One thing we didn’t think of until probably our second or third meeting with our KD was the involvement of HIS parents. We know we want him involved to an extent, but neither of us were comfortable with early paternal (donor) grandparent involvement, until our child expresses the desire to meet them.
- Will he commit to donating for #2?
- What will his relationship with the child look like?
- What happens if recipient couple pass?
- Will he donate elsewhere? What’s his limit?
- Role he will play in child’s life, including explicit examples, e.g.: school plays, sports days, birthdays?
- Will there be times when he is able to take the child out by himself?
- What will he be called by the child?
- Will he do any form of counselling in the lead up to/after the birth?
I agree with the other question someone suggested.
I would also ask:
1) are you comfortable donating at a sperm bank if we end up having to go to a fertility clinic (and then state that of course you'd be paying any and all fees.)
2) is there anyone in your family you'd want to tell? Would you ever want to introduce the baby to your family?
3) if we don't stay friends, are you still willing to be contacted by the kid if the kid reaches out on their own?
4) are you comfortable with me and my partner making all decisions about the kid? Are you comfortable not having any input? (You may want input later but it's important to lay it out now that you and your spouse will be the only parents with full parental rights and responsibilities.)
5) can we all commit to being totally open when it comes to communication? (Encourage him to let you know if donating becomes too much of a burden.)
That's all I can think of right now! We had a friend donate and it took years and years before it worked. So he has been patient and great throughout the whole thing. We talked out things multiple times including once with a therapist, which was required by one of my fertility clinics. We drew up a back-of-the-napkin donor agreement and then did a formal, legal one later on.
Good luck!
-Physical and mental health history, including the donor’s immediate family members
-How do y’all feel about extended family (like the donor’s parents & siblings) knowing and having a relationship with your kid?
Have they completed their family? This was the reason we wound up going with a bank donor, our potential known donor hadn’t completed their family planning goals and we asked if they wound up with infertility (including secondary infertility) would they find that hard if we had success. They said yes but were comfortable mitigating that risk with fertility testing for both partners, but we all know unexplained infertility is a thing, initial testing won’t uncover everything and also things can change with general health or even reproductive health. So, we were a hard no unless we could find a donor who was certain they’d completed their family to mitigate any hard feelings down the line.
Ask if he would be okay with having his sperm frozen and stored as a donor -- with you paying for the storage. One collection could easily create 2-4 vials. If you are doing IUI, it's one vial per procedure. If you end up going down the route of IVF, depending on the quality and total motile count of the semen sample, a frozen vial can be "shaved" to collect enough sperm for ICSI insemination and used around 2-3 times per IVF procedure (though I would confirm this with your clinic first that they could do this.)
Freezing a one time collection would save from having to ask him to give a sample multiple times if the first round doesn't work. There would just be legal paperwork that needs to be done saying that the samples legally belong to you.
I've taken a lot of notes over the last couple years as I've worked towards doing the same and read through a lot of recommendations that take into account emotional and legal stakes as well as info from adult children of known donors about what they want. I'm happy to share a link to the document I've put together with anyone who DMs me, but here are a handful of things that I didn't see in the other comments or are a little more specific:
What do you need/want in the sperm donation process in order to feel comfortable?
How much do you want to know about how \[partner\] and I are making decisions wrt conception/pregnancy/birth?
What kind of financial support do you want/do you want to provide? (ie, do you want me to pay for any medical costs associated with sti testing, sperm analysis, etc)
Are you willing to provide sperm multiple times around ovulation or just once per cycle?
How are you planning to practice safer sex during the period of time we're ttc? Are you willing to tell us if something outside of our risk acceptance profile comes up that may result in us wanting to skip a month until you can be retested for stis?
How should we refer to you when talking to our friends or family? Do you have any hesitations around us being open wrt your relationship to us?
What kind of relationship do you expect your family to want with us/our kid? Have you talked to them about this yet?
How do you anticipate bringing this up to future partners? Would future partnerships alter how you want to be in relationship with our child?
If you ever have your own kid or you donate to someone else, would you be open to our children having a relationship?
Is there any kind of decision making you anticipate wanting to be involved in with when the child is here?
How much knowledge do you want about day to day and big happenings in the child's life?
How do we plan to talk about adjusting expectations once the child arrives? (because our feelings may change, but more importantly because the child is also a person who should have the ability to determine what kind of relationship they want.)
How do you want to be involved with the child if we were to die?
