Tag: fertility
Oregon doctor claims sperm was improperly used to father at least 17 kids
An Oregon doctor got a big surprise when he submitted his DNA to Ancestry.com — the test revealed he had 17 children he’d known nothing about.
It turned out a fertility clinic may have used his sperm without his permission to father the children — and now he worries he could have even more rugrats running around without his knowledge, he claims in a $5.25 lawsuit reported by The Oregonian.
Bryce Cleary, now 53, donated his sperm to the Oregon Health & Science University 30 years ago as a medical school student, under an agreement that only allowed for it to be used to conceive five children, he claims in his suit.
“I wanted to help people struggling with infertility and I had faith that OSHU would act in a responsible manner and honor their promises,” Cleary told reporters.
After graduating, Cleary married and had three sons of his own and adopted a daughter. But in March 2018, two sisters contacted Clearly looking for information about their biological dad.
After submitting his DNA to the genealogical website Ancestry.com, Clearly says he discovered he was the father to those girls — as well as to 15 other people.
But “there could be a huge number of kids out there,” he said.
At least two of the offspring conceived through OSHU went to the same schools, church or social activities as the children he had with his wife, Cleary claims.
That means the clinic breached another promise: that Cleary’s sperm be used only for couples living outside Oregon, in order to lessen the chances the offspring would meet or become romantically involved, states the lawsuit filed in Multnomah County Circuit Court.
“The idea that you can produce that many children from one donor and throw them all in the same region?” Cleary asked. “There has got to be some reforms.”
Also, Cleary says the clinic was supposed to keep his information private, but didn’t.
All of the promises OSHU allegedly made, “were a lie,” Cleary said, adding that his donation was “distributed locally and in a largely irresponsible manner.”
The lawsuit claims that Cleary “incurred extreme mental and emotional pain, anguish and suffering, which have all had a significant and negative impact on his personal, parental and marital relationships.”
OSHU said it couldn’t comment on the case for confidentiality reasons.
Photo Credit: AP
Couple had son of different race after clinic mixed up embryos
A couple is fighting a Connecticut fertility clinic in court after they say the facility gave them the wrong embryo — and they wound up giving birth to a baby of another race.
The husband and wife, who now live in the UK, are suing the recently shuttered CT Fertility in Trumbell and Dr. Melvin Thornton, claiming the shocking mixup has left them with “haunting uncertainties regarding their second-born son.”
The pair first visited the clinic in 2015 while struggling to conceive and froze embryos using the husband’s sperm and eggs from a donor they specifically chose, according to their suit, which was first filed in a Bridgeport court in November.
The wife then became pregnant with the couple’s first child via in vitro fertilization — and gave birth to a boy in April 2016, the suit says.
They returned to the clinic in September 2016 in the hopes of giving their son a full sibling by using the embryos stored from the previous procedure.
But when the wife gave birth to another son in August 2018, the tot didn’t resemble his older brother “whatsoever” — and had “much darker skin pigmentation than either the father, genetic mother or their first son.”
Realizing something was very wrong, they ordered DNA tests — which gave the stunning result that their youngest child is not biologically related to the dad, according to court papers.
“While their second-born son is loved and healthy in every aspect, he is not in fact their biological baby,” court papers say.
They now live with a “constant, nagging and debilitating fear” that this mystery sperm donor will realize what happened and claim custody of their kid.
They also say the situation has left the family vulnerable to “ignorant and cruel harassment” from judgmental strangers.
“They are barraged daily with questions and suspicions regarding who the child’s real father is and even whether the [sic] mother had an affair,” the suit says.
And they’re worried about the fate of the rest of the sperm they gave to the clinic.
“They have reason to believe they have lost genetic material (embryos) belonging to them, with no knowledge as to whether it has been transferred to another person, destroyed or frozen under an incorrect name,” the suit reads.
In court papers filed earlier this month, the parents described the anguish that plagues them as they continue to pursue the case, which isn’t set to go to trial until September 2021.
“They are left with potential life-long haunting uncertainties regarding their second born son, and unknowns about what happened to their genetic material and where their genetic material ended up,” court papers said.
“Whose genetic material was transferred to the plaintiff? Is the child’s biological father a carrier of some sort of disease? What is the genetic makeup and background of the baby? Will someone one day attempt to make claim to the custody of their child?”
Lawyers for Thornton and CT Fertility didn’t immediately respond to requests for comment.
The couple’s attorney declined to comment.
via: https://nypost.com/2019/04/25/couple-had-son-of-different-race-after-clinic-mixed-up-embryos-suit/
Gabrielle Union’s New Book: “I Have Had Eight or Nine Miscarriages
In two weeks, actress Gabrielle Union will release her first ever memoir, titled “We’re Going to Need More Wine: Stories That Are Funny, Complicated, and True.”
Even though Union and Dwayne Wade are raising Wade’s two sons and his nephew, and another son that is not allowed in any family pictures, Union and Wade don’t have any biological children together.
Now Union opens up about her infertility issues. On Wednesday, PEOPLE magazine released an exclusive excerpt of the new memoir, where the actress details her infertility issues in several attempts to have a baby with NBA star husband, Dwyane Wade.
“I have had eight or nine miscarriages,” the Union wrote. “For three years, my body has been a prisoner of trying to get pregnant – I’ve either been about to go into an IVF cycle, in the middle of an IVF cycle, or coming out of an IVF cycle.”
Although the actress has opened up about IVF before, she declined to detail the struggles she has faced after three years of failed cycles. But, throughout the heartbreaking trauma, she revealed that she and her husband “remain bursting with love and ready to do anything to meet the child we’ve both dreamed of.”
“For so many women, and not just women in the spotlight, people feel very entitled to know, ‘Do you want kids?’” she told PEOPLE, after revealing that she never wanted to have children until she became a stepmom to her husband’s three sons and nephew. “A lot of people, especially people that have fertility issues, just say ‘no’ because that’s a lot easier than being honest about whatever is actually going on. People mean so well, but they have no idea the harm or frustration it can cause.”
We wish Union and Wade
Read more via: http://balleralert.com/profiles/blogs/gabrielle-union-talks-fertility-issues-new-book-eight-nine-miscarriages/