AIBU to wonder if surrogacy is a bit cruel?

[NRGR]

Firstly I'd like to say I think someone being able to give a couple the opportunity to be parents is a lovely thing! I don't mean this in a nasty way.

When a baby's born they say they instantly know who mum is, by the sound of her voice, her smell, heartbeat etc. So taking that into account, is it a bit mean to take that baby after it's born and pass it straight to someone else? One of the first things they say to you when you have a baby is have plenty of skin to skin because you are all the baby really knows.

Surely regardless of whether the surrogate used her own eggs or not, as far as the baby's conserned she is mum and she will be the one the baby wants.

"Cruel" is the wrong word I think but it just made me wonder.

I think the idea that babies "know" their mother from before birth is being a bit over stated.
Sure they will recognise her voice-they will recognise the voices of everyone they have heard often, but anyone holding them and feeding them with love after they are born will comfort them.
I'm not sure there is really a biological trauma there ( babies go through many small upheavals- after all birth is pretty traumatic! )
There might be psychological issues later in life, but I think that depends on the circumstances.
One sister carrying a child for a sister who has had a hysterectomy due to cancer is unlikely to cause trauma to the child.
Knowing your birth mother had you for money because she was desperate would be heartbreaking.
Women's bodies cannot be seen as commodoties for hire and commercial surrogacy should be outlawed everywhere.

First of all I’m pretty sure buying babies is illegal?
Give another definition to the scenario where two men are choosing a woman in a third world country from the agency catalogue, pay a deposit, fly in, the clinic mixes their sperm (so that they are "both fathers") and inseminates the woman, they never see the woman and have no contact with her, just travel back when told to pick up the newborn baby in exchange for the balance of the payment.
Unless, of course, they broke up in the interim / the baby is born with a disability / simply changed their mind.

When surrogacy is routinely undertaken by the likes of Kim Kardashian( I mean she carries a baby for someone in a minimum wage job) then I will believe that money and power plays no part.

If you think buying babies is illegal, read about the realities. Surrogacy has been banned in India and Thailand and some people now buy babies from the Ukraine.

www.aljazeera.com/indepth/features/ukraine-baby-factories-human-cost-surrogacy-180912201251153.html

Words are used all the time to obscure what is really happening. If you met a couple who told you they had bought their baby from another country you would be appalled. If they tell you they used a surrogate, that is a way of obscuring what has really happened.

of course it is

I was adopted at birth in the late 60s and in spite of having fantastic adoptive parents, I have always suffered with separation anxiety and have had attachment issues. I recently read “The primal wound - understanding the adopted child” and do now believe that removing a baby from its biological mother is very damaging to the baby (and birth mother). Just be because I don’t remember the trauma doesn’t mean it hasn’t affected me.

en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Primal_Wound

Skin to skin is important because babies recognise their Mum's heartbeat and voice, having spent 9 months in the womb next to it. It's not just to establish a bond; it's also hormone driven and can help promote successful breastfeeding.

A heartbeat is a heartbeat, the birthmothers beat wont differ from the donors beat. Also, there are enough surrogates who play a recording of the donormums voice to their bump so the baby will recognise it.

I am against commercial surrogacy because money shpuld not be involved in this decision. It opens something very personal to all kinda of abuse. I am absolutely for altruistic surrogacy. If someone wants to help her best friend or sister have a baby then nobody else should get a say in this.

I can't really think of any situation where I would see surrogacy as an accepted option.
Those who are surrogate mothers in the UK, good for you, but please don't pretend that you're being Mother Earth blessing some other woman (or man) with a precious gift. You've just let them use your body, as blood donors or live kidney donors do. I'm afraid you don't get bragging rights.
Where any money has been used in the arrangement, whether it's under the guise of expenses or not, make no bones, it's a salary. You have paid someone else to take part in what can potentially be a very risky procedure, both physically and emotionally. I'm afraid it's exploitation of women at its very worst.
The only way I could ethically understand surrogacy is where one woman is unable to carry a child so her egg and her partners sperm are fertilised in vitro and implanted in a relatives uterus. But you're still putting the surrogate in a very risky situation medically and mentally.
Sometimes life just deals shit cards, and using surrogacy as a way of improving your hand in becoming parents is morally reprehensible.

