A mum-of-five’s world has been left ‘shattered’ after learning her husband of 20 years was living a secret double life.
Mary Thomson* was at home on annual leave when she discovered a ‘plastic receptacle’ in the back of her husband’s wardrobe, alongside a file detailing sperm donations made under a fake name.
Confused, the 60-year-old confronted her partner, only to discover he’d been offering up his semen to young women in Facebook groups for the last five years.
While she had been out working 12-hour shifts, David* was at home ‘masturbating all day in a frenzy’, before delivering his sperm to clients in their 20s and 30s, meeting up in hotel rooms and on the street.
It is not known exactly how many pregnancies resulted from this, but Mary thinks the 45-year-old fathered ‘at least 10 children’ during that time.
After making the shocking discovery, the mum fled from Edinburgh to her daughter’s house in Hampshire for two weeks, where she says she ‘didn’t eat or sleep’.
Space soon became an issue at her daughter’s, but not wanting to go home, Mary temporarily moved into a homeless shelter.
Unable to secure permanent accommodation, she’s since returned to the house she and David shared, and the pair are living together while he undertakes a 12-step programme for sex addiction.
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And while she still feels an attachment to him, she claims she’s ‘no longer able to accept him as [her] husband’, and any lingering feelings might just be a ‘trauma bond’.
‘I’m still shattered. I feel a sense of extreme betrayal,’ she says.
‘I wonder if he ever really loved me in the first place.’
The mum, with grown-up children from a previous relationship, believes her husband’s donations were an attempt to satisfy a ‘pregnancy fetish’.
‘He fantasised over the recipients on Facebook, and he had a fetish regarding pregnancy and fertility,’ she claims.
‘He would take days off – masturbating himself all day in a frenzy – to get the results into some kind of large receptacle.
‘He had dozens of aliases online and different Facebook accounts.
‘He was desperate for as many babies as he could possibly achieve.
‘He also advertised for sex through natural insemination, which is having intercourse.’
Mary wishes she could go back in time and ‘not have to know anything about this’, as she misses the ‘normal life’ they had before the revelations.
‘He got on well with my family; we never fought or argued. We didn’t have a tumultuous, crazy relationship,’ she says.
However, she’s aware that ‘things will never be the same’ again now.
Responding to his wife’s claims, David said he ‘wasn’t that successful’ as a sperm donor, and believes he fathered fewer than 10 children.
He also said he did not receive payment for many of his donations, which would make him an unlicensed donor.
Warnings have been issued over unregulated sperm donations such as this, as they can carry serious legal, health and safety risks.
This follows a rise in unlicensed donors offering sperm on online forums and via social media of late.
The demand is thought to be driven by the cost of private fertility treatment, which can add up to thousands. The NHS does offer treatment; however, not everyone is eligible for it.
* Names have been changed to protect privacy.
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