Tracing pathways of relatedness: how identity-release gamete donors negotiate biological (non-)parenthood

Abstract

<jats:p>This article draws on an interview study with UK ‘identity-release’ sperm and egg donors, exploring how, in the context of a new ethic of openness around donor conception, they articulate their role in relation to offspring. I show that participants neither dismissed, nor straightforwardly activated, the relational significance of the ‘biological’ substance they donated. Instead, they renegotiated its meaning in ways which do not map straightforwardly on to established kinship roles. Building on a conception of personal lives and selves as fundamentally relational (Mason, 2004; Smart, 2007; May, 2013), I show how donors managed the conflicting demands of identity-release donation by tracing their relatedness to offspring along particular pathways (while diminishing others); the inherent connectedness of their own lives and selves enabled them to construct indirect non-parental connections with offspring as the siblings of their own children or the children of their friends or sisters.</jats:p>

The opposite of a step parent – The genetics without any of the emotion: ‘sperm donors’ reflections on identity-release donation and relatedness

“… Mohr’s (2015) ethnographic research with Danish sperm donors found that despite being encouraged by sperm bank staff to think of their donation in purely contractual terms, those who chose to be identity-release donors were clear that they had a role in relation to their donor-conceived offspring. Similarly to the gamete donors in Gilman’s (2019) study, however, they found it difficult to articulate what this role might be, envisaging a socially meaningful, but non-parental, relationship with their donor offspring. Naming connections and determining obligations to individuals to whom one is genetically connected yet socially disconnected, Mohr argues, causes sperm donors to engage reflectively in an intricate play of connecting and disconnecting the social and the biological, and in doing so coming up with their own ways of acknowledging the social significance of the biogenetic connections established through donor conception.…”

“…Surprisingly little is known about UK sperm donors and their thoughts and feelings about the removal of anonymity and being an identity-release donor. Drawing on her qualitative research with egg and sperm donors in Scotland, Gilman (2019) showed how the identity-release gamete donors neither dismissed, nor straightforwardly activated, the relational significance of the ‘biological substance’ they donated. She showed how donors grappled with a lack of suitable vocabulary with which to describe their relationship to children conceived from their donation and struggled to articulate why this connection was significant, despite most stating that it was.…”

A Sense of Connectedness in Reproductive Donation. Contrasting Policy With Donor and Donor Kin Lived Experience

“…Early studies into egg donation were rare, but tended to focus more on experiences (Konrad, 2005;Shaw, 2007). Since the mid-2000s, research into egg and sperm donors' experiences has expanded with important emerging foci being around potential exploitation, reproductive labour and racialised and economic inequalities (Nahman, 2013;Waldby, 2019); donation and enactments of gender (Almeling, 2011;Mohr, 2018); and also the relational consequences of donation, particularly between the donor and the recipient family (Andreassen, 2019;Gilman, 2020;Hertz & Nelson, 2019;Petersen, 2019). The latter is also the home of our study, which is the first qualitative study to situate donation in the context of donors' own relationships.…”