This week on ‘Parenting’, one mother asked how she would go about telling her five-year-old daughter that she was conceived via an egg donation.

“I have a five-year-old girl who’s full of fun and mischief and the apple of our eye,” she told Moncrieff.

“After many failed pregnancies we decided to go with a donor egg from Spain; it’s an anonymous donation.

“Everything went well with the process; my question is whether to tell my daughter in an age-appropriate way about the fact she was conceived with a donor egg.

“I have read various recommendations around it and now I’m much more confused than when I started.

“My husband is inclind to leave well enough alone, however, I feel if it came out later in life it would be really confusing or possibly hurtful for her.

“Obviously I don’t want her to reject me, however I do think it’s best for her own future that she knows – can you shed any light on all this confusion?”

Mom having serious conversation with girl. Image: Ievgen Chabanov / Alamy. 19 March 2019

Family psychotherapist Joanna Fortune said that every child has a right to know their birth story, but it would probably be best to let the five-year-old initiate the conversation.

“If you’re not getting any questions I tend to let children initiate a lot of the conversation,” she said.

“When they ask you a question they’re ready for an answer – and the answer should be true, honest and developmentally appropriate.

“If you’re not having the conversation right now you will be having it in the next year or two; you won’t get beyond seven without that question coming up typically.”

Books

Joanna recommended checking out the National Infertility Support and Information Group’s website at nisig.com, which has a host of resources and information available on this topic.

“The reason I mentioned them specifically is a number of years ago they did a project with the children’s book author Sadhbh Devlin and children’s book author and illustrator Tarsila Kruse,” she said.

“They produced these books called ‘A Special Gift’ and there’s different books for if you’re a single parent by choice, so maybe you had donor conception in that regard, or if you had a sperm donor, an egg donor – there's different variations of the story.

“There is a beautiful story picture book... I think that can be very helpful and even if you read it first – we should always read those books first as adults by the way.

“Don’t just crack it open and ready it to your child, you might say, ‘It’s not quite the way we want to go’ - fine, but you might find a framework that will help you structure the conversation you do want to have.”

According to Joanna, once a child understands the story of their birth they will start telling it to whoever they see fit, even if they are told that it’s private information.

Main image: Mother caressing her worried child outdoor in nature.