Surrogacy - thoughts, advice, help

[INeedAMinute]

Hello! I’m new here, although a long time lurker. My story is that I had a late miscarriage last year due to a bad fall, it was my first baby and I was unfortunate enough that the D&C procedure damaged my endometrium. We’ve always dreamt of being parents and are in a place where we're feeling much more positive after the sadness of what happened. And of course, are extremely nervous about looking into surrogacy, having frozen some embryos through IVF. My mum fostered kids when I was growing up and I've always been part of a really child-centred family, which makes it a bit weird to think I won't be carrying my own. I understand that surrogacy is debated hard on Mumsnet but I wanted to post here to get some advice on people's experiences as we want to go in with our eyes open. We've not yet signed up to surrogacy UK but would be really interested to hear any thoughts on the best way to get involved with this world. Are there any good UK-based online groups to discuss this (most of the ones I've seen are based in the US). I'd also love to talk to women who've been through this already as a gestational carrier, or who are considering it. I imagine it must be really intense as well as (hopefully) worthwhile to bring a new life into the world in this way.

their own biological mother

The advances in medical science, which allow women to carry children they are not biologically related to, leaves us without such cut and dried terms. You might say that a newborn 'knows' the woman who delivered as their biological mother, but if the baby was conceived using a donor egg, the child still would encounter the complexities around this at a later stage. Nothing is simple anymore. It is not necessarily a bad thing for families to have new ways of coming into being. Children in many different kinds of families have processing tasks to do. I have yet to see any cohort of traumatised children emerging as surrogacy grows in popularity - quite the opposite.

@Defmy if you took the time to research it and speak to the right people, you'd find a huge cohort of donor conceived adults who are not happy about how they came into the world and the lack of regard taken into their conception. Since the early 00's (or thereabouts) there have been MUCH tighter rules around donor conception, meaning children don't have to spend their lives wondering where they came from. However, preceding that were some very unethical ways of creating children and like it or not that has an impact on people. Knowing one or two who you believe are 'fine' doesn't make it ok. It should be a basic human right that everybody knows where they came from

So sorry OP. I’ve had multiple miscarriages so can understand a bit of what you’ve been through. One of the infertility bloggers I follow on Instagram posted recently about joining something called my surrogacy journey. Not really sure what their remit is but might be worth checking them out.

I'm not sure that MN is all that unrealistic tbh. Aren't we all part of real life? I suspect people are just more honest anonymously.

I don't know anyone in real life who has felt anything other than disapproval of the concept once they have given it, and the ramifications more than a fleeting thought.

That's not to say that I don't have the greatest of sympathy for your trauma, and admiration for the stories contained above.

As with many adopted children their "mother" is the person who raises them, feeds them, nurtures them, comforts them loves them with every single bone in her body

Of course an adoptive mother loves her child but the subject is surrogacy . Adoption is complex and is recognised as such,hence the thorough and intrusive screening of would be adopters. Its aim is to improve an existing difficult situation that the child is already in.They have already suffered a loss. It's child centred,not parent centred.

Deliberately conceiving a child to give away is not the same thing,especially when money is involved. The ends don't always justify the means.

I posted this on another thread which asked posters if they'd be a surrogate mother and if urge you to consider these points:

1. The mother-baby dyad is crucial for the best outcome for any child, it's why the bar is so high for removing babies at birth. I cannot understand why anyone would choose to create a child where trauma is inflicted from birth.

2. Pregnancy/birth is one of the most risky things a woman can do. IVF and carrying a surrogate baby increase the risks. Pretending that it is a benevolent and benign act covers up the risks to the mother.

3. Women are not vessels to satisfy other people's wants.

It is terribly sad that you are unable to carry your own child, OP, but surrogacy is not in the best interests of any child.

I'd urge not if urge

OP, I'd be ignore all the hysterical posters on here talking about "ripping" the baby from its mother.
I had twins a year ago. One went to ICU, and doesn't appear to have any issues with being "ripped" from me at birth. In fact, with both babies, as newborns, they didn't seem to care less who held them, as long as they got cuddles and milk.

So sorry for your loss. I had a couple of miscarriages, and during the D&C was worried about the impact on my lining. I was researching surrogates, when I got pregnant via my 10th IVF.
Good luck with your plans.

The first person on this thread to use 'rip' was you, user1471604848.

As with many adopted children their "mother" is the person who raises them, feeds them, nurtures them, comforts them loves them with every single bone in her body.

Adoptive mothers acknowledge that their children have experienced attachment trauma and most would wish for their children that they could have been safely raised by their birth mothers to spare them the trauma of separation.
Deliberately engineering attachment trauma for newborns is vastly different to adoption for children who cannot be raised by their birth parents.

Ok, so the same thing happened to me during a d&c after a miscarriage. Like you, I was looking into every option to have children.

