Surrogacy ends in abortion and ends a friendship

Thank you @RufustheBadgeringReindeer @ChairmansReserve

@OhHolyJesus
You hit the nail on the head there.
Women are socially conditioned for emotional care, to be helpful, to 'be kind' and now this has extended into risking physical health at the behest of fulfilling someone else' dream.

Many women in the developed nations may not be thinking of becoming mothers til their 30s thanks to higher education, workplace participation or meeting a partner with whom they wanted children.
This is likely when the reality of our reproductive health hits us along with the other risks pregnancy and childbirth bring to our lives.
It's very easy to imagine in our 20s that being a surrogate mum for someone important to us is an amazing gift to give.

It's a huge risk to take with your body and also for the future relationship with the commissioning parents.

And that is ok?. Because you feel it provides someone whose body prevents them from being able to carry their own child, with hope. That another woman's future is expendable for money so that a woman who cannot deliver a child can have own that they have 'ordered' to be created as they wish vs adopting a child ?

@WeRoarSometimes I am so, so sorry to hear what you have been through.

💐 for weroar

And for anyone with fertility issues

It took me 2 years to get ds1, it felt like forever at the time but I appreciate that it was only a very short space of time compared to many many others

@areyouthereyet
I have a history of late pregnancy loss but not infertility. I cannot explain the agony of being on a maternity ward being surrounded by coos of new born babies whilst sitting with a box, waiting to be discharged. Your world starts to crumble.

Some rather dark years passed and you lose hope, whilst everyone around is having baby numbers 2 and 3. It was rather a hideous for a while.

Not once, did I consider surrogacy.
It doesn't give me the right to ask another woman to risk her life to give me a baby.

Welcome to MN, by the way.

My eldest is gay

He and his boyfriend would like children eventually and will look into adoption etc but during conversations having a surrogate has come up

Not through them, just in general conversation

Dd has said she would have a baby for them

My ds1 is going to make the most fantastic father, as is his boyfriend. But dd could be permanently damaged through child birth, possibly die

And if I don’t want my daughters life and health threatened then I don’t see why I should be happy to let any womans life and health threatened

What would your plans be for the future of surrogacy in the UK areyouthereyet? Whose interests are most important? Would you commercialise it as some are calling for - to make it easier? If so how do you prevent it becoming a womb rental service with wealthy parents buying space in poorer women's bodies and companies profiting from treating women as incubators?

I had long term infertility, I’m opposed. Like someone said. You aren’t owed a baby.

I actually know someone whose wife was a surrogate. Once for friends and twice for 2 male couples she met on the internet (once it failed). The last time she didn’t even tell her husband she was going to do it until she was pregnant (he left her).
What is actually wrong with you that you would go get pregnant with strangers and not tell your husband.
It also means she’s had to 2 maternity leaves and 1 long sickness from work in a short space of time. Why is okay to do that to a small company because you want to be altruistic.

Let me guess, you're pro-prostitution too.

I am infertile, have no children, and am opposed to surrogacy. It was never an option I considered, though I’m in a financial position where I could have gone anywhere I pleased to make it happen, had I chosen to. Nobody has the right to a child.

There’s also the unspoken undercurrent in the pro surrogacy position that lives like mine, without children, are so unspeakably awful and meaningless, that anything a person can do to avoid a similar fate is fair game. I resent the implication- my life is pretty nice, really. Thanks for shitting on it, though.

When it comes to the point that women's bodies and babies become commodities, yes, we need to start looking at the bigger picture. I still haven't made up my mind fully on the issue with regard to altruistic surrogacy, but I do not think a person's desire for a baby trumps all other ethical considerations.

areyouthereyet
I am opposed to surrogacy because primarily , I lived in the Ukraine where it is a huge and criminally run enterprise . Women are cohersed into being surrogates at the detriment of their own health and wellbeing.
Surrogates die and it is covered up.
Lots of arrangements fail and the babies are added to the over 100,000 orphans in state care in the country.
But the sunny face of surrogacy where Mr & Mr Weathly or Mr and Mrs I Need a Baby is all the world sees.

Quite horrified by the amount of posts against surrogacy recently on mn. Really don't know how to put across what I feel but in short I think it's shocking the amount of people ready to deny hope to couples whose lives it could change. I'm willing to bet 95% of these people haven't experienced long term infertility.

Not even the most shocking part of the story but this really stood out to me:

"When the Weekly approached the surrogate couple to share their side of the story, they asked to remain anonymous."

So after everything, the "commissioners" went to the papers and presumably passed on address/contact info for a couple they admit were "traumatised" who were then blindsided with a ready-to-print story.
Just trying to get my head around the idea of going through something like this and then a journalist turning up on my doorstep with that much personal information, asking to "share my side of the story" (in other words, what have you got to say for yourself you selfish woman?) What the actual

While I was researching, I found this gem, "We guide you every step of the wayfrom conception to birthnegotiating tough issues such as your role during the pregnancy and birth, circumstances under which embryo reduction or termination of the pregnancy may be considered, and the surrogate’s responsibilities to you and your child
^
Cause your surrogate owes you accountability, doesn't she?^

For example, Colorado has no laws but is considering one that makes CP legal parents before birth. But as abortion has few restrictions in CO, it's unclear what happens when CP want an abortion.

Louisiana only allows surrogacy for married heterosexual couples using their own egg/sperm but legally recognizes the surrogate as the birth mother and bans traditional surrogacy because it considers it selling a baby. So it's a mixed bag as it's a homophobic law but stronger on mother/child bonding rights. Abortion, while still legal is very difficult to get in LA and i believe may be illegal after 20 weeks or viability.

Michigan is most like the UK and only allows altruistic (think they call it compassionate because the intent is for surrogacy like when mother had uterine cancer or similar). And they prosecute for compensation surrogacy. While abortion is relatively easy to obtain in Michigan compared to other states, you can't receive public funds for an abortion in Michigan but CP can't compel a mother to abort.

This is a cursory, and very limited, sampling. It's the Wild West and powerful lawyers like this Ken doll want to open up what I consider pre-Gilead laws.

www.iflg.net/who-we-are/rich-vaughn-esq/

I think (but not sure) that the USA contracts allow for termination of any or all foetuses without need for explanation. Not sure about changes of mind.

That article seems to hint that the law should be changed to force the woman to continue the pregnancy irrespective of circs.

In this case the circs could have been anything. As she had mental health issues as s result of the pregnancy.

That's really scary.

A 'foetal reduction' (selective abortion) was done against her wishes but eventually with her cooperation. The foetus was not 'reabsorbed' as she was told it would and she expelled and buried the baby in the garden

That was in the USA ? @OhHolyJesus

Laws are different in UK. I remember a case where one twin had anencephaly and was "reduced" - it became a foetus papyraceous (mummified) so when it was born the couple had to register it as a still birth and have a funeral.