Mother acted as surrogate for her gay son

Isn’t pregnancy more risky with increasing maternal age? That was my understanding, but I haven’t got data to hand...

What is this supposedly a 'solution' to? If a daughter wants a child and later discovers a health issue that means she can't, that is a totally different issue to the fact that a male cannot carry a child. Why should it be the job of female relatives to sort out males wishes whether that be gay sons, or trans people like Jazz who previously seemed to suggest utilizing their own sister.

I''ll have to take your word for it but I wouldn't use men's law as the standard for deciding who or who isn't a mother of a child. It isn't designed to work for women's interests or needs though, so it wouldn't surprise me in the slightest that a woman who gestated and birthed a child is treated legally as a literal incubator.

I don't support surrogacy in any form, this is another example of why it's a bad idea and harmful to women and children.

I think part of the question here has to be ‘what kind of a man allows his 61 year old mother to carry his child?’. And which idiot doctors facilitated it? 61 years for god’s sake.

Ooh that’s not right actually - not in the UK anyway.

Yet a surrogate with egg donor has no legal rights to keep the baby do they - so not viewed the same as a mother in terms of the one who provides the genetic material. So you would feel differently about it if it had been the partner’s sperm that was used?

When I read "mother" in your post Tunnock I thought you were talking about the woman who gestated and birthed the baby, not the egg donor. The former being the woman whose body literally grew the baby and protected it as a foetus - you can't get any more motherly than that.

This man fathered a child with his mother. Of course it's breaking the incest taboo.

The taboo is connected to the impact on a child of its bloodline being too closely linked - it’s not the woman’s egg so the mother and father in this case have no blood relationship.

Do you consider it incest if the woman carries a child for her daughter?

Because she's literally carrying and giving birth to her son's child - using her body so he can reproduce. Can you really not see that? The incest taboo isn't just about sex, it's about the creation of children too.

It wasn't the mothers egg.

The egg was donated by her son's partners sister and fertilised by her sons sperm.

So the baby is genetically related to both men.

How on earth is it taboo?

Presumably it wasn't the mother's egg and they didn't have sex.

How is it incest?

This makes me feel a bit sick if I'm honest. Sorry.

Exactly how much female self sacrifice is required before it's enough? Surrogacy seems to be the new frontier.

Nu2u no I would not do that, nor would I ever have done it, for my children

I said this to ds1 and partner the other day

They said 'eargh'

I said ' i wasn't bloody volunteering!!'

(I would)

How is that baby going to feel when it grows up and discovers its origins hopefully happy that they come from such a wonderfully loving and caring family. Far better than being born into a family with inbred hate of unconventional families. I'd happily do the same for my children, wouldn't you?

Hideous. How is that baby going to feel when it grows up and discovers its origins?

What's an 'old fashioned delivery' when it's at home? New-fangled way of saying vaginal I expect.

Am also very surprised, given the woman's age. I'd have thought the uterus wouldn't want to play ball at that age (younger than me btw).

I am concerned about her age, as it is well beyond typical menopause.

However, altruistic surrogacy (such as that within families for those unable to carry a child) is OK with me. If this were a 38yo whose own family was complete, acting as surrogate for a sister unable to carry a pregnancy on medical grounds.

It is very rare for women over 50 to seek IVF, and becomes headline news. The cut off is usually much younger, especially if it is NHS funded.

Existing thread here:

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/womens_rights/3550686-Surrogacy

I would be a surrogate for my child, in a heartbeat, if they needed me to and I was able to.