Description
Two Dl (donor insemination) adult women who experienced secrecy about their origins. One was told when she was aged 12 during a quarrel between her mother and stepfather. The other experienced secrecy throughout her childhood and growing up years, only to learn the truth when she was in her forties. Both are now married with children and, in both cases, their husbands appear on the video. In all the years that Dl has been used, it is surprising how little is known about the long-term outcome, i.e. how the children fare; what their lives are like; what are the issues they have met in their growing up years and now as adults.
To date, few adults have felt able to come forward to explain in public what their views are and what their experience has been. That is gradually changing. I (Alexina McWhinnie) was able to interview on camera two adults and it is their stories that are included in this series. One was from the USA and had been brought over by the BBC to appear on a programme. She and her husband had been in the UK previously, at the time of the Warnock Committee deliberations. She had hoped to meet the whole Committee but only met one member, which surprised and disappointed her. On her second visit to the UK, she and her husband agreed to come to Dundee and I was able to record a conversation with them. This was at the very beginning of my own research in this area.
Her husband also describes how these impacted on the family as a whole. By the time I met her she had formed a donor offspring support group in the USA which had produced appropriate literature. This conversation covers: Her personal history as a child and adolescent; the impact of Dl on her family relationships; the impact on her husband and children; her continuing search for the donor; her experience of the lack of concern for the perspective of donor offspring.
See also A DI Adult and the Legacy of Childhood Secrets.
Does not necessarily show current practice.
A DI Adult and her Quest for her Donor Father ‘Who was my Biological Father?’ from Concord Media on Vimeo.