I'm now sitting here with 2 children I carried to term myself after getting pregnant naturally. It took (a lot of) time and operations and medication, but it happened.

My advice would be don't get too far ahead of yourself. Take it one step at a time. Have you been properly treated yet? Surgery, hormones, something to stop the adhesions regrowing? You might be surprised at what's possible.

There are other meds you can take to try to make your endometrium thicker too. Go and see someone who specialises in this.

Lastly, a good percentage of women who this happens to do go on to have their own children that they carry. It's absolutely possible. And don't believe all the figures about how much endometrium you need to have left to get pregnant - I did twice with a smallish patch only 4mm thick.

I know it's devastating to have this happen to you, but it doesn't always mean things are impossible.

So sorry for your loss OP

Agree with the lady above. My friend had terrible damage post D&C and is now pregnant with her third . I think they may have done IVF for at least one of them and it was a long road but they have been lucky

I was taken from my mother at birth, and I feel it in every aspect of my life. No amount of love and care from my adoptive parents will EVER make up for that severing of ties. It's visceral.

@TeckanandMultra

I was taken from my mother at birth, and I feel it in every aspect of my life. No amount of love and care from my adoptive parents will EVER make up for that severing of ties. It's visceral.

I'm so sorry for this. People who engineer this through surrogacy don't think at all about the baby.

Wow. I can not believe the judgmental comments from women on here who have never experienced surrogacy and likely not infertility.

We had an amazing surrogacy experience as Intended Parents and my best friend did as our surrogate. I now have my 11 month old who is an amazing and happy baby.
I’m not going into the fine details on here because to be honest I don’t want to be told how wrong it is by women who don’t know shit.

OP - PM me if you’d like and id be happy to chat about our experience.

I believe it is immoral to ask another woman to put her health at risk to provide you with a child. Pregnancy and childbirth damage women’s bodies, usually permanently.

Don’t use the term gestational carrier, it’s appalling. A pregnant woman is the biological and legal mother of the child she is carrying. The child knows no other mother. To deliberately remove the child from her is akin to a crime, from my perspective.

@northerngirl88

The simple truth is that you created a baby for you own needs to intentionally remove it from its mother at birth. It doesn't matter that it may be genetically linked to you. That baby was grown by its mother. It's all she knew. But your desire to have a baby was more important and you were happy to risk your friend to get what you wanted.

I am very sorry for your loss but I think surrogacy is totally immoral and shouldn’t be allowed.

I would do it without hesitation for my sister.

I would do your research elsewhere though as MN hates surrogacy.

www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-7898913/Mother-two-tragically-dies-giving-birth-friends-baby.html

What a heart-warming story

Either a womn who bears children born from using donor eggs is the mother or the woman who donates the eggs is the mother. Both can't be true. It can't be down to the intentions because the word mother is about a woman's relationship with a baby.

Legally, the woman who carries the baby for 9 months is the mother.

And it's not just women on MN who have issues with surrogacy. It's banned in France, Spain, Portugal, Belgium, Italy, Austria, Germany, Norway and Finland.

It should be banned here too. It's not in the best interests of the baby.

Sorry to hear you are struggling with infertility op.

I don’t personally agree with surrogacy but I can certainly understand why people do down that route.

MN is apparently not representative of real life, yet it’s full of real people

I think it’s just the uncomfortable truth that people on an anonymous forum will tell you what they actually think whereas your friends and family won’t do that.

I am hugely against surrogacy for the many solid reasons already set out on this thread. You can dress it up however you like but there’s no getting away from the fact that it’s putting a person’s desire for a baby above the best interests of a baby and risking the health and potentially life of a woman to do so. Infertility is utterly tragic, but two wrongs don’t make a right.

Gestational carrier? A human being, a woman, risking her life to fulfil someone's entitlement to a baby, reduced to an incubator. A baby, a human infant, separated at birth from the woman who created him/her.

I personally feel it should be entirely banned. No one has the right to a child.

I think the reason mumsnet is quite anti-surrogacy is because biological mothers know something that not everybody does know. Which is that pregnancy, giving birth etc is an attack. A prolonged, unpredictable, all encompassing and relentless assault on your whole being. It changes you forever in lots of ways.
Of course it varies for everyone but even in the nicest pregancy and birth, you are exposing yourself to huge risk to your health (mental and physical), relationships, work, just everything.
Of course this cost is usually well worth it.
But personally I could never ask someone to take that on for me.

Good breeders won't allow you to take young stock before they are weaned, so my usual recommendations won't be much help. You could perhaps try gumtree? They aren't as fussy about enforcing welfare.

Sorry, my mistake it isn't a foal or puppy you are after, just a human baby so it's fine to buy one with the intention of removing it from it's mother immediately after birth.

There's a reason wealthy women rarely, if ever, become supposedly altruistic surrogates for strangers.