Donor Siblings

YBnormal85

Do you guys keep in touch with your children's donor siblings? If so,I'm curious how many they have. So far we know of 3,and one on the way.

2brides

I know we have a ton. A lot.

But we haven't reached out to be in touch. I can't imagine we will, unless the kids are interested when they get older.

mrs&mrsk

i know of 2 and 1 on the way.  so we are #4 (well timing wise we are #3).  before we got preg, he had less than 5 known.  They are ALL boys.  We haven't gotten in touch with any (yet) but we may after he's born. 

jennicole85

We used a known donor so our circumstances are slightly different. We asked, out of respect, that he let us know if/ when DS will have a donor sibling. We are the first (and only) couple that he has donated to as of now but I know he has been in contact with other couples. We won't reach out to any donor siblings but once DS reaches 18 he will have that option if he chooses (just as he will have the option to reach out to our donor).

YBnormal85

We decided we want to be in touch with the donor sibs for health reasons. One of the babies has a health condition and we feel that it is important to see if it shows up anywhere else as well. So far our LO is healthy though

Karlamo

I'm so glad this was brought up since I am still struggling with how to handle this. We have not registered or reached out to any other parents.  I would love to put my head in the sand and pretend that the only people that R is related to by blood is us. 

What I am struggling with is I don't like the term donor sibling's.  I don't refer to our donor as his father so why would I refer to his other off spring as my kids siblings (this is a rhetoircal question I ask myself). When the time comes to talk with my kids about their donor, I need to also figure out a way to discuss the other off spring without implying that they are their brothers/sisters.  I will let them draw that conclusion for themselves if that is how they see it. 

Am I over thinking this?  Does anyone else have similar feelings?

ETA: We chose an open donor to give our kids the choice to make for themselves.

jennicole85

@Karlamo‌ you brought up some interesting points that have never crossed my mind. I'm intrigued to see other thoughts on them!

I don't think I'd use the term donor sibling while explaining everything to DS (once he asks) but I'm not sure how I'll tackle the topic either. I keep telling myself I have oodles of time before questions like these surface.

JGY

We have no immediate plans to contact any of the other families who conceived via our donor.  S has zero interest in even knowing who is out there.  I am insanely curious (I have identified 10 so far), but I only research/stalk.  No contact.  That is G's choice to make.

We definitely need to have some conversations about terminology and how we will convey who these people are.  In my mind, I see these other kids as a bit of a stepping-stone on G's journey to understanding his genetic link, should he choose to do so.  Because there is an age requirement for contacting our donor (18), having access to these other kids before that time might provide a nice outlet to an angsty teenager should he be longing for that kind of contact.

But maybe he will have no interest?  That's why I leave the choice and the steps up to him.  I'll keep stalking though (I just won't tell G or S).

There was a good thread about this topic a while back.  I'll see if I can dig it up and post the link.

JGY

Here's the link.  TRIGGER WARNING ... It's from 2013, and there have been some losses from the pregnancies mentioned in this thread ...

https://forums.thebump.com/discussion/12183658/sibling-registry-and-the-like

channe9

@Karlamo You're not alone in the way that you're thinking about this! Although we are not yet pregnant, I've been thinking about this A LOT. As a social scientist, thinking about something A LOT means reading many books and articles and watching just about every remotely related documentary out there. I watched snippets from two such documentaries the other night and there were moms who said almost word-for-word what you have said. They struggled to have the right language as well. 

For me, sibling is about growing up together in the same household OR even growing up with a (biological or not) parent in common. It's about care and commonalities not biology and genetics. My cousin refers to her daughter's donor siblings ONLY as such -- they are never half-brothers or half-sisters but "donor siblings" as "sibling" is a word we don't use that often anyway.

Everyone has different understandings though. From these documentaries, some parents seem to immensely benefit from knowing other parents and kids and they seem to feel connected to the other parents through their child. For me though, I would feel the same as you do -- or at least just now in the TTC phase anyway... 

JGY

This thread was on my mind today.

