What is a ‘Sperm Baby’ and Who Holds Legal Obligation?
Photo: Josh Willink
Watching Love is Blind DC as a family law attorney made me cringe over and over again. The thing that bothered me most in terms of legal misconceptions was everyone referring to a “sperm baby” as if it was someone’s legal child. I also personally found the term incredibly offensive. So, let’s go over some basics, and get us all on the same page.
In Virginia any pregnancy resulting from any intervening medical technology is assisted conception. And a donor is someone who contributes sperm or an egg in assisted conception. A donor is not a legal parent of a child, UNLESS the donor is the spouse of the gestational mother. So anonymous or non-anonymous, it really doesn’t matter. Exception if the father was the spouse but dies during the ten-month period preceding birth. To be a tiny bit more tricky, if a party implants an embryo using sperm from their spouse AFTER the spouse files for divorce (unless implantation happens before) notice can be given to the physician – unless the spouse consents in writing to be the parent. Those are the rules in Virginia.
If a party does not have legal parentage of a child, they have no legal rights AND no obligations to that child. And in fact, it is completely possible that the person who is having assisted conception may have a spouse who is the actual presumed parent of that child, especially if they are same sex. This means that a donor doesn’t owe child support, if they die the child does not inherit, they have no rights to visitation or information, and have no right to make any decision for that child.
And further, Virginia is a sealed adoption state, so even an adult adoptee can only get limited non-identifying information on their biological parents. So can we stop acting like anyone who donates an egg or sperm by assisted contraception, has any legal or moral obligation to that child, or to disclose it to anyone because they aren’t their children!
