March 28, 2024

Woman had 2 children after secretly taking ex-husband’s frozen sperm

A father was forced to pay his ex-wife £100,000 so that she can raise two children she conceived via IVF without his consent after secretly taking his frozen sperm.

The two children involvedA father was forced to pay his ex-wife £100,000 so that she can raise two children she conceived via IVF without his consent after secretly taking his frozen sperm. The 57-year-old unnamed man had stored his sperm after he learned that drug treatment for arthritis could make him infertile. Two months after their separation, however, he says his ex-wife forged his signature and used her £25,000 divorce settlement to conceive a son and daughter via IVF at the Bourn Hall Clinic in Cambridge.

The man only learned about the children three years later when his ex-wife’s sister called to say his son was critically ill in hospital. At that stage he had remarried and had two other children. The man, who cannot be named for legal purposes, has had little access to his children since then and has spent nearly £200,000 in continuing legal battles with his ex-wife.

When she ran into debt in taking care of the children, a judge ordered him to give her £100,000 to help raise them. Now the father-of-four is calling for a change in the law so that other parents will not experience the same ordeal. He said: “I was stunned when I found out she had withdrawn my sperm without my consent because at the time we had split up and were going through a divorce. It was a deliberate act to bring two children into this world without a father to look after them. I was never at the clinic and I never signed the documents. 

“I love the children and spend money on taking them out and buying them clothes, but it is an expense I shouldn’t really have. The cost of this has been huge. It is scary to think how little control I had over it all. I just can’t understand how they believed her. The stress of it all has turned my life upside down.”

When asked about her actions, his ex-wife said: “I don’t believe I have done anything wrong. It was getting later and later for me and I wanted to have a child. If I had not done it then I would not be blessed with my children. I have no regrets, I would do it again.” She added that a court ruled it was a simulation rather than a forged signature. ~ London Telegraph, May 29

Woman had 2 children after secretly taking ex-husband’s frozen sperm
Jared Yee
Creative commons
human drama
IVF
reproductive revolution
UK