I did some more snooping, which basically just involves visiting the facebook pages of those who I know have a child by our donor.  Well to my surprise, one of them had posted a photo montage of 6 of the donor siblings onto her FB wall.  It was a 3-year age progression with a picture of each of the 6 of them from each year.  I was a little floored.  I mean, I knew that a few of them were in touch (I didn't know 6), but I didn't know how much they communicated. 

And then that led me to ponder whether by leaving this choice up to G once he's old enough to make it, am I denying him a long-term relationship with these biological connections?  If he decides to reach out to them as a teenager, will he be the newbie with a bunch of other teens who have essentially grown up together?  Oh brother, I'm in for it with this wandering mind of mine.

(For the record, I found the public post/pictures to be more than a little creepy and it would definitely violate any feelings of privacy had we been a part of it - this is probably good, it keeps me running back into our hole)

 

wishiwaspreggo

I guess I'm more open than most... I'm actually Facebook friends with the mothers of my donor's offspring.  All our kids are born within months of each other.  I envision them having a relationship like I did with my cousins.  We all know we're related and see each other a few times a year but don't see each other as brothers and sisters.  I do expect we'll meet up once a year perhaps and let our kids get to know each other.  I feel like the more information I give my kids, the less questions they'll have and the more complete they'll feel. 

YBnormal85

It's interesting to see everyone's different takes on the situation. I think when the time comes we won't necessarily refer to the donor siblings as such,but I think we will ultimately just say that the donor who gave us a gift that helped us bring Lennon to our family gave other people the same gift . Something along those lines. I find it very helpful to know how the other kids are doing,from things like if they have food allergies or bad reactions to vaccines and such.

ball.and.chain

@RobertJane33, you can sign up on the CCB Donor Sibling Registry while still maintaining a good deal of privacy.  If your login name is not obvious and you choose to "hide" your email address, it will just say that there are b/g twins in NY and when they were born.  I can send you a screen shot of what it looks like for us if you want.  That way you will be plugged in to the network and your kids will be "known" but you don't have to have any contact with anyone unless at some point you choose to.

JGY

KLeigh1 said:

Reading this made me think that some people on this board might have donor siblings or diblings as @flygirl1228 put it (I love it) here.  Probably not most of us, but some.  Im curious, and was wondering if that would make those of you who are a little reluctant, more likely to want to know about those families?  Just a thought since this is such a close group.

This thought occurs to me often.

 

redrockmama

Flygirl1228 said:

I have looked a bit to see if there are others out there. I think only two others. Our donor wasn't on for very long so I don't think there will be many. I have not registered or tried to contact. I think I'll leave that up for our kids. We use the term diblings instead or donor siblings. We haven't talked much on terms of how to have the conversation but we will be open and honest and explain as well as we can.

haha some of our good friends use the term diblings as well and we probably will too. They are actually really close with most of the diblings. It's interesting how different families choose to have relationships or not at all. 

J and I have a few not super serious convos about contact with dibling families. I feel very much like @JGY. Part of me wants to wait until M (and our future kids) want to have a relationship with them. Part of me wants to make those connections now so that it is a normal relationship they have had their whole life. I would hate if they were upset with us for withholding those connections from them. I check the DSR pretty regularly and no one has posted yet. I know there is at least one other family because there was a medical issue with one offrspring and when they let me know about it I asked if there were any healthy babies born using the donor and they said yes. Who knows how many though. One of these days J and I will make a decision whether or not to reach out or not. 

vamommies

We plan to register to with Fairfax Cryo for the sibling registry. We might contact other families who have children from the same donor as others have said for health reasons and possibly if our child would want to meet them someday. That is entirely their choice however. We selected an unknown donor, not necessarily by choice, he just better resembled my partner. 

FSBC

We reported our pregnancy to Fairfax mainly because our donor was nearing the limit of allowed pregnancies and wanted to be a part of the accurate count so they could stop supplying when necessary. I am sure that there are several who used the same donor who chose not to even report anything. My mind runs wild at the thought of this donor having several dozen births as a result of his donations. I am aware of 4 (two singles and one set of twins) all boys, by just being a fly on the wall. The Cryo bank told us he has 20 or more reported pregnancies...

