How did you broach telling family about a donor conceived pregnancy?

[wishIwasonholiday10]

Any tips on how to tell my parents about a donor conceived pregnancy? If you have been in this situation did you tell them at the same time as announcing the pregnancy and were they supportive? I’m not sure what their attitudes to egg donation are, I know people gave a range of opinions on this. Obviously plan to tell the child so do want to be open about it. We haven’t told them we were trying for a second child so the announcement will be a surprise.

My own daughter had problems carrying a baby, conceived no problems, yet numerous pregnancies ended with loss, eventually she went down another avenue and has a beautiful baby, so technically not blood related, but this baby is my daughters and she’s loved just the same as my other grandchildren who are blood related @maximalistmaximus
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OP, I mean this kindly, but if you have got to the stage whereby you’re using a donor egg and your parents have no idea, then is it safe to say you’re not very close to them anyway? I can’t imagine my DDs not talking to me about difficulties they may have had with conceiving until well after the event.
Anyway, I truly believe these matters should be open and honest - by not telling people it’s like it needs to be kept a secret as if it’s something wrong. I do feel a bit mixed about the use of donor eggs but mostly because I believe it’s exploiting women’s bodies, but if my DD had a baby in this way I couldn’t see myself feeling any different about that baby than I do about my naturally conceived grandchildren. They would still be my grandchildren!

I would probably not tell them yet. I’d let them all bond first.

By the time you tell the child, it will be seven - ten years down the line and maybe it will be commonplace to use egg donation and nobody will be cutting people out the will etc.

or tell the grandparents in a few years but not that long.

I know someone who wasn’t treated the same as a sibling and he grew up fucked up and hurt because of it. All kids should be treated the same. They are too young to be singled out for less presents or whatever like he was. It’s cruel and unnecessary so I’d not tell anyone just be all ‘we were hoping and then it happened hurrah” with no details.

Although it would be worse if the grandparents went weird after they got told when the child is say 5, and THEN gets treated differently and notices it “mummy why doesnt gran give me hugs and presents like my sisters get’ oh God that would be awful.

My advice is not to tell anyone - not even the child.

I’m so glad you’re not my parent

Telling a child that they come from a donor egg should be like telling them they are adopted. It should be something they always know, not something announced then they are 7, 8, 9, 10 etc as a PP suggests. I say this as an adoptive parent who adopted a baby. Telling children later is much more problematic. My LO has always know she’s adopted so there’s never been a ‘so I’m not yours moment?’ which can be really damaging for an older child. Of course, my LO is my child and my love for them is exactly the same as every other parent’s love - and vice versa!

Sorry books like this are brilliant for talking to kids from a young age about there they are from.
amzn.eu/d/g2t4qGE

That’s ridiculous. Children have a right to know where they are from.

I have two donor conceived children. These days professionals advise you to start mentioning the donor from age 2 or 3 so that it becomes something the child has always known rather than a disclosure.
Probably you would want to tell your older child before the baby is born so that you have lots of time to talk about it. You don’t say your first child’s age but robobabies is a good book to have for under fives, perhaps even 6 or 7 year olds.

My child who has a friend who is DC. You must let it be part of their story from the get go. The child and mine have been aware since they met at 2/3 and it's just a random fact about themself, they feel comfortable sharing it as it's not a "big secret" so other kids mirror that and dont see it as a big deal

Do they really just let you have donor gamete IVF without any sort of counselling or advice on how best to approach this with the child or wider family?

Are your family aware of your fertility struggles? As your last child was also conceived through IVF I imagine this has been a long process. If they are aware I'd just slip the info in when telling them about the pregnancy saying something like "we were lucky enough to have had a successful round of IVF using donor eggs and are expecting a baby in October"

I also agree with the PP that said it should always be part of your child's story, not something to announce just a fact as much as their hair colour is.

I’m going through DE treatment right now. I hope I’ll be lucky.
i don’t expect my family to be supportive about it at all. I wouldn’t tell while I’m pregnant just to avoid additional stress and headaches (we don’t need any additional stress during pregnancy), but I’d definitely tell once the baby is born. I don’t want to keep it as a secret and there’s nothing shameful about DE. It’s something to be happy about and feel grateful. It’s just how I feel about it. But everyone’s different.

We fully intend to make it part of the childs story from early on.

My first child is almost 3 and we haven't talked about where babies come from yet. I was planning to search for some books that include IVF to read with her soon.

We plan to use the information on the Donor Conception Network as a starting point of how to bring it up with the child but until recently its just been a theoretical possibility as we didn't know if we would be successful.

I kind of understand where @maximalistmaximuscomes from. So, if DD had become pregnant, I would rather not know how it came about, tbh. And is it any of my business?

Not a single person on this thread thinks of the later impact on these children of donor gamates.

its selfish

id ban egg donation.

no need to create children for them to suffer later in life.

one example: (there are many)

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/stories-42159574.amp

I'd be keeping you at arm's length if I were your daughter. Zero expectations and only allowing you to spend short periods of time with my children whilst I was there to supervise.

Of course they do

dreadful to not consider telling them when they have a right to know and to be able to contact genetic parent later

A few of us asked if you’d similarly choose not to include an adopted grandchild in your will @maximalistmaximus

I’m curious as to your answer?

You should be ashamed of yourself and you should expect your family to go no contact with you if this is your attitude.

I told my parents that we’d had a donor egg at the same time as I told them about my pregnancy.

It was all a bit much for them to take in really, as I don’t think they even knew that was possible. I was mid-40s and they’d given up on ever having any grandchildren!

I told other friends and family too, and also DC around the age of 6.

The main reason for telling people was that with DNA testing becoming more common and people looking up their ancestry online etc, we figured that it might come out one day, so we decided to be upfront about it.

Mine knew as I'm gay. However, I think it's a personal decision whether you want people to know or not. I think as long as child is aware, it's no one else's business. Lots of luck x

We used a donor egg and told most family, the reason being that it was well known in the family I would be highly unlikely ever to conceive.

I don’t know what they may have thought privately, but if it was remotely negative then they kept it to themselves. One of my more elderly relatives reacted with a blunt “Oh” when we told them, but was wonderful when DC actually arrived. DC has been welcomed into my extended family as much as if they been a natural conception with my own egg.

How vile. You’d feel the same about an adopted child then? Sounds like they’d be better off without you anyway!

As abhorrent as some may find @maximalistmaximus post, there’s no use pretending more than one person in society will feel this way, and it could well be the OP’s parents. Some people will discriminate. Heck, my friend’s health insurance discriminated against an IVF baby - if a non IVF baby needed NICU, covered. IVF baby? No cigar. That’s fucked up, but it shows you how rife the discrimination is.

Witg that in mind, I would only tell the child. It is nobody else’s business. It should be up to that child to decide who in the world knows their genetic background. Please don’t take that away from them.

No telling a child at 7/8 years old is far too late. They need to always know , so picture books as a baby , books with words as a toddler. Talking about it in general conversations eg yes you do have beautiful blue eyes they came from your donor whose egg grew inside mummy. Then progressing from there as they get older with more details. .Waiting and giving a reveal can be really damaging.