Any threads on the embryo case?

[Quootiepie]

Just wondering, as I think the decision is today...

That was my knee jerk response too. I regret it now. As soon as I turned it around I realised that the decision to allow an ex to use embryos created from my sex cells to have children with a new partner was not one I could make lightly, if at all.

I met an egg donor and was impressed by her determination to help other people (she'd tried ivf herself, but failed). it didn't inspire me to do it though, as I have the same feelings as aloha about my gametes. and it's a pretty invasive procedure to go through for someone you don't know (unless it's for egg sharing)

In addition to all the very good points already rasied I have also been troubled by that fact that in the unlikely event that the ruling had gone in Ms Evans favour, whilst My Johnston could have been released from parental responsibility, there could have been the opportunity for Ms Evans to push some emotional blackmail onto him several years down the line.

I have to say that I am relieved that the case went this way. The consent forms that they would have gone through at the time are fairly detailed and cover a number of circumstances (eg what would happen to the embryos in the event of death of one of the parents etc). The idea that these consents could be subsequently overruled would make me very uncomfortable indeed.

I am surprised from this thread that there is a general idea that adoption is fairly straightforward in this country though? I would have preferred adoption over IVF in many ways, but there are huge hurdles to many couples going down this road, and it actually felt far more intrusive than IVF. Whilst the clinic still had to sign off on our fitness to be parents this was done without the home visits and interviews and panel assessments involved in adoption. Proportionally I bet a far greater number of MNers are IVF parents rather than adopters, if only because there is a huge shortage of babies for adoption, and adopting children who have been subject to neglect or abuse for the first 3 years of life can never be presented as an easy or straightforward alternative to IVF or natural conception.

thanks Ladymuck - a good point about the difficulty of the adoption route. I hesitate to make it myself as some people know I have a vested interest and so I try (and probably fail) not to bang on about it. She would also have faced additional hurdles as a single parent and with her medical history.

I am NOT criticising people who CHOOSE to donate eggs or sperm btw. I just could never do it myself because I would find it so distressing to have a biological child to whom I could not be a mother.

I agree that adoption would have been hard for her, and I can totally understand her fierce desire to have her own baby. The whole thing is sad.

I don't think it implies any such thing (though he may well now think that she wouldn't make a great mother, and he doesn't know her partner at all - he could be awful for all he knows, a great advocate of smacking for example). He is saying it would be unacceptable to him, as it would be to me. I would certainly not want my own biological child to be brought up without my love and care. I think that is normal.

There are loads of people out there who make perfectly lovely parents. Doesn't mean I would have been happy to give them my babies though!

I think if DH had a previous GF and they had done this I would have a problem with it but I would feel bad to say no to a woman who has no chance of ever having them again.

I don't think it is a value judgement. I'm certain there are better parents out there than me. Doesn't mean I'd want one of them raising my child. It is selfish in a way. But why not? If we are concerned about her feelings on not being able to raise her biological child, we must consider his feelings on the matter as well. Surely they have equal validity?

It's a good point about adoption being hard. That surely is one of the sadnesses of infertility. If for some biological reason, you can't get pregnant through sex, then your options are all difficult, expensive, intrusive procedures none of which carry any guarantee of success. Adoption, ivf, surrogacy - none of them sound easy to me.

I think that Natalie Evans has been poleaxed by several kinds of bad luck. 1) the cancer, 2) splitting up with her ex, 3) caring very deeply about her genetic connection with a child and 4) her ex also feeling strongly about his genetic connection with a child. The only one she has any control over is 3).

donors are very thin on the ground now - I understand that there's just one sperm donor in Scotland now

Really Bundle? Why so few? Wonder who the one guy is? A strange kind of uniqueness.

I know, it's weird, all down to the anonymity of donors being lifted (once the offspring reach 18). I heard it in a radio interview.

I know what you're saying Sobernow, but at the same time it is hard to know exactly whether this could ever be just a case of letting her use the embryos? Even if he was let off parental responsibility, the children would eventually be entitled to track him down. And if she was inf act bitter about him in any way then there would be plenty of emotional stuff that she could use against him over the next few decades. It is hard for an absent parent to have a relationship of their own shaping with their child.

Would you be equally happy for your ex to bring these children along to your children's school say, so that your children had half-brothers or sisters at the same school?

Lucie suggested that if he died, would she still be able to use the eggs.

LETS KILL HIM. THATS THE ANSWER

I have seen him being interviewed and he really is the most unpleassant man. But don't worry about him. He doesn't give a shit. He can produce his own child, with his own sperm, any time he likes.

Do I feel sorry for her. Yes. Alot. Because she had the most awful taste in men and chose to have that VILE man, who then took away the only thing she wanted. The cancer didn't take it away. He did.

He makes me feel ill.

Well I'd like decent people to have the wonderful experience of being parents, certainly, but not with my kids! Otherwise we'd all be happy to have our children taken at birth to be given to better, richer, kinder parents!

Bloody hell. So could lots on children from donated sperm now have significantly higher chances of being related, in theory.

God Oblamov, would you like it if things were reversed and your ex - one you didn't speak to or have any relationship with - wanted to use an embryo made with your eggs to implant in his new partner in his new relationship, and maybe, just maybe, you could see that baby on alternate weekends, if they felt like it?

Sorry Aloha. I got a bit carried away. I did say in my earlier post that I wasn't sure, if the right decision had been made. I'm not saying she SHOULD have been allowed. I was just having a rant against him. Has anyone actually seen him. He is really unsavoury. There is something really........horrible about him.

oblomov, the blood case was only allowed posthumously because consent was, on balance, thought to have been given...here that clearly isn't the case.

Tinker, I believe that there is a limit to the number of children that can be fathered via donor sperm from one donor (though not sure what protocals exist to stop the donor registering at lots of different clinics). One of the factors considered in using donor sperm is whether you would be able to use the same donor for subsequent children (ie whether they are near the end of their quota etc).

there's nothing at all unsavory about him imo, he just looks like any bloke I'd see on the tube in the morning and he's obviously given this a lot of thought. if the situation was reversed and he could no longer have children, I don't imagine her rushing to give permission to use "their" embryos in say a new girlfriend he might meet.