I am not sure about a donor registry at this point. I wish I could find some and just watch from a quiet distance for a bit.

:-/

Himee33

L belongs to the Fairfax forum and has chatted with some of the people using our donor. We know right now that 1 family had a boy. I'm sure there are other pregnancies but haven't been reported yet.

L and I refer to them as "half-siblings." Part of me doesn't like the fact that our future children already have half-siblings and the other part finds it kinda cool. L is all for reaching out and finding people that used our donor, but I also want to leave it up to our future children because that's something they might not want to know. We did pick a donor that is open to contact one day. Just so we have all the answers that I know will come up. We also have about 9 vials left so all our children (our plan is to have 3, but you never known what will happen) will have the same donor. We do plan on leaving it entirely up to them if they want to contact him when they are able.

ATXmommas

I respect where everyone is coming. There is certainly no right or wrong in any of this. I lean more towards making the connections while Ash is still young. Personally, I want to normalize this process as much as possible and not leave him with the burden of making such a huge decision for himself. I realize that others see that differently - that I'm taking away a decision that I should allow him to make for himself, but there are going to be a million choices that Z and I have to make as his parents on his behalf and this might just be one of them. With that said, we haven't taken any steps yet and i don't know when we will though I feel certain we will at some point.

KH826

Ugh! I have been purposely ignoring this thread for a little while, because I am admittedly not super comfy with this topic. @Karlamo mentioned a lot of my thoughts on the subject already. I too REALLY dislike the term siblings. I am not sure what I would call them... but I don't like the term donor siblings. I have done no investigation into this for our donor, but I do know that our donor has had multiple confirmed pregnancies and was "popular." He is currently listed as quarantined and they might be releasing new vials in the Spring. Not really sure what that means.

Anyway, as of this moment we don't plan to connect with any other families that have used the same donor, but obviously things could change over time. I definitely respect all of the opinions here, and it forces me to think about things differently.  

2MamazInSeattle

@ATXmommas‌ we think alike on this!

We are both wide open and would love to connect with any diblings (we have used that term for a while too!). We know her egg donor has 6 offspring most likely all local. Her sperm donor only has 1 that we know of (boy in ny) sadly we both want to be in touch but neither of us had our email addresses exposed in CCB'd DSR so we exposed ours and are waiting to hear from her at some point. He only donated once and left the program early.

After watching the MTV series and seeing those kids all meet up annually, the bond some of them formed (especially the only children) seemed to be nothing but goodness. Neither of us have ever felt threatened by our donors or what any relationships S might form with a dibling. If it makes her feel more connected in the world, I'm all for it. It takes a village...and I see diblings as nearby neighbors in her village. We both feel knowing some diblings along the way will increase the normalcy of her being a donor-conceived person.

ETA: I'm pretty ok with the term "donor sibling" as that feels sort of clinical to me. I'd never call my sisters a sibling; to me sister or brother would be too intimate sounding though for sure.

mrs&mrsk

I'm still on the fence. I wonder if/how things will change when R is born. 

On one hand, I like hearing/knowing about the other children on CCB (not to the point that DW does, she will check out FB, etc).   On the other hand, I'm in the "this is OUR child only" club.  But that's not really fair to him when he gets older. 

I found out when i was 21 that i had a 1/2 sister and it was very weird for me but  we met her when we were 30 ish (she contacted us on FB) and have kept in contact/ visited etc since. I guess it's different because R will understand that he was from a donor and probably about the possibility of siblings.... where for us it was quite a surprise.  

ATXmommas

I'm cool with donor sibling too. Though dibling is growing on me!

Jazibel

Jumping in late.  

We used a known donor who lives nearby and we see him with the boys a couple/few times a year. My wife and I both really like our donor as a person and it has been really nice to see him with the boys. Our friends who not live in LA have a daughter with the same donor. We're currently using the term cousins to refer to their two kids (one of whom is not related). I think we'll explain to Kaden and Owen that Baby H is a sibling in the future. If our donor has more children we'd be open to including them in our network/community.  

