Come on Wednesday.
Alla, Happy hump day, everybody, Happy hump Day.
I love hump Day. Laura's got her foot up on the desk.
But we all get itchy feet. You're doing a radio show, you don't.
It's like when you can't commit to something, isn't it? That's like what that means?
No, that's coming into money.
I think it means.
It's not between my toes. It's not like a gross part of my foot. Were talking about my feet way too much on the show. It's like just the sign around my ankle. It's so weird, like I just got bitten by something.
Anyway, I've googled it. What does it? Chi feet mean?
Many situations can clean to It's saying moisture dry or tin or parasites.
No, you know how they say things like the apple never falls far from the tree. I'm pretty sure when you've got itchy feet, it means that you can't commit.
You're run out of there, you're married.
Here we go.
Yeah, Apparently an old superstition is if the soul of your foot is itchy, it he said that you will walk on strange ground.
Oh where am I going after this?
Really? We got to the bottom of that guys.
Hey, on the show today, I have very exciting baby news in my world.
Oh yeah, I.
Mean, we know, we're so excited.
You've been through a lot with me on this show. You know, big breakups, big new relationships, partners, and there's a new stage in my life. I'm still at home with my parents, but there is big baby news.
It doesn't matter. When I had my baby, I was living in a sharehouse.
That makes me feel so much better.
That's probably going to come as a shock to some listeners.
Or lived in a share house with Matt's best friends when she was born. We moved out to two weeks before she was bornly received how I was, Well, I did my whole entire pregnant in a sharehouse.
Really, And I know everyone would have thought Britt would be the next one with like baby news, with the IVF journey and the engagement.
Well the sharehouse. She screams, pregnant in the sharehouse. I've got them, I've got kids, but they're just in the freezer.
Yeah they're on ice.
Yeah.
Well, I've got baby news, and mine are in this world. I'm going to let's go to a break. When we come back, I'm going to share. I think some of the most exciting news I've ever had in my life.
What bread was so excited for you, Mitch.
That's after this here on the pickup, Welcome to Wednesday. I this week became an uncle.
Okay. I was so happy for you.
You're so happy for Becky, for your sister, but also for you.
This is such a big moment for me.
It's the first baby in the family, my beautiful sister Becky, who's been on this.
Show before many times, many times.
Yeah, she gave birth to the first baby in the family, baby Remy, thirty seven weeks.
She's a gorgeous little girl.
And with my brother in law Kurt, happy, healthy, I feel like a different man. Even though it's not my baby. There's something going on in my body, my hormones.
Her Okay, mane.
Baby, and I think this is part of me.
I understand this, Mitch, because I remember when my sister had her very first so she's got a little boy and a girl. But when she had Archer, my nephew, my very first nephew, I had this real feeling.
It just was different. I was like, oh, this is my baby. I'm now an auntie.
But also I'm a mom, Like, I'm sorry, Alicia, but I'm vet. It felt really different for me, but also I think from us as well. With Becky having a baby, there's so much more load into this. Becky's been on the show, She's spoken about how hard her health battles have been over the last year having MS, and this is just such a huge and incredible change in life.
Like, we're so excited for her, so much so I sent a photo of myself bawling my eyes out in our group chat.
I know, I got a photo of it.
I got a photo of Remy. And first of all, they didn't tell me the gender. They're like, born seventeen seventeen, Remy, and then.
It's just a baby. All babies look like blobs.
Also, Remy doesn't really.
Remy's gender neutral, so my, oh my god, boy girl, boy girl. I didn't find out for two hours. They were so stressed with the birth of the baby.
Maybe they're trying to keep a gender neuse. They are beautiful. That is a beautiful baby, this.
Little baby girl. And I sent it to the group chat and Laura was sobbing.
Sobbing, And then I saw the photo of myself that I sat and I was like, God, I need to book myself in for some botox.
So I did that straight afterwards. I love it. That's what you thought. You know, some people are pretty criers and some people are ugly cries.
And did God, I'm an ugly cryer. No, I just think, like, and you know your sister Sherry's pregnant, brit.
Yep, She's having a baby in like seven weeks, her first baby.
So I'm super excited.
I just sudden came over me.
I'm so proud of Becky, Like she was so so scared truthfully about living with MS. She's only diagnosed this year. Having this baby. She had to get a caesar, and the whole family were worried and scared. And the Cheery family are so close, like you know us, Yeah, we were all obsessed with each other.
