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  • Chapter 8 - ‘It’s All on Their Terms’

  • from Part II - Children’s and Adults’ Lived Experiences in Diverse Donor-Linked Families
  • Edited by Fiona Kelly, La Trobe University, Victoria, Deborah Dempsey, Swinburne University of Technology, Victoria, Adrienne Byrt, Swinburne University of Technology, Victoria
  • Book:
    Donor-Linked Families in the Digital Age
    Published online:
    13 July 2023
    Print publication:
    27 July 2023, pp 138-153

  • Summary

    In recent decades, a number of jurisdictions have moved towards more open practices in donor conception, including legislating for the rights of donor-conceived people to trace their donor. In such contexts, the donor’s role is ambivalent. They are not expected to enact a parental role in relation to people conceived from their donation. However, they are expected to ‘be available’ for some form of relationship. Our UK-based research found that donors typically navigate these dual obligations by articulating a moral commitment to ‘following the lead’ of the families they help to create and particularly the people conceived from their donation. In this chapter, we illustrate how sperm and egg donors imagine and enact this commitment but also show that it is easier to say than to do. The embedded nature of donors’ personal lives and relationships create challenges in letting others decide their role in relation to recipient families.