Being adopted (and not currently having any knowledge of my biological family) it was really important that our kids know as much about their genetics as possible growing up.  When we're using the sperm bank of california we were planning on registering and making contact with any other interested families.

ATXmommas

JGY said: 

And then that led me to ponder whether by leaving this choice up to G once he's old enough to make it, am I denying him a long-term relationship with these biological connections?  If he decides to reach out to them as a teenager, will he be the newbie with a bunch of other teens who have essentially grown up together?  Oh brother, I'm in for it with this wandering mind of mine.

I guess my question back to you is how old do you think G will need to be for you to feel comfortable with him making this decision?  I'm inferring that he will need to be a teenager from what you wrote, but if he expressed interest at a younger age, would you be open?  And for the record, I don't think you are doing anything "wrong."  We each have to navigate this according to what we feel is best for our family/kid.  Just want to explore this a little bit with you.

JGY

ATXmommas said:

JGY said: 

And then that led me to ponder whether by leaving this choice up to G once he's old enough to make it, am I denying him a long-term relationship with these biological connections?  If he decides to reach out to them as a teenager, will he be the newbie with a bunch of other teens who have essentially grown up together?  Oh brother, I'm in for it with this wandering mind of mine.

I guess my question back to you is how old do you think G will need to be for you to feel comfortable with him making this decision?  I'm inferring that he will need to be a teenager from what you wrote, but if he expressed interest at a younger age, would you be open?  And for the record, I don't think you are doing anything "wrong."  We each have to navigate this according to what we feel is best for our family/kid.  Just want to explore this a little bit with you.

Good question!  I'm mostly coming from a perspective of not wanting to keep anything from G, but also wanting it to be HIS journey of discovery.  I guess that I figured that it would take until at least his pre-teen years for him to come to the conclusion that there might be other kids out there who had the same donor.  I'm sure his learning about sex and understanding what a donor is will come sooner, but I'd expect that it might take a bit longer for him to put things together enough to ask about potential diblings.

At any rate (and I speak only for myself here, not S, we need to iron this out), when he asks I will encourage him to explore to the degree that he is comfortable.  I'm not going to do the searching for him (which I've already done) but I will sit with him while he does it, make a few suggestions, and probably allow him to use my FB account (only while I'm next to him) to do some exploring. 

I guess to sum up, I want him to dictate the timeline and level of interest in any future involvement with his diblings.  My big worry though, is that by then he will feel that he's missed out on years of interaction simply because I wanted to wait for him to take the reigns.

Thoughts?

ATXmommas

A couple things - 

1) Holy crap.   So, this thread made me check the family forum for our donor.  I made a spreadsheet to count all of the other children with the same donor.  The results (not including us): 18 families, 11 boys, 12 girls, 2 unknown (25 total).  Includes one set of triplets, 3 sets of twins, and 2 other sibling groups.  Wow, wow, wow. My mind is blown a little bit.  Still processing.

2) I don't know that I've ever shared this here.  I don't tend to talk about it a lot because the story involves really good friends of ours.  So, back before Z and I started TTC, some of our best friends, another lesbian couple, were also starting TTC.  One night we were hanging out and Z and I excitedly told them about the donor we picked out.  A day or two later, I get an email from one of them letting us know that they had picked the same donor.  So, yes, it was surprising, but not completely.  Like me and Z, the carrying partner was Caucasian and the non-carrying partner was Hispanic.  So, they picked a Latin donor - and there really aren't a lot to choose from, so it wasn't completely crazy that we picked the same donor.  Anyway, they were planning to start trying before us and asked us if we would reconsider, but understood if we didn't want to.  Z and I both agreed that we were unwilling to change donors and that we were okay if they were to use the same donor.  The other couple felt very differently - they didn't want to have any known diblings so present in their lives - a perspective that I completely understand, but didn't share.  In the end, they decided to switch donors.  Just a random story to show how differently people can feel about the same topic.  And also - if Z and I weren't such blabbermouths, we could have ended up with the same donor as our very good friends!

