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Widow seeks new life after death
The widow of a Georgia soldier who was killed in Iraq was granted the right to extract sperm from her late husband with the hope she can one day conceive his child. The extraction wasn’t conducted until four days after Sgt. Dayne Darren Dhanoolal died, however, making it “highly unlikely” any sperm would be viable, experts said. Regardless, widow Kynesha Dhanoolal has pressed forward.
The widow’s mother, Yvonne Watkins, said her daughter hopes to have her husband’s sperm artificially inseminated as early as this summer.
“We’re trying to honor my daughter and Darren’s wishes,” Watkins said. “All of his comrades and anyone who knew them knew he wanted children.”
What’s your take on the story: In the absence of a will, should such post-mortem retrieval even be allowed?
back to top25 Comments to “Widow seeks new life after death”
I realize this is a grief reaction, but I’m wondering what the men here feel about this. Would they want this done to them without their express permission? It seems like a violation.
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In the absence of a will, should such post-mortem retrieval even be allowed?
Interesting twist. Personally, I’m opposed to anything that deliberately impregnates a single woman.
Putting that aside, I’ll point out that once you’re dead your spouse can allow future use of your eyes, bones, kidneys, liver, pancreas, heart, lungs, and small intestine. On a certain level, this is just an extension of that.
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NO.NO. and NO. Will she then turn around and apply for death benefits for the child? Will the child be eligible for military benefits and the fathers social security?
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What NJLawyer said…”It seems like a violation.”
And I don’t mean to sound unfeeling about her grief, but it just sounds weird to me as well.
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But isn’t organ donation a little different? That’s making use of viable organs to help someone stay alive. That doesn’t create a whole new person.
If this is what this man wanted, why didn’t he provide a sample before he deployed? I mean, he did have to think about his possible death and deliberately made the choice to have his mother deal with his remains if the worst happened.
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Well, on one level, I think she’s within her rights. She and her husband wanted to have a child, and she is in fact having his child, albeit post-mortem. I don’t know what the situation would be if he had had sperm frozen for future use before going into combat, but the same reasoning as that case ought to prevail.
On the other hand, as a widow, this is going to be at best a difficult thing for her, as it would be for any mother who is widowed. And she is making this decision in the midst of a time of grief. If she waited, she might conclude there were better ways to honour her husband.
Finally, my visceral reaction, and my reaction as a guy… ewwww, creepy.
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I’m not sure if it should be allowed, but I know that I would not want my wife to do that if I were to die young. I’d much rather she marry another, and focus on having children with him.
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Well, it doesn’t gross me out, but it seems wrong for the child and the mother.
I think it’s a bad idea, as Stu Bob said, to purposely conceive a child with a father who can’t be present. It’s sad for a child when his parent dies after he is conceived or born, and to purposely conceive a child in that situation seems downright cruel. The mother will also be in a difficult situation, raising a child alone.
A good solution to all this is to wait. That’s often the best thing to do when facing a big decision. If the sperm cells can be extracted and are viable, then preserve it, and see if she feels the same way in sixth months.
Let’s hope that she’s not doing it for the benefits. I doubt she can get enough for her son and her to live on.
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Eck. It makes the child a weird souvenir of a relationship that once was, leaving the child to always be a reminder.
Yet time and our God has a funny way with us — we recover balance, find new grace, move on.
Wouldn’t it be far better to forego the souvenir, and look forward to the day (God willing) when a new life comes in the presence of a faithful mother and father, together?
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NJL– You’re right, it’s different. Still, I think it’s something of a precedent.
One of the many ways this is different is that organ donation is a good thing and this is an extremely bad idea. I hadn’t thought of the benefits angle. That makes it even worse.
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Poor idea. I think we have enough single-parent children as it is. And the idea that this man’s sperm is somehow a substitute for the man himself biologizes humanity a bit too much for my tastes. He simply cannot be “the father”. And allowing either the courts or the military to determine whether he would have wanted this child to be conceived even after his death is also a problem. Death does have a way of changing one’s point of view.
The legal ramifications might get very weird. Is this child to somehow be an heir of the father? Suppose Mom freezes the sperm and the child is born 10 years from now?
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I had a boyfriend die at the age of 20. He had sperm in a sperm bank, saved because he had to undergo treatment for testicular cancer shortly before he died. After his death, his mom was (understandably) having a hard time letting him go. His dad wanted that sperm destroyed. His mom mentioned in passing to me that maybe one day I could use it! I was appalled! She just couldn’t bring herself to let him go. I would never have had his child without his permission – and we weren’t married, so I would have had no claim to it. And, I certainly hope she finally allowed it to be destroyed. He would never have wanted it to go to someone else – it saved it to make sure HE could have a child someday. It wasn’t a donation. I never found out what she decided to do. I would tend to think this widow is having a hard time letting her husband go. But I don’t think this is a healthy thing to do. On the other hand, if they wanted to have a child together, maybe it’s fine. Strange, though.
