To think it is wrong for a surrogate to have a child for two men?

[Extremelychocolatey]

The men in question are Elton John and David Furnish.

link

It feels wrong on so many levels.

I read an unbelivable article in one of my trash mags recently. A woman had her kids and was a successful surrogate to several happy couples. Her 18 year old, childless DD decided she wanted to do the same and did! (how that was legal or ethical I dont know). She bonded with baby before it was born and was devastated when she had to give it up. She became very depressed and desperate for a baby. She is currently pregnant with her new boyfriend.

How was that allowed to happen? Madness.

Sugarmouse, I am not thinking of the no doubt kind and generous women involved, or his ever patient rich parents. I am thinking of that little tiny, week old baby boy. And what HIS life will be like.

"So for every child who feels a loss, there is the possibility that there is one who won't."

Yes indeed. My 40 yo sister still undergoes counselling. And this was a for situation that couldn't be helped. Not one that was designed and paid for.

And Sugarmouse, I used to say the same thing as your colleague too. You happend to mention that she is dead, everyone expresses sympathy, so you say " It's OK, I don't really remember her etc etc" It is what you do.

I was 35 when my dd was born. It HURT how much I wanted her there, and she had been dead more than 30 years. Don't underestimate it.

Pantofino it's odd the emotions that having your own children bring up, isn't it? My dad died when I was 8 (a long long time ago) and when DD was about 15 months old I spent months feeling inexplicably furious. I finally realised that I loved and adored my DD so much that I couldn't imagine doing what he had done - i.e. ignoring very obvious symptoms of heart disease and refusing to go to the doctor. I was so angry with him for not being willing to do one small thing that would have meant that we probably wouldn't have lost him. But my DD is not my biological child, which perhaps reinforces my earlier points.

Just because people can procreate naturally doesn't automatically become better parents than those who have to use alternative methods.

In another thread it was mentioned that teenage mums make some posters cringe, but on the basis of this thread, surely they are the best parents for their ability to reproduce in the conventional sense?

I believe it's down to the individual couple and how they parent that will be the best deciding factor. EJ and DF seem to have a lot of godchildren and clearly must have a good way of interacting with children. I wish all three of them the best for the future.

My personal concerns would have been the age - but I don't think their age should stop them becoming parents - merely it would be a consideration. Plus Rod Stewart is to become a father soon and he is a similar age to EJ, no threads about that is there?

As for the explanation to the child, well the child was very much wanted and probably will be loved - what more needs to be explained?

MrsDeVere - that young lady was on This Morning, with her mum. I had serious concerns then that she had no real understanding of the implications of her actions (and this was post surrogacy). The poor girl seemed to still be in shock.

There should be laws or stricter guidelines in place to prevent that.

(overall I do think surrogacy is an amazing thing to do - not accounting those coerced into the procedure)

late to this thread, has made interesting reading seeing everyone's POV.

I feel deeply uncomfortable about it and can't really put my finger on why.
I know it is not homophobia, it may be the age thing, but the reality is how removed a woman is from the process of bringing a child into the world. That makes me quite sad.

I should step out I guess, as this is making me feel upset, so rational discussion goes out the window. I suppose my overall point is that maybe I believe that mothers are more important than anything. (Obviously my history has a bearing on this).

I am not homophobic - and would hate anyone to think I am. I just don't beleive that you can knock a birth mother out of the picture and not expect it to come back and bite you on the ass.

Do posters who feel uncomfortable about the woman's role being removed, feel the same way when a lesbian couple have a child, and no man is involved?

(removing single parents from the above, as that is a different matter)

I think it is different. Men can impregnate, then leave. Women are the ones who do pregancy and birth.

I was in contact with a family member who was dumped in early childhood (family tree thing). He didn't care who his father was. He was trying to get to the bottom of why his birth mother left him with "friends" in Birmingham.

to a certain extent yes I do reindeerBollocks, However, I know of two lesbian couples who went for donated sperm and both of them the man has a role in the childs life, they are not nameless faceless or nonexistant.

If as someone has said it turns out that the woman is a sister of one of the men who is going to continue to have arole in the childs life then I would feel at ease with it.

wannaBe, surrogates don't generally use their own eggs, so she would not be 'giving away her children's siblings'.

Also, you keep making the comparison between the US and India as though India is an exploitative and ethical place. Don't you think that's a bit ignorant? There are many, many talented Reproductive Embryologists in India who genuinely care about their patients and the surrogates they use. I think your assumptions are a bit racist, tbh.

K12Mom -- did you see the first link I posted? Pregnancy is not a business, risky or otherwise, surely?

It is a life-changing event all right, but to present surrogacy as some sort of financial boon for women in poor countries is to make them seem even more like baby incubators, good for nothing but childbearing in the eyes of their societies. It is also to grossly downplay the risks and ignore all sorts of possible issues that might not face western women embarking on this path. They do not have health insurance, or life insurance, and the risk involved is real just as in any pregnancy, despite the availability of medical care.

We never hear about long term effects these pregnancies may have on their relationships in their families, or with their spouses. We never hear whether their spouses have coerced them into this method of making money.

Well, obviously it's possible that a woman may be coerced into being a surrogate, it is also possible that it may badly impact her health. This is the case with everything though, surely?

And for people to say that "all surrogacy is bad" because some people may abuse it, is denying women the world over the chance to be a mother.

oh and someone saying about insurance for surrogates - ummm yes it is available - yet another ignorant sweeping statement. My surrogate would be frothing at the mouth at some of the comments about co-ercion and baby stealing etc.
This is pretty one sided - the whole thing stinks of homophobia to me re this particular couple

I agree with the previous two posters. Also, I know this has been brought up before, but John Travolta & Kelly Preston just had a baby, by all accounts through a surrogate.

How comes nobody has anything to say about that? Is it because they are a heterosexual couple?

I would hate to think that homophobia exists on MumsNet.

"Just because I get the feeling they live in LaLa land where everything they want available becaue they have tons of money."

Yes, this sort of thing?