To think there's a valid discussion to be had about the ethics of surrogacy?

[LRDtheFeministDragon]

Just what the title says.

I know some women become gestational surrogates out of altruism, and that in some places (not the UK) women can be paid quite a bit to be surrogates. But I still think the ethics of it is worth discussing.

I'm curious how other people see this. I worry that it's so easy for women to be exploited. And it does seem to me that there's a gendered issue here. I'm not sure men 'get' how difficult and potentially dangerous pregnancy is.

Yes, just got that! I had a moment

I would think less of people willing to put a woman through that without her own baby at the end. Even family/friends - they are obviously willing to put that relationship on the line to gain a baby.

If a family member/friend were to ask such a thing of me I'm not sure they would consider me family/a friend once I told them what I thought of it.

What do you mean by TS mustbemad? That provision of the HFEA is unusual as it applies even if it is 'informal' artificial insemination, there doesn't need to be a clinic involved. So if the conception occurred with the aid of a turkey baster in the living room then it'll still apply, just so long as the conception wasn't through sex.

alpine i've had many of those today, must be something in the air!! Bed time yet????

Sorry User i get carried away with my abbreviations. TS is traditional surrogacy, so yeah mostly the turkey baster type. GS is gestational which involves IVF.

And now you've explained it i realise i was being a knob & not reading properly 🙈

No it's just complicated! Most of the HFEA only applies to clinics, so if you are an unmarried couple then the situation is different. That particular provision for married couples is unusual because it applies outside of clinics and outside of the UK too.

I have issues with surrogacy too, one of my issues is this

The way I see surrogacy in particular is why would I subject another woman (or even two with donating eggs) to a potential risk to their own fertility, their own ability to function in life/work/live without disability or even death because of my desire to have a child? thats whats not ethical. We're not only buying babies and body parts were outsourcing the risk of death/disabilty for a fee

I also feel that prostitution (which I am also against) is probably quite a good analogy - there are probably a few genuinely altruistic surrogates, but I am unsure around issues of consent. Obviously paying for surrogacy is a no no, but I also think the language around it is very coercive. Surrogates are "amazing" "selfless" "altruistic" with the implication that those who don't wish to be a surrogate are the opposite of those things. I think there is a certain amount of social pressure, especially if the agreement is between friends /family. When there is pressure it is much harder to judge true consent.

Finally a few people have commented that the surrogate should have no rights over the child as it is not biologically theirs. I totally disagree with this. The child might not genetically be the surrogates, but it is definitely biologically. The surrogate has shared her blood, her nutrients with the baby through the placenta. The surrogate has felt those first bubbles of movement, felt the baby moved as it grows inside her. The baby has heard the mother's voice as it grows. I'd say that it is a pretty symbiotic relationship that is important to both the mother and child.

That's correct Alpine.

To clarify...my brother is the bio father, but it's a donor egg.

So whilst i'm not her mum, she knows who i am & as she gets older she will know where she comes from etc. I see it as a bond for life & we are all fully open to her questions as she grows.

If you're not her mum, who is? If one of her questions is: are you my mother? What will you say?

I am not, to be honest, remotely concerned about children of surrogacy. I would imagine their chances of loving parents are perfectly good

That's a really shitty thing to say.

Why?

I don’t understand how it can be optimal for a newborn baby to be removed from its birth mother so soon after birth to be given to someone with limited connections. Irrational, I know.

It's entirely rational. I find it sad that you felt you had to add that.

The adoption argument is always rattled out aimed at gay couples. Why is it never thrown at hetero couples who use IVF or donor eggs/sperm?

Oh it is. Constantly.

If adoption is 'the ethical way forward' then nobody should be allowed to have children - with or without help - until there are no more children in foster care. The adopt argument ime comes from people who never struggled to conceive...and yeah ime is chucked at gay couples a lot more than it is straight couples.

Ninja she'll know from early on that i gave birth to her, so the liklihood is that won't be one of her questions. If I disappeared for years & she found me i could fully understand that one, but she already knows me as her 'tummy mummy' (she's 3 before anyone starts on about the 'twee' language). As she grows up the language & explanation will be adapted accordingly.

