By admin on April 22, 2014

Madi, a donor conceived college student on the Donor Sibling Registry had a great idea for her school project.

This is what she wrote to me a few weeks ago: In our class we have been given the vague assignment of choosing a global problem (anything we want) and selecting a global brand (again, it can be any brand) and creating an idea to connect the two in order to help people. Being a DC person I immediately thought of the DSR and the struggle that donors and DC people go through in finding their families. My team and I thought that it would be an incredible idea to explore how an airline company could work to help the DSR and those who use it connect with their long-lost loved ones by getting people to donate miles or free flights to people traveling to see their biological family members. I reach out to you today because I would love to hear your thoughts on our idea and or anything you feel we should know about the DSR before beginning our brainstorming. I think the DSR is an incredible tool and as a DC person I am thankful it exists.

And here is the finished school project video that I received from her yesterday:

http://vimeo.com/92497809

What a fabulous idea, and so well done! I wish I knew a marketing expert, or someone who worked for an airline who could help us bring an idea like this to fruition.


By admin on April 06, 2014
I just received the following email today. If anyone is still questioning the importance of comprehensive medical and genetic testing of donors, and the urgency in regards to being able to update and share medical information amongst families…read on. When will the reproductive medicine industry get on board, and realize that deliberately keeping genetic relatives from each other can be harmful to families?
“I am the parent of two children who were born with a sperm donor.  They are both in their early 30’s.  In the past 6 weeks we have discovered that they were born with a bad gene and they have a rare heart disease.   With this gene,  a person just drops dead with no warning.   In checking my grandchildren, two of them, under the age of 10, carry the gene.  My oldest child and the youngest grandchild have had surgery.   My younger child is going to have a baby in December and that grandchild will have a 50 percent chance of getting the disease.  Still testing etc to see what that treatment will be.  I have had DNA testing done and I do not carry the gene.  Doctors said it had to come from the donor.

My question to you is what should we do to notify others about this issue.  We just can not sit back and not try to notify others.  I have been in contact with the doctor who did the procedure.  The donor was a medical student or an intern.  It was not like it is today.

To say the least, we are beside ourselves.  So much has happened and we are just trying to do what is needed and we all feel that we should reach out.
Thanking you in advance, for any advice you can give us.”

84% of our surveyed sperm donors said that they had never been contacted by their clinic/sperm bank for a medical update, while 23% of them said that they or a close family member had a medical/genetic issue that would be important to share with families.
96% of our surveyed egg donors said that they had never been contacted by their clinic for a medical update, while 31% of them said that they or a close family member had a medical/genetic issue that would be important to share with families.
 

By admin on March 14, 2014
“More Family” by Ellen Glazer
In my work counseling individuals and couples who are struggling to build their families, I tend to live more in the world of “before” than “after.”  By this I mean that I may know people for weeks or months or even years as they endure the pain of infertility and make decisions regarding donor conception and adoption. Ultimately most move forward and become parents. While I may know them well while they are seeking a donor or in the adoption process, many vanish once the babies come.  And so it has become a pleasure for me to occasionally be treated to a bit of the “after.”  Yesterday was such a day.
I had two experiences yesterday that I hope will be of interest to DSR readers.  The first was with a couple that I met twenty years ago. At the time they were ending infertility treatment and moving on to adoption. Last we spoke, they were adopting a baby girl. That baby is now their 18 year old daughter. They brought her to see me yesterday because she wants to search for her birthparents.  Her parents fully endorse the search but wanted us to meet to try to anticipate, as best we could, what might lie ahead.

We began with a discussion in which it was clear that the parents understood that their daughter should take the lead in the search but she needed to know they were in the background as her safety net, steady support etc. About twenty minutes into our meeting, the parents suggested that they leave so that their daughter could have some time alone with me.  Once they did so, she opened up about what she really wanted in the search saying, “Right now I don’t think I want a relationship—I just want to see her.”  As we explored this, she emphasized the need to simply see someone with whom she shares genetics.  She wisely added that her feelings about a relationship might change but that for now, it was “simply seeing” that she wanted.

I include this story because I imagine that many DSR members can identify with it—the idea of simply wanting to begin small—kinds of a “drive-by, look-see”—with the option to develop a relationship over time.  However, it was the “after” visit I had later in the day that I found more intriguing and wanted to be sure to share with the DSR.
My afternoon visitor yesterday was a woman I’d known when she and her husband were deciding on egg donation. As with most, it was not an easy decision and one that involved a lot of going back and forth with “should we,” “shouldn’t we.”  Ultimately, the couple decided to seek a donor. They are a Greek couple and while they understood and seemed to agree with my stance against anonymity, “this is the donor we want and she wants to be anonymous” and so it was.

Things change.  My Greek former client came back yesterday. She is now the relaxed and content mother of a four-year-old daughter—and she is in steady email communication with her donor. She had come to discuss their correspondence in light of the decision she and her husband had made to remain a one child family.  For many reasons, they were clear that their family was complete.  However, like many other older parents I meet who have one child, they had concerns about their child being “alone in the world.” They were making conscious efforts to be more involved with nieces and nephews so that their daughter could have a strong sense of extended family. “But I have other thoughts about how she can have ‘more family’” my client said. “I’m hoping our donor can become part of her life.” She went on to acknowledge that a good part of her motivation for being in touch with her donor was to lay the foundation for more contact in the future.

Whether or not my client, her daughter and their donor will have anything more than a “pen pal” relationship remains to be seen. Like the earlier in the day adoptee beginning a search for her birth mother, this ED mom knows that forging a relationship with a “relative stranger” is complicated and cannot be predicted. What interested me was not trying to predict the outcome of her efforts but rather, the idea behind them—“more family.”  While some donor-conceived families may feel full to overflowing, some single moms and couples with one child may welcome opportunities to nurture  kinship with donors and their families.

Ellen Glazer, author of the book Having Your Baby Through Egg Donation