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My first 2 questions are if they wanted children so badly
1 Why didn’t she get pregnant before his deployment?
2. Since there was a chance he would die and if #1 wasn’t an option, why didn’t he preserve his sperm in a sperm bank if it was so important for him to have children?
3. Where is his will that states he wants this to happen? He was a soldier going off to war and would have had a will under normal circumstances since his commanding officer would have hounded him to get to get one.
My guess is this subject never came up and if it did he didn’t want his wife raising a kid by herself if he died – so option #1 and 2 were not options in his head.
I am not buying the woman’s story in the least. The idea he would want her to have his children and that he would agree she should harvest his sperm after his death to do so is bizarre.
This woman needs to grieve and then go on with her life – hopefully this poor soldiers sperm is long dead anyway.
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If I am dead, the living can do their own thing.
As for me? it is none of my business. I have other problems, like my daughter and son-in-law are flirting with JWs. “Bible studies” at their house…
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In # 12 TL mentions the mother of the young man – as a mother of a young man myself, that thought did cross my mind as well. I don’t think that is wrong or abnormal to initially try to hang on to one of your children – but it’s not healthy and hopefully over time all of the ones involved can handle and deal with their grief in more appropriate ways.
I can understand your dismay Bob B – if your daughter was raised as a Christian, take hope and comfort in that fact and trust the Lord that His Word will not return void. My Mom (a strong Christian) met with the JW’s for months – I was so upset with her but she said it only served to strengthen her faith and convinced her more than ever how cultish they are. (Not that I’d recommend it.)
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In a weird sort of way, isn’t this necrophilia?
My, my, the ethical questions that modern science has created.
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As his widow, she likely has the full legal right to do this.
As a recent widow, I can not bring myself to be too harsh with her. One shouldn’t be quick to jump on things that newly grieving people do.
I would hope that she doesn’t rush to action. And I would hope that she later decides not to prodeed.
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Seeking to create a new human life by the seed of the dead? What a perverse intersection between necrophilia and narcisism.
God’s law provides that newly married men are not to go to war, but rather they are to spend their first year at home with their wives (Deut. 20:5-8). As Dr. John Robbins points out, in God’s eceonomy,
Thus the time for conception was before Sgt. Dhanoolal was sent overseas, not after he was killed. (Which isn’t necessarily the same thing as saying she should be legally barred from doing this. Still, that judge needs his head examined.)
StuBob also makes an excellent point: Why is this women intent on conceiving a child whose father is already dead?
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Her right? Maybe. Ethical? I cannot say, but stubob makes a good point. Would I want it done? Not on my dead body!
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I went to school with a couple who were excited to announce their pregnancy…and a few months later the husband died suddenly, before his son was born. I always thought that if I’d been that wife, I would have been so glad to have my husband’s baby. It would be hard, and I hope he had good life insurance, but I think I’d still be happy to be pregnant.
As a single woman who wants children, but cannot morally have them, I sympathize with this woman. She may or may not have a chance to marry again. I think what she is doing is unwise, but in her situation I think I’d want to do it, and have to remind myself it isn’t a good idea–that there’s a difference in losing a spouse through death when one is already pregnant and deliberately choosing to be a single mother. (She could justify it to herself pretty easily–she was married to him, she could have just as easily already been pregnant by him…) But I think it would be pretty hard to explain to a child, “Yeah, your dad was already dead, but I wanted a kid, and so I had you.”
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I’m puzzled by the strong personal reactions. I think it’s a bad idea for practical, spiritual, and psychological reasons, but my opposition is entirely intellectual, not at all visceral. That is, other than thinking it’s a bad idea, I wouldn’t care one bit if my wife extracted sperm from my recently dead body.
It’s not like I’m using it for something else.
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To have a child without a father is just wrong!
To lose a father is bad enough, but to have a child without a father is just wrong for the child!
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As JJF attests there are several reasons why its a bad idea and as illama points out her story doesn’t make sense, however, if I were dead what people do with my sperm really doesn’t matter.
Cheryl
you’ve been a foster mom several times, I beleive you write or edit children’s books, so your desire to have children is apparent. Now I can understand your position against pre-marital pregnancy, but have you thought of adoption? Just curious you don’t have to answer.
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HRW, Thought about it, not in a position to do it. (And I wouldn’t consider infants or boys, but girls who were likely not to have a home at all otherwise.) But I’m not pursuing it, as I’m not in a position to do that.
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looks like a long, slow, painful, multi-generational lesson to be learned the hard way
talk about “doing what is best for a child”
gives a whole new meaning to the word/concept father and father-child relations
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