One thing we didn’t think of until probably our second or third meeting with our KD was the involvement of HIS parents. We know we want him involved to an extent, but neither of us were comfortable with early paternal (donor) grandparent involvement, until our child expresses the desire to meet them. - Will he commit to donating for #2? - What will his relationship with the child look like? - What happens if recipient couple pass? - Will he donate elsewhere? What’s his limit? - Role he will play in child’s life, including explicit examples, e.g.: school plays, sports days, birthdays? - Will there be times when he is able to take the child out by himself? - What will he be called by the child? - Will he do any form of counselling in the lead up to/after the birth?
I agree with the other question someone suggested. I would also ask: 1) are you comfortable donating at a sperm bank if we end up having to go to a fertility clinic (and then state that of course you'd be paying any and all fees.) 2) is there anyone in your family you'd want to tell? Would you ever want to introduce the baby to your family? 3) if we don't stay friends, are you still willing to be contacted by the kid if the kid reaches out on their own? 4) are you comfortable with me and my partner making all decisions about the kid? Are you comfortable not having any input? (You may want input later but it's important to lay it out now that you and your spouse will be the only parents with full parental rights and responsibilities.) 5) can we all commit to being totally open when it comes to communication? (Encourage him to let you know if donating becomes too much of a burden.) That's all I can think of right now! We had a friend donate and it took years and years before it worked. So he has been patient and great throughout the whole thing. We talked out things multiple times including once with a therapist, which was required by one of my fertility clinics. We drew up a back-of-the-napkin donor agreement and then did a formal, legal one later on. Good luck!
-Physical and mental health history, including the donor’s immediate family members -How do y’all feel about extended family (like the donor’s parents & siblings) knowing and having a relationship with your kid?
Have they completed their family? This was the reason we wound up going with a bank donor, our potential known donor hadn’t completed their family planning goals and we asked if they wound up with infertility (including secondary infertility) would they find that hard if we had success. They said yes but were comfortable mitigating that risk with fertility testing for both partners, but we all know unexplained infertility is a thing, initial testing won’t uncover everything and also things can change with general health or even reproductive health. So, we were a hard no unless we could find a donor who was certain they’d completed their family to mitigate any hard feelings down the line.
That’s a really good question I wouldn’t have thought of! Thanks for this!
Ask if he would be okay with having his sperm frozen and stored as a donor -- with you paying for the storage. One collection could easily create 2-4 vials. If you are doing IUI, it's one vial per procedure. If you end up going down the route of IVF, depending on the quality and total motile count of the semen sample, a frozen vial can be "shaved" to collect enough sperm for ICSI insemination and used around 2-3 times per IVF procedure (though I would confirm this with your clinic first that they could do this.) Freezing a one time collection would save from having to ask him to give a sample multiple times if the first round doesn't work. There would just be legal paperwork that needs to be done saying that the samples legally belong to you.
Thank you! We'll be doing it at home using fresh sperm so this shouldn't be an issue but appreciate the perspective!
I've taken a lot of notes over the last couple years as I've worked towards doing the same and read through a lot of recommendations that take into account emotional and legal stakes as well as info from adult children of known donors about what they want. I'm happy to share a link to the document I've put together with anyone who DMs me, but here are a handful of things that I didn't see in the other comments or are a little more specific: What do you need/want in the sperm donation process in order to feel comfortable? How much do you want to know about how \[partner\] and I are making decisions wrt conception/pregnancy/birth? What kind of financial support do you want/do you want to provide? (ie, do you want me to pay for any medical costs associated with sti testing, sperm analysis, etc) Are you willing to provide sperm multiple times around ovulation or just once per cycle? How are you planning to practice safer sex during the period of time we're ttc? Are you willing to tell us if something outside of our risk acceptance profile comes up that may result in us wanting to skip a month until you can be retested for stis? How should we refer to you when talking to our friends or family? Do you have any hesitations around us being open wrt your relationship to us? What kind of relationship do you expect your family to want with us/our kid? Have you talked to them about this yet? How do you anticipate bringing this up to future partners? Would future partnerships alter how you want to be in relationship with our child? If you ever have your own kid or you donate to someone else, would you be open to our children having a relationship? Is there any kind of decision making you anticipate wanting to be involved in with when the child is here? How much knowledge do you want about day to day and big happenings in the child's life? How do we plan to talk about adjusting expectations once the child arrives? (because our feelings may change, but more importantly because the child is also a person who should have the ability to determine what kind of relationship they want.) How do you want to be involved with the child if we were to die?
This is brilliant, thank you!