14th April 2014 | by MFC Team
Man becomes father using sperm frozen before life-saving cancer treatment
Antony Allen, 41, was diagnosed with Hodgkin’s lymphoma at age 17, and was required to undergo a year of life-saving chemotherapy. Allen was told that the cancer-fighting treatment would leave him infertile. His father, Les, encouraged him to freeze his sperm so that he would have an opportunity to become a father in the future. Although reluctant, Allen agreed to have several samples of his sperm frozen.
He shared how difficult it was to be a teenager with cancer – “When you consider what else is happening to kids of that age – bodies changing, exams, peer pressures of all kinds – life is hard enough.”
Still, despite receiving regular cancer treatment, Allen tried to live a “normal” life. He is now the father of three boys: Charlie, 13, Jonah, 5, and Bobby, 2. All three of his children were conceived using Allen’s cryopreserved (frozen) sperm. Allen says that he is grateful that his father “insisted” that he freeze his sperm. He says:
“I owe my dad a debt that I can never repay. Grateful doesn’t even come close to how I feel when I look at my boys and think about what might not have been.”
After 24 years of cancer checkups, Allen has been given the “all clear”. Along with being the proud father of three boys with his wife Sarah, he is now pursuing his dream of being a social worker and has opened his own youth club to provide support to teens.
Read the article here.
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