I still live at home. My other sister lives at home.
Like the royal function that happened after this baby was born, Michelle Truy, Like she.
Sat down on the couch. She's now a grandma.
She gets the phone book out, she calls everyone she's ever had an interaction with.
And she did it the same way. She went Hello Annie, Karen.
Yeah, it's Grandma here, like the same joke the first time.
That's good for you.
And an hour later, Hello Sam from Coles who serves me on a Sunday Grandma who.
So beautiful?
Is what it is?
Fair?
You did call me and I was like hello you like Hi, it's Uncle Mitch your mum's gear.
I love to plagiarize gear, you really do.
Definitely a Mitchchury thing I did.
But I'm an uncle.
So when you listening to this show, now you know that's been what's missing. You know on this show we talk to mums all the time, mums picking up kids in cars.
Now you understand.
Now you can go, I can write that game man.
Now now it's pick up with Britt, Laura and Uncle Mitch.
Oh my god, Rebrand Well.
Okay, from all of us, genuinely, we could not be happy for Becky. It's such a beautiful and special time and for your whole family.
It's incredible. We're so so thrilled for you guys.
Well, speaking of babies, there is a documentary that's on Netflix at the moment that has absolutely gone viral, and it's The Men with a Thousand Kids. This Netflix series honestly, it's all around sperm donation and the ways in which some people are accessing this donation via things like Facebook, Marketplace. It's so fascinating and we're gonna be talking about it next all.
Right, it's on my way here at the pickup well, which.
We've just been talking about.
Your beautiful sister having a baby, remember the first baby if the Trury family.
Cute and dining, and she's beautiful. She's so beautiful.
But this's got me thinking about a Netflix special that I've been watching recently. And I don't know if you guys have seen this yet, but everyone in my friendship group is talking about this. It's The Man with a Thousand Kids. It's on Netflix. It centers around this guy.
His name's Jonathan Meyer, and no one knows exactly how many children he has bothered, but as one could figure out from the title, people think it is upwards of a thousand children, so he Basically what happened is in the Netherlands, he was giving his sperm away to people like on Facebook, Marketplace, on the Internet, throughout these different websites that were set up for the Dark's Back, where yes it really is, but also come out it's come
out that it wasn't just in the Netherlands. There's people in Australia that have earth children to him. There are people all over the world that have birth children around the world. No, he's been traveling, so he's actually a YouTuber and a musician. Right, So he's traveled the world and every place that he goes to he's making sperm deposits. And then sometimes it's through sperm banks, but more often than not it's actually through like unofficial sources things like basebook marketplace.
So hang on, laws is he doing this because you know, not all heroes were capes and he just wants to help people out Or is he making.
Money from it or is it some weird power trip. No, so apparently he doesn't make much money at all. Like it's quite in terms of how he sees it. It's quite altruistic that he's like, I've got great.
Sperm and I want to give the gift of life to as many people as possible.
Hang on, if he's traveling the world he's making bank from this.
No, he's not doing it as a I mean, if you look at his YouTube, he's definitely not a wealthy man by any means, and I don't think that donating sperm.
Makes you a lot of money as a career choice.
But the laws in the Netherlands is that if you're donating sperm, you're not supposed to father any more than twenty five children. So the fact that he's exceeded this by like god knows how many. He says he thinks it's more around the five hundred and fifty mark, but
the documentary goes into saying it's a thousand. Now the problem is is that now it's come out that there's all these kids to this man, which then creates like the issue of all these children growing up in the same town who are all siblings or half siblings, and then like they sleep together, yes, and then falling in love with each other and going to the same university and meeting their half brother and having a relationship with them. That originally I had that thought of like, Okay, who's
crazy enough to go and do this? But then I kind of had to step back a little bit and I was like, I'm in such a privileged position that I have my own sperm bank walking around the house at home, you know, I don't need to worry about where I'm getting mine from to make children, But I mean, you would have to consider this people who are in same sex relationships or people who are not in a relationship but are desperate to have a baby.
It is so hard, there's such a wait.
List for getting access to sperm that then it kind of made me rethink. I understand why, if you're desperate, you might go to these sorts of resources to try and get a bit of help.
It's a good discussion, but then clearly now the ethics need to be outlined and there needs to be an infrastructure that can make something like this actually happen, because it is very beneficial. But you're right, kids getting with siblings down the track is not what we see.