Why is it a shitty thing to say regarding children of surrogacy? Chances are - with adoption - for a couple who have to jump through as many hoops for a child, they will be geared up to meet that child's needs. Unlike some couples who fall pregnant with no clue

*as with adoption. Sorry, fat fingers

To those who are opposed to surrogacy in all circumstances, I would be interested to know which option you think someone in this position should take:

The couple have had multiple rounds of IVF, none resulting in a live birth

They have 5 frozen embryos left - all five are euploid and have the potential to become people. The path of trying 5 more goes is not an option because specialists all over the world have confirmed that the woman's body cannot support a pregnancy and no more transfers will be possible

A friend of the woman has wanted to be a surrogate for a long time. She has had full implications counselling about pursuing surrogacy. She offers to carry the woman's child to help her and her husband have a family.

The case is reviewed by the fertility clinic's ethics committee to be satisfied that all parties are entering into the process willingly, making informed consent and are physically well enough to proceed, and the welfare of the child is being considered and protected. Full life cover and any expenses are paid. The surrogate receives no financial compensation for being a surrogate.

1. The couple and the surrogate decide to match and embark on a journey together. The pregnancy is successful and a much wanted and deeply loved child is born. The baby goes skin to skin with the woman, the child's intended and genetic mother, as soon as he or she is born. The intended mother breast feeds her baby. The surrogate grants parental responsibility to the intended parents and a parental order is granted by the family court. The child is brought up knowing their story. The surrogate remains an ongoing presence in their life. The families remain friends and are in regular contact.

1. The couple decide not to pursue surrogacy. Adoption is not an option for them. Their friend goes on to become a surrogate for another family, to help them have a child. The couple do not pursue surrogacy and therefore they cannot use their embryos. They donate their embryos to another couple, to help them to have a much wanted child. The records are transparent and the child can find out their genetic origins when they are 18. The couple remain childless.

1. The couple decide not to pursue surrogacy. Adoption is not an option for them. Their friend goes on to become a surrogate for another family, to help them have a child. They donate their embryos to medical research. The couple remain childless.

1. The couple decide not to pursue surrogacy. Adoption is not an option for them. Their friend goes on to become a surrogate for another family, to help them have a child. The embryos are discarded. The couple remain childless.

I am the woman. These are our embryos. My friend is the surrogate. We have not yet decided how to proceed. The end result of option 1 is the outcome for the vast majority of surrogacy cases in the UK

What do you believe is the preferred outcome of these options?

My womb is too damaged to sustain a pregnancy

I would give anything in the world to be able to carry my own child

But after 4 cycles of IVF, 6 cancelled cycles, £50,000 of fertility treatment, 2 pregnancies, 2 miscarriages, 3 surgeries and seeing the world's leading experts in infertility and miscarriage, I have been told I cannot carry a child and the only way for us to turn one of our frozen embryos into a person is if we transfer one into someone else's womb

I cannot express the extent to which I feel like a total failure as a woman, because I can't do what I'm supposed to be able to do as a biological woman

My body couldn't keep our babies alive. I am quite literally barren

Coming to terms with the fact I will never be able to carry our child has been devastating. That I will never be able to feel our baby kick inside me, that someone else would be nurturing our baby with their body and feeling their movements - and knowing that the law means that they are the legal mother of our child - is very tough emotionally. Accepting that my pregnancies which failed are as close as I will ever get to this.

I have had the privilege of getting to know a number of women who love being surrogates. Commercial surrogacy is illegal in this country so surrogates cannot be paid for carrying a pregnancy. You can't simply throw cash at a woman. Surrogates in the UK can only do surrogacy for expenses only - meaning expenses directly incurred as a result of the pregnancy, so that they're not left out of pocket (eg loss of earnings, childcare, maternity clothes, travel to clinic or midwife appointments)

Surrogacy in the UK is altruistic and based in friendship and trust. There is no legally enforceable agreement between the surrogate and the intended parents. The surrogate goes on the birth certificate until a parental order is granted and a new birth certificate can be issued

Surrogates hold the power - they are the ones who choose intended parents to match with, not the reverse

As IPs you can't just throw money at a surrogate. A surrogate chooses you.