ATXmommas

stringy813 said:

JGY said:

ATXmommas said:

JGY said: 

And then that led me to ponder whether by leaving this choice up to G once he's old enough to make it, am I denying him a long-term relationship with these biological connections?  If he decides to reach out to them as a teenager, will he be the newbie with a bunch of other teens who have essentially grown up together?  Oh brother, I'm in for it with this wandering mind of mine.

I guess my question back to you is how old do you think G will need to be for you to feel comfortable with him making this decision?  I'm inferring that he will need to be a teenager from what you wrote, but if he expressed interest at a younger age, would you be open?  And for the record, I don't think you are doing anything "wrong."  We each have to navigate this according to what we feel is best for our family/kid.  Just want to explore this a little bit with you.

Good question!  I'm mostly coming from a perspective of not wanting to keep anything from G, but also wanting it to be HIS journey of discovery.  I guess that I figured that it would take until at least his pre-teen years for him to come to the conclusion that there might be other kids out there who had the same donor.  I'm sure his learning about sex and understanding what a donor is will come sooner, but I'd expect that it might take a bit longer for him to put things together enough to ask about potential diblings.

At any rate (and I speak only for myself here, not S, we need to iron this out), when he asks I will encourage him to explore to the degree that he is comfortable.  I'm not going to do the searching for him (which I've already done) but I will sit with him while he does it, make a few suggestions, and probably allow him to use my FB account (only while I'm next to him) to do some exploring. 

I guess to sum up, I want him to dictate the timeline and level of interest in any future involvement with his diblings.  My big worry though, is that by then he will feel that he's missed out on years of interaction simply because I wanted to wait for him to take the reigns.

Thoughts?

I think you can let them take the lead - but start it for them as clearly he'll be too young for a long time to get the concept.  My hope/plan is to do it early so that its somethign that is always a part of her life.  But, if she ever doesn't want to be in touch, get together, share things, or have us share things about her - I certainly wouldn't force that to happen.

I guess I see it like cousins or second cousins. You have them, its a fact. You will always have them. Some you see all the time, some you have never met. Some you might become close to, some you might not like at all and rarely talk to.  Right now when you are a young kid - you are going to see them because we see their parents (the ones we get along with). When you are older, you don't have to be friends with them - or you can be.  But I feel like that is easier than discovering a cousin you didn't know you had when you are an awkward teen and then trying to get to know them if you want to.

That's how I think of it.

So, I think G may realize he may have diblings earlier the pre-teen years.  Maybe not, but I do think kids are savvier than we know or expect sometimes.  But, from what you have stated, even if he were to catch on before then, it sounds like you will be open to exploring that with him.  I don't necessarily think that it will be "too late."  I just looked at my donor's forum on Fairfax and from what I can tell, there are no others that live in Central Texas.  Some mentioned where they lived and suggested get togethers and I don't know if those get togethers have actually happened or if they will once our kids get a bit older, but I don't anticipate that we'll be having regular or frequent contact even though we are open to exploring these connections earlier.

I think 2Mamaz mentioned Generation Cryo.  Though some of those kids had reservations about meeting their donor, it seemed that so many of them valued their relationships with their diblings.  Personally, I don't think that I'm taking anything away from Ash by forging relationships with those families, but I also don't think that you are taking anything away from G by letting him forge those relationships for himself.  LIke I said, no right and wrong here.  We all need to do what seems right for our families.  I think this would be a great topic to revisit every now and then.

redrockmama

That is interesting about your friends @ATXmommas‌. We have friends who considered using the same donor as close friends and today I went to lunch with a friend who suggested we use their donor for our future kids. He's Puerto Rican so not likely, but she said she thought it would be cool to know other diblings so closely.

Jazibel

This is such an interesting topic. I hope we all remain part of this community over the years as all of our families story unfolds, I look forward to witnessing the journeys. It would make one heck of a documentary!

I appreciate the different perspectives and it's so helpful to read them and continue to formulate our thoughts.  

