A Utah couple was stunned when a DNA test they took for fun revealed a shocking truth.
Vanner and Donna Johnson from Salt Lake City decided to undergo IVF treatment in 2007 because they wanted to have a second child, but they were unable to conceive naturally.
The couple were delighted to welcome a son and as he grew up, they were open about his conception via IVF.
But more than a decade after their son’s birth, the family took a shocking turn when they decided to take one of the popular ’23andMe’ DNA tests for fun.
When the results came in, the family was surprised to see that their son’s father was listed as “unknown.”
Donna told ABC4 in an interview about the ordeal: “When my results immediately showed that we had two sons and that our oldest was a half-sibling to his younger brother, we knew through me that something had to be wrong.”
Another rapid DNA test confirmed that Vanner was not the biological father of his son, meaning that Donna’s egg was fertilized by someone else’s sperm during the IVF process.
Vanner was stunned to see “father unknown” in the results. (ABC4 Utah)
“There were a lot of emotions that we had to work through, including going from the love for our son that hasn’t changed … to the issue that we were dealing with,” Vanner said. “This mistake that was made, how did it happen, why did it happen and what do we do now?”
The family waited a year for the right moment to talk to their son about what had happened, but fortunately he seemed to accept the new reality.
Vanner then did research and ran more tests to determine the identity of his son’s biological father, eventually narrowing it down to a man named Devin.
After tracking him down, Vanner called Devin and asked if he had undergone IVF before – which he had.
The two families began putting together timelines, with Devin’s wife recalling, “There was a date where we were at the clinic at the same time. I was doing transfers, so they transferred the embryos and she was doing the extraction, where they take your eggs and retrieve them, and it was that same day… we think around the same time, uh, 14 years ago.”
Vanner was proud to welcome his second son through IVF. (ABC4 Utah)
It was a shocking realization, but the families tried to make the best of it. They stayed in touch and even met in person.
However, the families felt that stricter rules should be introduced to prevent such mistakes.
“We shouldn’t look back and try to solve problems. There should be things that prevent these problems and issues from happening and it shouldn’t be up to the patient to take responsibility,” Devin said.
The families decided to take action against the University of Utah Center for Reproductive Medicine over the error and in 2022 they settled out of court.
When the story came to light, the clinic released a statement saying, “The safety and care of our patients is our primary goal. Our providers and staff strive to provide excellent care and we are continually working to improve.”