking to find a "dad," he just wants to ask some questions and see what he looks like.

Ryan knows that he is 6 -feet tall, has brown hair and brown eyes, but that's about it. Wendy still has the one page of information that the donor filled out years ago, that describes his personality, and desires of how he wanted the child to be raised. "To educate the child, raise him/her without biases of any kind. Teach him/her to trust in others, but to rely on self."

But, Ryan wonders what kind of sports he likes or maybe if he is a Bob Dylan fan as much as he is. If donor #1058 ever does come forward and gets online to meet Ryan, I can only imagine it will bring that man the greatest joy to know that he helped create a fantastic teenager, who, much to my delight, likes doing things like eating "Cool Whip" right out of the tub!

Now, to Michigan.

Meet Dr. Kirk Maxie. A scientist, medical doctor, owner of a successfully chemical research company, and in his younger years, a regular sperm donor.

After analyzing old sperm bank records, Dr. Maxie calculated that he has donated 2,161 viles of sperm and probably has over 400 biological children.

Dr. Maxie told me that he started donating after someone suggested that he help out women who really wanted to have babies that couldn't. He, unlike many, did not do it for the money (most donors only got about $20 a "pop" back then) and just really wanted to be of service to infertile women. But now, years later, he is realizing just how unregulated the industry really is and fears that his sperm was mishandled in many ways.

Thousands of babies could have been born by his donations. Now Dr. Maxie feels like he owes it to his offspring the right to know where they came from, and after registering on Ryan and Wendy's website, Maxie has made contact with two sisters who were his natural daughters. He told me that it has been an amazing experience, and they now communicate by e-mail often. He still hasn't met them, and isn't sure he is ready for that step. But that's OK, and is often the case with donors and recipients, and that's what the website is for.

I hope that donors and their offspring who haven't heard of the registry find our story on the air, or here on the website. I think it's a great vehicle for those who want to find out more. There is always the chance, that things may not go well. A donor could be a convict, and the other way around, it could be too emotional for some, etc. But for those people who are ready, this is the way to go.

If you or someone you know ends up finding each others donor, please write us back with our "comments" link here on the website. I look forward to keeping track of this story in the future!

Laura

Story posted by permission