It is illegal to facilitate a match or advertise for a surrogate, so matches come from friendships between surrogates and IPs

I have had the privilege of knowing a number of surros from the UK surrogacy community - including one very special lady who is very keen to match with us. She has 4 children of her own and has wanted to be a surro for many years now. She has been sterilised by personal choice as she doesn't want any more children of her own, but she absolutely loves being pregnant and says that she cannot imagine life without her children, and desperately wants to be able to help couples like us to have their own families. Her ambition is to do 4 surrogacy journeys (ie 4 pregnancies) - one for each of her own children

Women in the UK do it out of incredible generosity and kindness, and a desire to help others.
It is from a profoundly humbling place. I am in awe of the surrogates and amazing stories in the UK surrogacy community

Where there have been any cases of exploitation in the UK, they've almost exclusively been either TS (traditional surrogacy) without parties going through any implications counselling as would be required if doing GS (gestational surrogacy) through an IVF clinic, or a UK surrogate going to an overseas clinic for a GS transfer, where they also don't have the same requirements as clinics in the UK.

I really do think the surrogate should be able to change her mind at any point up until a fixed point after the birth - the time of adoption I want to say but not sure if that's the right terminology.

That's exactly how the law works. The surrogate can change her mind until the parental order is granted. The intended parents have no legal rights. The surrogate has all the rights. The parental order can't be applied for until a minimum of 6 weeks after the birth

I don’t understand how it can be optimal for a newborn baby to be removed from its birth mother so soon after birth to be given to someone with limited connections. Irrational, I know

Would the baby's genetic parents be 'limited connections'?

Kim K used a social surrogate tho didn't she? So i can understand why the views might be slightly different tbh

No, KK had placenta accreta with her first two pregnancies and was advised a third pregnancy could kill her. At least that's what the surros on the surro groups I'm on said - I don't follow Kim K otherwise!

I don't understand the ethics in the uk at all. So you can't pay but can pay "expenses". My friends paid over £10k to their surrogate, I don't know the exact amount. This was for "expenses" to someone who didn't work so no loss of earnings I'm not entirely sure what the expenses were, the couple asp paid all the clinic fees etc. This lady wanted to be a surrogate to help someone I'm told, intrigued about those expenses though!

@bananafish81 I hope you had outcome number 1?

@Jassmells We haven't yet decided how to proceed. I very much hope to have outcome 1 one day. I understand that people on here are deeply uncomfortably with the idea of surrogacy and it is a very important debate to have. I do however think it's important to understand the different situations within a very all encompassing term of surrogacy. I would hope that even if people don't agree with surrogacy, that they recognise there are fundamental differences between the scenario I describe and renting a womb. I understand some would not, however.

@bananafish81 I hope it works out for you.

... there are an awful lot of children already alive who are in need of loving parents. Adopt a child, rather than persuading a woman to have one on your behalf.

Wasn’t long before some ignoramus trotted this old chestnut out.

I have massive issues with commercial surrogacy for the same sort of reasons others have posted, but mainly because of the commodification both of women's bodies and also to some extent of children, as sometimes it appears that children have been virtually ordered.

The way that bananafish and mustbemad have described altruistic surrogacy is very different, the idea that two women/families become friends and then one offers the other the option of surrogacy simply because they can and want to help is lovely and very kind. However there is still the potential for things going very wrong (for all parties including the baby) as can be seen in the reports from the cases that end up on the family courts.

The description from the report early in this thread of a first meeting with a potential surrogate in a service station with a contract that she was not able to understand, then not meeting her again until implantation at a clinic outside of the UK is very far from an open offer from one friend to another. This surrogacy seemed to be commercial in all but name, where the intended parents seem to have essentially 'bought' their babies as cheaply as possible, with little thought of the children's welfare let alone the mother. I hope it was a real outlier and bananafish and mustbemad's experiences are much more typical.

I strongly believe that mothers should never be taken out of the picture when it comes to birth and early nurturing and that it's very important for children to be able to have meaningful relationships with all of their parents whenever possible (excepting where that is likely to cause harm to the child).

While I can see that agencies have in the past and in some countries been exploitative of both surrogates and intended parents informal arrangements can go very wrong where implications and hypotheticals have not been thought through and then horrible situations arise where no one 'wins'. I also worry about the role of matchers that seem to have arisen through Facebook groups and other similar social media settings. It's not just money that can cause problems, sometimes people get a big buzz out of the power they get from running groups, and that must be magnified when they also really do get some power through being so important in creating life.

When it comes to surrogacy, a woman who loves another woman as a relative or friend undertaking surrogacy, is a tiny tiny fraction of the number of children born to surrogacy.