Donna and Vanner Johnson conceived their second child through IVF in 2008. 11 years later, a DNA test revealed something had gone horribly wrong.
- A family took DNA tests to check if they had genetic health issues.
- Vanner Johnson had a shock when he found out his second son was not his biologically.
- It turned out that his wife had been impregnated with the wrong man’s sperm at a fertility clinic.
The Johnsons told The Guardian that they conceived their first child naturally, but after they had issues conceiving their second because Vanner Johnson had hernia surgeries that blocked his sperm duct, they turned to IVF, choosing a fertility clinic in Utah that specialized in male infertility.
They eventually got pregnant, and in 2008, Tim Johnson, their second son, was born. Over a decade later they found out that he was not Vanner Johnson’s second son at all.
Vanner Johnson wasn’t his son’s biological father, but they didn’t know who was
The family — including their sons aged 14 and 10 at the time — did 23andMe tests in the summer of 2019 because they were on special offer and they wanted to learn about any genetic health issues they might have.
But when they received the results, Tim Johnson’s father was listed as “unknown.”
“I felt like I wanted to scream,” Vanner Johnson told The Guardian. “How could his father be unknown? I’m his father. I’ve been his father since he was born.”
Vanner Johnson told UK TV show This Morning in 2021 that he only ever entertained the idea that his wife cheated on him as a “joke.” They knew there must have been a mistake, either with the test or the IVF, Donna Johnson told The Guardian — and the 23andMe results were otherwise too consistent to suggest that it was the DNA test that was the problem.
After waiting a year to tell him, Vanner Johnson took his son out for ice cream and broke the news. Tim Johnson took it well, telling his father, “It doesn’t matter. You’re still my dad.”
Once the couple confirmed with a lawyer that finding their son’s biological father wouldn’t mean he was taken away from them, they began to search for his “unknown” father.
Tim Johnson had been conceived with another man’s sperm
After tracking down Tim Johnson’s biological aunt through a test by AncestryDNA, the family found the man they suspected to be his biological father: Devin McNeil.
Devin McNeil and his wife, Kelly, didn’t believe the Johnsons when they contacted them at first, but after comparing medical notes and realizing that Tim Johnson was tall, athletic, and had a chin dimple just like Devin McNeil, he agreed to do a paternity test.
And, just as the Johnsons suspected, it revealed that Devin McNeil was Tim Johnson’s father.
The families realized that Kelly McNeil and Donna Johnson’s procedures at the fertility center had happened within an hour of each other. Donna Johnson wrote in the US Sun that, somehow, Devin McNeil’s sperm had been used to fertilize his wife’s eggs as well as hers, instead of her husband’s sperm,
The two families settled out of court with the fertility clinic and met for the first time in June 2021. Tim Johnson came out of that meeting with three half siblings, and Devin McNeil told The Guardian that he plans to be in his life for as long as he wants him to be.
DNA tests can reveal shocking truths about people’s backgrounds
This is not the first time DNA tests have revealed unexpected truths about people’s backgrounds; some people have found out that they aren’t the race they thought they were, and one couple even discovered that they were cousins after 17 years of marriage and three kids.
Kara Rubinstein Deyerin grew up thinking she was biracial, but a DNA test revealed that she was actually half Jewish, not half African. She now runs the non-profit Right to Know to help people who encounter surprises in their genetic makeup.