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Woman learns she was donor-conceived: ‘I wasn’t the person I was’
A British woman is speaking out about the trauma she experienced after learning she was donor-conceived.
Amanda Burgess, 34, told her story on an ITV documentary called “Born from the Same Stranger.” She said she learned by accident that her biological father was a sperm donor when she was 21.
“I was 21. That night out was just like any other normal night out I would have had, and then my mum walked in,” Burgess said on the show. “My friend looked at her and said: ‘You need to tell her.’ My mum had told my friend’s mother the big secret, and then the next morning, my mum just blurted it out: ‘Your dad’s not your dad, we had to use a sperm donor.'”
Burgess went on: “From that point, life was just different. I wasn’t the person I was 24 hours ago. Suddenly, I was donor conceived.”
Though Burgess didn’t wish to upset her parents, she described yearning to know her real father, a yearning that led her to take a DNA test years later. “If I knew the identity of the donor, I would know once and for all, who I am,” she said.
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“And if there are half-siblings, I would love to have a relationship with them. It’s really hard, you don’t know who you are, almost.”
Burgess did learn her father’s identity through the test, which led her to break down in tears on the show. She has since connected with him, and said, “I definitely feel lighter like a weight lifted inside, and I feel like I’m not so alone anymore.”
Burgess’s story mirrors that of many other donor-conceived children who describe feeling shocked at learning their parentage is not what they thought. Many have struggled with learning that they have dozens or even hundreds of siblings they were unaware of, while others have described feeling mental and emotional strain. One Harvard Medical School study found that nearly half of children the children conceived through donor technologies sought psychological care after learning how they were conceived.
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International·By Bridget Sielicki
