Woman's Hour - Parenting: Going it alone

Episode Date: May 1, 2019

Why do some women opt to go it alone and become solo parents using donor sperm and eggs? Jenni speaks to Genevieve Roberts, author of 'Going Solo,' a book about her experiences of becoming a mum using donor sperm and Beth who is pregnant with her first child, using both a donor egg and donor sperm.

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BBC Sounds. Music, radio, podcasts. Hello and welcome to this week's podcast for parents. Now, there's been a lot of discussion this week about the IVF industry. There were warnings from Sally Cheshire, who chairs the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority, about the hard sell employed by some practitioners and a lack of honest information about success and failure rates. The Barbican in London is holding a fertility fest in which Maxine Peake, who's spoken about her own failure to conceive,

will take part in a play called Avalanche. So what persuades a woman to make the decision to use donor sperm and donor eggs and embark on the efforts to have a child entirely alone. Well Beth has done it and is now 11 weeks pregnant. Genevieve Roberts has a two-year-old daughter and is the author of Going Solo. Why did she make that decision? I was 37 years old and I'd always believed that I would have children at some point it was just part of the fabric of the backgrounds of my life I wanted to have a fertility test just to find out whether my fertility was high and I expected it to actually come out quite high I'd had a miscarriage a couple

of years before that with a previous partner the results were alarmingly low and I was told quite starkly that it was a it was a decision I needed to make swiftly if I if I wanted to have children. Are my days on your end? I think at that stage it would have been if I'd have run around trying to get pregnant with someone else that maybe wouldn't have set up a very stable world for the children I was hoping to conceive. Beth, why did you choose to go it alone with donor eggs and donor sperm? Well, initially, I was just choosing the donor sperm. And similarly, I was in a place where I always wanted children. I felt my life was in limbo. And that was assuming I'd do it with a partner. But I've gone through my 30s, largely single, you know, a couple of relationships,

and hit the point going, something's got to give. And the thing I really wanted was a child. I started off thinking my fertility was going to be great. My sister had a baby with her husband at 40. My mother's mother had her at 38. And I was actually going into it with just thinking it was donor sperm. Didn't even know donor egg really existed didn't really occur to me but after a lot of trying two and a half years of trying with donor sperm I and I knew my fertility tests were also extremely low I'd produced a couple of good embryos along the way had one chemical pregnancy which is when you get pregnant but it doesn't survive I hit a point financially emotionally where it wasn't right for me and for the last year I spoke to a counsellor about I wanted to come to a place where there was a next stage for

me and I spoke to them they were absolutely amazing I asked every question every concern and got to that point over my last year of trying with three more IVF cycles on my own I came to the conclusion donor egg was a positive move for me and then and then moved to it this year. Genevieve I know you began by going to a fertility clinic which gave you the name of a United States sperm bank what happened when you logged on to it? I was amazed I'd never kind of gone down a rabbit warren of the internet that had brought me to a sperm bank before. So I was really, really surprised to see the similarities between a sperm bank and a dating website. their own personalities profiling themselves there were huge numbers of details looking at whether they were couch potatoes or active neurotic or laid-back responsible all sorts of things there were photos baby photos and adult photos and some of the people had written letters that I guess you know that the parents that mums could pass on

to their children so that the the donor conceived children could have an idea about who they'd been conceived by. How did you select the one? So for me it was really important to me to bear in mind this wasn't going to be a partner for me this was someone so I looked somebody you might meet sometime in the future it could certainly be someone that my daughter and son-to-be could meet and I feel very strongly that if they would if they want to do that that's something I'd really support them in I looked for health predominantly I thought that was a really good gift you could give your child so I looked looked through so many entries. I couldn't find one family that was untouched by cancer. But I looked for families where most people seem to have lived to be quite an old age.

And that seemed like a good first thing. I also picked someone who was very passionate about life. Beth, what about you? You had to choose a donor for both? Yeah I am there's lots of Danish sperm banks which is great for me I'm half Danish and I was really positive about having a Danish sperm donor in particular my surname's Danish so my child's surname will be Danish so that was very helpful. I went for physical attributes as my first thing I had a real thing around in particular when if I had a blonde child and I'm brunette, if people go, oh, does your child look like daddy then? And just throwing up questions, just almost the ease of physical attributes and a sense of belonging to me and then other attributes as well.