I one hundred percent understand the people that are looking to get the sperm from Facebook marketplace like there.
Of course they are.
There is such a limiting factor or limiting number of available donations in Australia. I have multiple friends in same sex relationships that have had to go to other countries to get what they need to go and procreate. So I understand the feeling of desperation to go to a place like.
This, but I don't think I'm gonna have to do some research.
I don't think I can get on board with this ethically, there's a lot wrong with it. You don't know where it's from. You're not doing the same testing, there's not the same screening. So it's for me, I understand it, but that doesn't necessarily mean I think it's completely okay.
There's also the risks that are involved that that's what this documentary goes into, like what people thought they were getting, and some people didn't just get deposits.
Some people actually slept with him. So it's like, here's the thing.
Though, it's so interesting to talk about it, thinking this man's in the Netherlands.
We've done some research here at the pickup.
There is an Aussie version of this guy who lives and breathed in Australia and he's doing the exact same thing. He hasn't fathered a thousand kids, and he's a bit more ethically focused. But we thought, you know what, let's actually go inside the mind of someone who does this for a living.
Yeah, like what would make someone want to father that many children or even donate sperm in the first place?
Exactly?
So he's joining his next Adam Hooper from Sperm Donation Australia. He's coming on the show after this on the pickup standby. It's going to be fun.
Laura.
We know you're obsessed with the Netflix sensation that everyone is watching at the moment.
Man with a thousand kids, I.
Just think it's so fascinating.
So if you've missed what it's about, there's a guy in the Netherlands who has potentially fathered over a thousand children from his sperm donations across the world. But so many of those children are like centered in this one town in the Netherlands. So now there's this big moral and ethical debate going on around how some of those kids might end up falling in love with each other.
And you know, so we wanted to go inside this industry because it is an industry and we think this is so far away. It's in the Netherlands, stuff like this is happening in Australia. On the phone joining us live is Adam who but from Sperm Donation Australia. Adam has two children and more than fifteen donor children out there in the wild. He joins us now to educate us on this because it's such an interesting topic. Welcome to the pick up, Adam, How are you mate?
Yeah, I'm good, I've been I'm well wind watching the Thousand Kids show on Netflix, hasn't.
It My biggest question?
Though?
Adam is correct me if I'm wrong.
You don't go through the normal traditional sperm bank sort of setups. Do you you have a different way in which people can access sperm.
Well, that's not entirely true. Look, basically these days now the weights that clinics for a donor is two years plus. So a lot of clinics now are telling them to come to sperm Donation Australia, source your donor and then
take them through that route. So you know, that's the thing about spermination Australia is it's more of a personal choice because anonymity is dead now the child can find out who you are at eighteen regardless, people are deciding now that it's probably good to find out from day one if they're comfortable with who that Jenne potentially is going to be.
Adam, what made you want to do this?
I came across a person that it was in the same sex relationship and they said that they were looking to start a family. I had just had my second child at that stage, and I was in a relationship and I knew how special it was for me and my life to be a parent. And when I got to speak to this person, I thought, Wow, this person you really deserves, you know, to be worthy of being
a parent. So then I looked into the clinics and then I went to go sign up with a clinic and they're like, you don't know who you're going to be helping or who's going to pick you. And that didn't sit right with me because I didn't want my two children having incests. So for me, I had to know who I was helping.
So can you tell me then, if you've got fifteen donor kids already, do you have a relationship with those children at all? And also, on top of that, what's the limit for you? Like, how many donor kids do you think you'll bring into the world.
Well, look, my day's slowed right down now, I've got so many donors Now. Back in the pioneer days, when Jonathan was around back in twenty fourteen, you know, he would do a post and nearly every woman on the post was commenting and wanting services. That's because there was a lack of donors. Now we've got thousands and thousands of donors to choose from, and you know, this documentary is just brought through three hundred people we had to screen through in the last week week or so. So
you know. So for me, I'm not really actively looking to donate, but every now and then I come across a really good person that just captures my interest that you know, I feel compelled to help.
So if people don't, if people wanted to just donate, Adam like they want to do a good deed and help someone but not be involved, can they do that?