If we decide to move forward with baby #3 using EV's eggs we might look for another donor and likely would use a sperm bank.  I jumped on line a couple of weeks ago to read profiles and it was totally daunting.  Plus the thought of meeting 20-some "diblings" seems super overwhelming - though maybe a little cool too.

Is it safe to assume that this information is private until you join the ranks of "parenting a child genetically tied to a certain donor"? 

ATXmommas

@Jazibel‌ - Fairfax hosts private donor forums. I can't recall if you have to have a reported pregnancy to join or just have to have purchased to join. Fairfax reviews the request to join before approving. It's extremely private. Many families seem to post every few months and include pictures of their kids - others don't. Very interesting.

ETA: I think you just have to have purchased vials.  I joined the forum in between my two pregnancies.

JGY

ATXmommas said:

@Jazibel‌ - Fairfax hosts private donor forums. I can't recall if you have to have a reported pregnancy to join or just have to have purchased to join. Fairfax reviews the request to join before approving. It's extremely private. Many families seem to post every few months and include pictures of their kids - others don't. Very interesting.

ETA: I think you just have to have purchased vials.  I joined the forum in between my two pregnancies.

My understanding is that you have to have a reported pregnancy to be given access to a particular donor number's forum at Fairfax.

Our forum has very low activity.  There are a few more families that have posted on the forum than have registered on the DSR, but only 1 thread and only 7 kids total.  I know there are more diblings out there (Fairfax posted on Facebook that triplets had been born to this donor, but they have not posted anywhere).  I have not posted on either site.

Our donor has been discontinued (except for siblings) due to reaching his max number of reported pregnancies.  Which, at Fairfax, is still a pretty high numer.  Either 20 or 25, I think.  And that's just in the USA. Of course it's all self-report and all on the honor system, and I honestly don't know if people who don't carry those pregnancies to term call to update Fairfax (and I wouldn't blame them if they didn't).  So it's a total crapshoot as to how many there actually are.

As @winstan1 mentioned, it's pretty damn daunting to have that number of 20 or 25 rolling around in my head without a personal relationship to any of them to ease us into it.

I also truly hope that this group sticks together for the long haul.  I really look forward to hearing about every family's journey, and I'm fascinated to learn how things evolve with this particular topic!

 

ATXmommas

From Fairfax' website:

"Fairfax Cryobank limits the total number of births for any donor based on the application of several criteria. Specifically, a donor's sales will cease when either of the following criteria is reached: (1) Maximum of 25-30 family units (children from the same donor living in one home) reported within the U.S.; OR (2) Total number of units sold reaches our designated limit (actual numbers are not disclosed). In addition, we also monitor the reported location of births and limit the geographic distribution of a donor consistent with the guideline of the American Society of Reproductive Medicine (ASRM). Notwithstanding the standard used to limit the number of births per donor, sperm banks do not limit the number of births within a family unit, thereby permitting full siblings via donor insemination."

I've counted 19 family units that have posted in the forum, so there could be more out there. I know our donor is only available to families who already have a child by him. Still - there could conceivably be another 6-11 families that I don't about. This wasn't really on my radar when choosing a cryobank/donor. We picked a popular one, it seems.

And, @JGY‌ , the website does say that the donor forum is reserved for people who have conceived a child with a donor. I know for certain that I joined right around the time we lost our first baby, so maybe I did report that pregnancy and don't remember.

YBnormal85

So interesting seeing everyone's response on this topic. I agree with the cousin-like relationship,and I see it being a bit like that for our LO. We likely will never meet the donor sibs that are closest to her age as they live on he opposite coast as we do,but we enjoy keeping in touch online. Since the twins mama and I were expecting the babies at the same time we loved exchanging notes on our pregnancies and such and the babies ended up being born within two weeks of each other. It's so neat to see them reaching milestones "together". Such an interesting topic.

BostonGayGal

More than a dozen, no real interest in meeting them. We chose a bank on the opposite coast in part to minimize the chance that our daughter will end up dating a half sib .