And then for the egg donor, I found it much harder because there are far fewer out there. And I decided I did want English. I decided I'd love the child to be the makeup of me, English and Danish. But that made it really hard and I was looking at the London Egg Bank because my clinic worked with them and I didn't want to there's not just not as many options and I didn't want to leave my clinic and so that I waited a little bit longer I was very lucky but I was and you don't get as much information but again I looked for some physical attributes and then was really keen if I could see signs that they had both a kind of a career drive and an artistic side and I did find someone

and the letter they write a letter you get once you've chosen absolutely touched me and I just felt delighted. Beth this has gone on for a long time you've had a lot of treatment how much did it cost you? It's tens of thousands so i mean being completely open it it starts with a five and i'm fortunate that i'm uh i'm in a world where 50 000 yeah and i'm in a world where i have bonuses um and luckily i had a couple of really good years and have been able to fund it but i funded it all myself initially i I moved with a view that I would probably have a baby quite soon to a two-bedroom flat of course three years later that isn't the case and I'd allowed about £15,000 when I was moving in equity and then as I say fortunately had the bonuses that

allowed me to continue. Genevieve what about you how much have you spent? Well I conceived Astrid through artificial insemination, which is a lot. It's the kind of least medicalised process. And I think that was maybe around £5,000. I'm currently pregnant through an IVF pregnancy. And that was that was a little bit more. But yeah, we're talking just over 10,000, so slightly different figures. Genevieve, a lot of people will say, well, that's OK if you could afford it. Lots can't. And other people will say, come on, why this obsession with becoming a mother that makes you go on and on trying? How do you respond to those really now rather common criticisms? I think I can, you know, I'm really open to people asking me questions like that. I did have this absolute longing to become a parent. And I felt that if I got to the end of my life, that would be the one thing that I would look back on with regret. If I just hadn't't tried I did speak to a friend who has adopted

about adoption he's a male friend and he said to me were he a woman he would have gone to have a child himself just because the adoption process is so tricky in this country um particularly if you're on your own um and I think I felt that that rejection that can come of being unsuccessful in adoption would be very hard. But yeah, I do think it's especially hard if you don't have any resources behind you. I was lucky to have savings. If you don't have that, then it's not as free an option. But I think probably since time has started people have used other methods of becoming parents. Beth what about you how did friends family the health professionals you know

your GP the midwife presumably you're meeting now how have they responded to this? Overall really positive I mean my friends and family have always known I've wanted to be a mum, probably more than most of my friends throughout my whole life. And actually, I had looked at adoption first and again came to some kind of blocks that looked much harder than I'd ever anticipated. And I was slightly afraid of it. And I'd always been slightly afraid of having a baby on my own for a couple of friends having difficulties during their pregnancy. So that was my fear of doing it on my own. And I suddenly had this release and had this almost epiphany for me that I wanted to do it on my own.

And I was just welcomed with such warmth, and particularly from my mum, who's been brilliant about it all. And I just remember going, I'm going to have a baby on my own, and her just opening her arms to me. So on the whole, it's been very, very positive. And health professionals, it's quite weird going into the nh system now nhs system they're slightly confused which i'm surprised about at different points by having an egg and sperm donor the system i still have to test for i have to test for sickle cell and other and other um other potential diseases even though it's genetically not my child and

they said it's just easier to put you through all those tests than try and explain there's nothing difficult in the terms of their attitude towards me it's just the system isn't set up to deal with the non-genetics. Genevieve what do you say to strangers you might meet who assume there's a father at home and say oh how's the child's father? You know what it's an assumption I make when I see mums with their children seeing a mum with their child on maternity leave is so natural and it's actually more unusual to see dads on parental leave with with small children so um i'm very very open about it i i tell people i i let them know that Astrid is donor conceived. There's definitely been times where I have just avoided the subject.

There's been various cab rides and things like this where someone will go, oh, is your husband excited about number two or something like this? And I'll be like, yeah, I don't have a husband. And then as they go, your boyfriend? And I'm like, oh, let's just not get into this this time just finally what do you wish you'd known at the start of all this because you started writing as you were going through the process yes doing your research what do you wish you'd known then before um I think it's been a more wonderful experience than I had ever anticipated.

I think I was trying to prepare. I think probably you find solo mums prepare a lot more in advance, perhaps. You're trying to kind of think of all these bad things that could happen and what you'll do to cope with them. I don't think I spent much time thinking of how wonderful it would be. And every day there's something that just reminds me why this was an amazing thing and how lucky I am to have Astrid. I was talking to Genevieve Roberts, her book is going solo. And also I was talking to Beth. Thank you for joining us this morning. And don't forget, we do like to hear from you. If you have any ideas

about things you'd like us to discuss for the podcast for parents, then get in touch. You can email us or you can tweet. Bye-bye. I'm Sarah Treleaven, and for over a year,

I've been working on one of the most complex stories I've ever covered. There was somebody out there who's faking pregnancies. I started like warning everybody. Every doula that I know. It was fake. No pregnancy. And the deeper I dig, the more questions I unearth.

How long has she been doing this? What does she have to gain from this? From CBC and the BBC World Service, The Con, Caitlin's Baby. It's a long story. Settle in. Available now.