Online sperm donation. Weird weird weird....

[Sporkle99]

....and I can't believe women actually use some of them! My friend is looking to have a child via a sperm donor, but doesn't want to spend thousands and has been looking online on an app called just a baby. She's looking to find someone she can get to know for some time then co parent (she knows I am posting here about our discoveries on the app last night). There are men on there who literally state that they have a pregnancy kink and they want to 'plant their seed and watch it grow' with a link to 'verified reviews' from women who state things like 'we both got what we wanted out of it. He's super reliable, kind, etc etc'. Some of them are ex sperm bank donors who reached the maximum limit and are now fathering 100+ children via these apps.

I also considered going it alone but couldn't find a way that morally sat right with me. My friend is now starting to feel the same.

Has anyone else come across this before? My eyes were opened pretty wide last night. Absolutely bonkers. Just can't imagine ever learning that I was conceived partly to fulfil someone's kink....

Not sure what I want from this thread other than a little decompression!

It is expensive though. Have you looked into it? You can’t just have it delivered to your house to do self insemination. You need a clinic to administer it. And once you are paying clinic prices buying sperm and paying for insemination, you get to the point where you might as well do IVF, since insemination can take a lot of goes (hence fertile couples often taking months to conceive naturally), so once you add up the price of all the sperm and insemination attempts…
This is why many lesbian couples end up paying for IVF even though they don’t necessarily have any fertility issues.

Don’t be ridiculous. Lots of people who can’t afford expensive fertility treatments have children.

They are on the same sites. Yes there are weirdos on them, just like there are weirdos on online dating sites and apps. I saw a number of profiles of men who said they were only looking to donate and only via natural insemination - I gave them a swerve. You use your judgement, do your due diligence and get to know someone a bit. No different really from looking for a romantic partner online .

Exactly

Using these dodgy blokes is massively unfair on the child.

🙄

Not all people who have children have an easy time of it financially though. Many suffer, especially now.
However, if she is contemplating intentional single parenthood I would imagine that she could afford the treatment, she just chooses not to.
I’ve paid for several rounds of IUI and IVF and the expenses are nothing compared to the cost of actually having the children.

So you are saying that anyone who can’t afford the upfront costs of expensive fertility treatments shouldn’t have children because they can’t afford them?
that’s clearly a completely ridiculous position.
Why don’t you visit mumsnet conception boards - particularly the threads were women are struggling - peddle that view, and see how it goes down.

As @Flimpychunk has pointed out, unregulated donations can go very very wrong, especially when the males involved exploit women who are desperate to have a child.

She'd be risking STI's, inherited conditions and untold emotional challenges for herself and the child.

Do you have any personal experience of this or are you just speaking from your podium?
how many romantic partnerships do you know/ have you heard of that “go very wrong” including for mum and child?

@CoParents - it is. Every child deserves to know who their parents are. The HFEA changed the regulations in 2005 for a reason.

Children deserve better.

Children born out of these informal situations are more likely to know who their biological “parents” are, and have some level of contact with them, like the pps on this thread who have actually used these websites.
The women I know who’ve gone the clinic route- they + their children have no contact with their donor whatsoever. yes the child has the right to eventually know the identity of the donor but only after they reach adulthood (turn 18).

It's not judgment and ignorance, it's common sense! For every woman like you who got lucky and find someone genuine, there will be many women who are duped by awful men. How did you know your child's father didn't have any number of STIs he could have passed on to you? Any genetic conditions? Wasn't a paedophile or a pervert? There's a reason sperm banks are regulated!

Because he had STI testing and shared the certificates. Because we talked about our family health histories. because we got to know each other.
Do you have children? Did you and your partner have genetic testing before you had children? Did you get background police checks to find out if their were a paedo or a pervert?
I didn’t “get lucky”, I used my judgement, as does anybody when they go about their life and form relationships with others

How would an online doner be tracked for genetic conditions, physical or mental illness?

Maybe all sex should be regulated to screen for STIs, genetic conditions and perversions.. add in physical and mental health histories to keep @Daysafter happy.

You're assuming they're telling the truth @CoParents

You have no idea if what they're telling you is true. And no idea how many siblings your children have.

They are strangers. Just more of a risk.

I have just as much knowledge of those things as you do of your situation/ partner 🙄🙄🙄🙄. How do you know if your partner lies to you.

my children have no siblings other than each other. I can be as certain as that as you are of yours.

My family is NO different to yours in those respects.

“Just can't imagine ever learning that I was conceived partly to fulfil someone's kink....”

To be fair even through the natural method of making a baby you were probably conceived partly through kink 😅

Hahahaha brilliant 👏🏻 👏🏻.

to be fair we also have no idea if the men who donate to sperm banks are telling the truth. Obviously the sperm is tested for STIs which rules out that risk,but most sperm banks only rely on asking the donor for personal & family medical history and don't do genetic testing as standard so donors can easily just lie. I know women with kids conceived via sperm banks who later discovered genetic conditions passed down by the donor. There's also nothing preventing perverts & (unconvicted) paedophiles from donating to sperm banks. The banks also can't give any guarantees about number of siblings as they have no power to stop their donors from also donating to other sperm banks, in other countries or privately via the apps & facebook groups

@CoParents - it's great that you have a good and open relationship with your children's dad. Do you accept that there are risks for a lot of women buying sperm of random men on the internet?

Yes of course there are risks. There are risks to all kinds of choices in life, especially when it comes to reproduction. These risks can be mitigated in the case of informal sperm donation as they can in all sorts of situations. It depends on how you go about it. Just because it’s an unconventional path doesn’t make it inherently more risky , or wrong, than many other choices / risks that people make/ take all the time.

@CoParents - to be fair what you've done seems sensible. Not everyone who buys sperm off the internet is as discerning