‘My Gynecologist Of 9 Years Was My Secret Dad, And He Knew The Whole Time’

Morgan Hellquist from New York had never imagined she’d found out the identity of the man who donated his sperm for her mom in that way. The 36-year-old “screamed and sobbed” and couldn’t tell her mother, Jo Ann Levy, about how the gynecologist she had been seeing for nine years was also her biological dad.

Back in 1985, her mother had gone to see Dr. Morris Wortman, an ob-gyn in New York, for pregnancy help. She was told that the sperm she received was from an anonymous medical student.

Fast forward to 2016, Hellquist went to check on Ancestry with a DNA test and found out weirdly that she has multiple half-siblings from a supposedly medical student. It wasn’t until five years later, in 2021 did she find out that the father of them all was none other than her own gynecologist, Dr. Wortman.

She met David Berry, 37, and Carl Lore.

The daughter, who is now suing the doctor, sobbed while talking on Good Morning America, “He knew the whole time who he was, and I didn’t. He took away that choice for me.”

Levy had gone to seek his help after his husband, Gary, was hit by a drunk driver on his motorcycle and lost control of his lower half. Still 20 years old then, they still wanted to start a family and were only required to pay $50 three times a month before she finally conceived the daughter.

Since 2012, Wortman has also been conducting breast and pelvic exams on Hellquist. He even fitted an IUD for her.

Hellquist met David Berry, one of her half-siblings, in 2016. The 37-year-old only then found out that the father who raised him was not his biological father, and they went to meet more of their half-siblings, all of whom were around the same age.

“And it started to feel like, well, if there’s seven, there might be 20. And if there’s 20, there might be 100. And I started to feel terrified,” shared the woman, who also added that they’ve all bore some sort of resemblance to the doctor.

They took the test and found out that Wortman was the man that did artificial insemination on their mothers.

Hellquist recalled, “When we found out, there wasn’t any need to tell [my mother]. I was screaming and sobbing at the top of my lungs.”

Unfortunately, only seven states, not including New York, would categorize this case as sexual assault. But Hellquist managed to still file a lawsuit because of Wortman’s treatment of her despite being her biological daughter. She declared, “I have a case because he touched me without my consent.”

David Berry’s mother added, “He had my permission to use a donor. Specifically, a medical student. He did not have my permission to use his own sperm for a donation.”

“I am the product of something that should have never happened with an unconscionable violation of ethics, at a minimum,” David commented.

Now a mother to her own children, Hellquist said, “He’s something I can’t escape because his DNA’s in me. His DNA’s in my son. I wrestle with that. The first time I held my son, that man was in the room with me.”

But there’s a silver lining, and Hellquist added, “David and my siblings are… it’s not even bittersweet. It’s that they’re the shining glue that holds me together during all of this.”

Her mother also shared that she felt like it’s “her fault” and that it was as if the doctor had forced himself on her. She shared that her family would consider the man as a miracle worker and recalled, “He was all over the news when I was in my late teens. My mom would stop cooking dinner and say, ‘There he is.'”

Hellquist’s lawyer Kathryn Bruns spoke, “A physician owes a duty to his patient. In this instance, he had a duty to not treat her. He violated his ethical obligation as a physician.”

But the creepiest part was probably how Hellquist recalled him asking his wife to “get a look” at her in one of her sessions, seemingly hinting that she also knew the truth.

The doctor has denied claims that he used his own sperm to inseminate her mother but has not yet commented on the accusations.