Chapter 3 - THE NIGHT I DIDN’T REMEMBER
There are sentences you never expect to say.
“I may have conceived my daughter without knowing who provided the sperm” was one of them.
My pregnancy with Sophie began after a period I had spent years trying not to think about.
Michael and I were married.
We were trying for a baby.
We had one early miscarriage.
Then another.
My OB referred us to a fertility specialist for testing.
Nothing catastrophic.
Michael’s sperm count was somewhat low.
My ovulation was irregular.
We tried medication first.
Then one intrauterine insemination cycle.
I remembered the procedure.
Michael provided a sample.
The clinic processed it.
The insemination occurred.
Two weeks later:
pregnant.
I had never questioned it.
The clinic was Parker Fertility Center.
Again, the name had nothing to do with my family.
The physician was Dr. Nathan Parker.
No relation.
The coincidence had been a running joke.
Then something surfaced in archived medical records.
The day before my IUI, Michael’s sample showed severe deterioration after preparation.
A laboratory note stated:
Repeat sample requested.
But no repeat collection from Michael appeared in his record.
Instead:
Backup donor specimen used per authorization.
I stared at that sentence.
“What backup donor?”
My attorney, Lisa Monroe, said:
“That’s what we need to determine.”
I had never signed donor consent.
Michael had never signed donor consent.
At least not knowingly.
The clinic had closed five years earlier after Dr. Parker retired following licensing problems unrelated to us.
Archived records existed through a medical-storage provider.
We requested full files.
Michael joined me.
That mattered emotionally.
He did not have to.
He said:
“If someone did this to us, it happened to me too.”
He was right.
The backup specimen code was TP-1960.
Thomas Parker.
My father was born in 1960.
Could be coincidence.
Then the records revealed Dad had participated in a male-fertility research program at the clinic two years earlier.
He had provided samples.
Some were stored.
Research consent did not automatically permit reproductive use.
We needed the forms.
The archived study paperwork contained Dad’s signature consenting to research storage.
Not reproductive donation.
No authorization for use in a patient.
So how did one of his samples become “backup donor specimen”?
The answer required people.
The former lab manager, William Crane, was alive.
He remembered.
Not me personally.
The incident.
“There was a family emergency.”
“What family?”
He hesitated.
Then:
“Your mother came in.”
Margaret.
My hands went cold.
“What did she do?”
“She said Dr. Parker had spoken to your father.”
“About what?”
“Preserving the family line.”
There it was again.
Blood.
Lineage.
May you like
Real granddaughter.
The obsession had existed before Sophie was conceived.