Look, every donor looks for something different for what suits their lifestyle. For me, I like the personal social aspect of it. I like to know that the child's going all right, and now I helped a good person. Yeah, you know, I don't have like check in we've mean sort of demands, but like, you know, just the friendly
chat here and there that does me fine. And yeah, I put the group meetings out there for parents to come and let their children meet each other so they all feel comfortable and know each other so they don't have that risk of incests. You know, the formal channels of clinics unless the kids come forward and want to reach out to the donor, then the children don't necessarily
ever meet or know of each other. So you know, you're still finding that risk of incest that happens from the clinics more likely than this way.
Wow, nowadays, let's go to a break because I mean, we can't just talk sperm our's hand, as much as.
We'd all love to, you would love to.
Let's get producer Grace in here, because I think if you're in the car listen to this and you're thinking, oh, it's a bit mad, I don't know. I don't know, I don't know. I mean, odds are I put money on it. You've got a nuclear family, you might be in a heterosexual relationship. I think you'd really benefit from hearing Grace's side, someone who is actually at the precipice of doing this asself. Yeah, I'm so Grace Epe joining us next on the pickup.
Hey, if you're just joining us.
We've been talking a lot about kids and IVY pro creation going down the right channels and the wrong channels, and the reason that that is is because this Netflix documentary Man with a Thousand Kids has been going viral.
It's exactly what it sounds like.
It's a man that is spreading his seed left, right and center, and he has a thousand kids around the world.
Go to kids. So we did speak to our very own version of that in Australia. His name is Adam.
He has been doing the same thing on a lesser scale, more monitored fifteen. I mean it's no, but he runs sorry, he's done fifteen, but he runs a group for it that is not mainstream IVF clinic. It's just a group on Facebook online where you can go and swap eggs for sperm or donate sperm. But we have our very own executive producer, Grace, who is married to her beautiful wife Diana, and happened to be a member of this group.
Grace, you're going down this track, are you?
Well, yeah, I've been a member of Sperm Donation Australia
for probably the last three or four years. No, purely because I was just fascinated and then you know, it got to a point where I was like, I'm going to marry this woman, so I need to start figuring out what my options are and that kind of thing, and it was just really fascinating to see when it was a smaller scale, and it's grown a lot in the last couple of years, and you see all these babies born, people asking for things, having discussions about co
parenting and stuff like that. It's really fascinating to be a part of RAY.
So why would you?
And I think the big ethical question that everyone kind of goes to, especially people who don't have to ever consider the idea of getting a sperm donation, is like, why wouldn't you go through an IVF clinic. Why wouldn't you go through a registered source. You know it's safe,
you know they do the testing. Why is it that so many women who are looking for or people who are looking for sperm donations are doing it through that are like an unregistered way or like a Facebook marketplace, Because it seems crazy.
It does seem crazy.
But I think the biggest selling point going through a known donor or someone you meet on a Facebook group, for me personally, is that when you go through like an IVF or go through a sperm bank, your child can't know who that person is until they're eighteen.
They can find out everything at eighteen.
But I think it's really fascinating and I've been reading a lot from donor conceived children who are now grown up and have been through that experience themselves, and I think it's so fascinating when they're like, every child has the right to know biologically where they came from, their cultural backgrounds, their family, medical history, that kind of thing, and it's really important to me that that person that my child would know who their biological parents are.
But you get that information through an IVF clinic, right, yeah, But they can't.
They can learn all their medical history and stuff, but they can't then have a connection with that. I think the shocking thing here that a lot of people in the car listening wouldn't know is that there is up to a two year wait at an IVF clinic to get as boom donation, especially even if you're happy with what's on offer.
And I say what's on offer, because there's not that many.
No, I know a lot of people that go overseas to get it because they go through the Australian books and they're not happy. And I guess that's a huge reason we're seeing people go into these underground absolutely, especially if you do happen to have more things around what you're looking for in a donor. For example, my wife is Filipino.
I intend on carrying our child, but we'd really like, you know, our baby to share cultural heritage from both of us, so we would love a donor that happens to be Filipino.
Do you ever worry about the safety of this sort of situation? And I think that's the big thing is everyone's like, well, if it's not from a registered source, it's not safe. But I mean also hooking up with some random guide and nightclubs it doesn't feel particularly safe to me either.
But is that a consideration for you?
Definitely, and I probably will go down the route of like testing anything that that kind of thing. But like you said, you hook up with a stranger in a club and you get pregnant, nobody's done any genetic testing there, nobody's you know, got a family medical history.
Like, it's the risk you take in any situation.
Thanks to boys that got plenty of it. Well up next they'll drive you home.
Mitch is getting fired after this. See you, guys,