A story by one mom who used a sperm donor to have a child, who started out well-off financially but hit hard times:
…But to get help from the state, I first have to meet with a social worker and then the CHILD SUPPORT ENFORCEMENT OFFICER. The eagle has landed. I didn’t know when or why that donor was going to be a problem – but that problem is now! If a mother with children needs public assistance and she’s not receiving child support, then the state will find the father and make him either pay support now or repay the government later for part of the help his child receives.
So I get out all of the paperwork from many years ago and take it to my meeting with the child support officer. He listened to my story. I spread all the clinic documents in front of him. He asked a few questions before looking at me like I had three heads! I told him that was all I could do to prove to him that he would never locate my daughter’s “deadbeat dad.”
He said he still needed to advertise in the newspaper that that state was trying to locate my daughter’s biological father in the chance that he would come forward, just as they do in all child support and adoption cases. I told him that would be foolish money spent by the government and that I would be embarrassed to have my name published like that for all to read. Everyone in my world knows how I conceived my daughter. But I didn’t want everyone I ever knew finding out in the newspaper that I was on food stamps!…
Categories: Fatherhood, Reproductive Technologies
This quote really brought it all home for me:
“I almost used a friend as donor so that my daughter could meet her bio-dad when she was older. Thank God I didn’t! It would be awful to drag him into this by the state forcing him to support a child.”
REALLY!!! REALLY??? What on earth are we doing here people? Whose interests should we be protecting? Really….
Reading this reminds me of my friend Mac; a “hot” landscape gardener who comes to our rescue doing those things that get harder as one gets older..( like cutting back rampant wisteria growing over the pergola).
When we first met, about four years ago, Mac was immediately interested in our small grandchildren who were visiting. He told me that he has a daughter; aged then about 3. He said, “I am a sperm donor father so she doesn’t live with me”. We knew nothing about each others’ personal history at that time. I shared with him that I am an adopted person and that I have many friends who are adoptees/or DCs.
He was surprised, but very interested; we shared our stories with each other and have continued to do so (when he gardens) since then.
Mac grew up in a “macho” country town in Oz. Said he knew he was gay from late-childhood. His father (and brothers) were intermittently hostile and understanding of his homosexuality. He has been living as a gay man since his early adult life and has had MANY relationships; often traumatic and he is still hoping for a deep, lasting relationship.
Not long after one very painful relationship ended; he was contacted by a woman he had known since childhood. She too had grown up in the same country town; he said he had always admired her because she seemed to him more “sassy” and less willing to accept the fate of many young women in their rural setting. She was a few years older than him; became pregnant fairly early in her life and has raised a daughter as a single mother. The father of her now adolescent daughter has not been in her life (or that of his daughter) since she was born.
Mac kept in intermittent contact with Roz and, at times, played a minor role in her life and was a “friend/uncle” to her fatherless daughter.
Roz and her daughter (about 10 at this stage) were living in a commune in a rural town; lots of single mothers…some heterosexual and some lesbian women. Roz had a woman partner at this stage and together they wanted to have a child; especially a sibling for her daughter who, as an only child, longed for a sibling.
Roz asked Mac if he would be willing to consider making available his sperm so that she and her partner could parent a child together.
He said that he was enormously flattered to be asked by Roz to be her donor. He regarded her as a beautiful, interesting woman; perhaps if he were not gay…the sort of woman to whom he might be attracted.
So, somewhat on the rebound from yet another relationship that had ended with Mac having a broken heart, he agreed to be her donor. He said it all happened very quickly; within two months of providing sperm Roz had conceived.
The arrangement was that Mac would have no financial, or paternal responsibility for the child; he would remain in the background…perhaps occasionally visiting as a remote “uncle”, the role he had already played with the older girl.
It had been agreed that Mac would be informed when the child was born. Two weeks after the birth he was told that a girl had been born. He was not invited to see the baby; it was only upon his great insistence that he was allowed to visit mother and baby.
He said, “the minute I saw her..I loved her because she is my daughter”. He was emotional when he recalled this tender, life-changing moment.
So began a difficult relationship between mother, father and child that is still (four years on) a struggle. The mother’s relationship with her partner ended; the mother was impecunious and had no choice but to ask Mac for financial help for their daughter. Mac was wanting to be involved in his daughter’s life but felt that his financial support was the price exacted for access to his child.
Mac sees his daughter every second weekend; travelling a long distance to see her. He said this little girl’s behaviour is sometimes difficult for her mother (and him); she tells her mother she wants to live with Mac (she still doesn’t call him Daddy, although she knows he is her father).
Mac is determined that his daughter should be provided for in the future. He works very hard and has told me that she is the sole beneficiary of his estate, when he dies.
The adults are doing their level best in this difficult situation, but what about this small girl who is caught in the middle of this fractured family??
Sadly, this fracturing was caused by two adults who, although they love her dearly, failed to recognise that in creating her in these circumstances, they were denying her her birthright. Surely it is the birthright of every child to be created from love, respect and commitment between its parents??
I told Mac that long ago I had heard this said….”the best thing any man can do for his child….is to love its mother”.
Mac is making a superhuman effort to love his daughter’s mother, despite their many conflicts; because his loves his daughter.
This little girl has to make sense of this complex arrangement. Somehow I think that when she is an adolecent and young adult…she will be asking her mother and father some very hard questions which they will be required to answer.
awesome article.
*Like*