Do they though? I’m not sure that a newborn has a concept of a mother let alone to ability to recognise her (things sound very different and don’t smell at all in the womb). I think you may confuse a baby shortly after birth than one that has literally just been born.

Babies are not a right.

Unless you of course you can have them as nature intended. It is interesting that many are now focusing on the right of the baby in this situation but there is less focus on the far more common situation of people that really shouldn’t be parents having as many babies as they like because they can. I’d hazard a guess that most babies, children and teens live in less than optimal situations with less than optimal parenting.

Now I’m not saying surrogacy should be a right - far from it... Nature is the cruel one. Most people can reproduce regardless of how they will raise their offspring and regardless of if they are abusive or neglectful.

MarmiteTermite I’ve heard that before and I’m sorry. However what are the implications of this? Should women never be allowed to give their babies up? Should they be forced to abort if they don’t want to raise a baby?! Feels like it could be used to tie women to motherhood that they potentially don’t want.

I think surrogacy is pretty awful, especially given the financial disparity between the birth mother and the adoptive parents that seems the norm ( more so in America though) and it’s not something I would ever be involved in
However, I have no fertility issues so I can’t really judge people who do it generally - apart from rich people who rent the wombs of women in desperate circumstances, I DO judge them

Just reading about it, and they think a baby can recognise its mothers voice from 7 months gestation.
They don't know if babies can recognise other voices. Remember a baby in a womb is hearing its mothers voice from being inside her body. It would be a very different ability to be able to hear enough outside her body, to recognise voices.

I am absolutely for altruistic surrogacy. If someone wants to help her best friend or sister have a baby then nobody else should get a say in this.

Altruistic surrogacy in the UK doesn't just cover a woman choosing to help someone close to them with whom they have an existing relationship though- I might be able to support those very restricted circumstances. Altruistic surrogacy in the UK can lead to situations like the following- a vulnerable woman with some learning difficulties and in financial hardship meeting a couple on FB and being offered a few grand in 'expenses' to carry a child. Perfectly legal altruistic surrogacy under our laws, absolutely exploitative. For anyone interested in the judgement-

www.bailii.org/ew/cases/EWFC/HCJ/2016/34.html

There is a lot of evidence to show that adopted children - even those relinquished at birth in the 50s and 60s- suffer long term psychological problems. Whether this is related to the act of separation, stress levels of the birth mother during the pregnancy, inability of the adoptive parents to accept their own infertility etc is not clear. Some of these issues would be mitigated by commerical surrogacy arrangements, especially those using eggs/sperm from the adoptive parents, but not all.
Surrogacy is baby farming. This responds to a demand from childless people. They (usually) enter into a commercial agreement with a woman who is prepared to sell her body for commercial gain. Where the mother is from the developing world, she does this because she cannot earn money in other ways. Often these women are further exploited by middle men in the business for the money.
The only person without a choice in all of this is the child which is produced. And perhaps we should be focussing on that child‘s needs rather than those of the buyer/seller.

I read of 2 gay men one is an actor, BD Wong. The sister of one of the men was a straight surrogate with the sperm of the one who wasn't her brother. I thought that was a good way of both men having a biological link with the child.

Reading these posts has made me feel a bit sad that my children were handed to their fathers for the first cuddle. I was just exhausted and just didn't want to hold anyone for a few minutes.

There’s an article about surrogacy in the observer today, although it considers this more from the perspective of women’s bodies rather than the children

www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/jan/06/keeping-up-with-the-kardashians-paying-other-women-to-have-your-babies-surrogacy

@MinecraftMother

I think you did a wonderful thing.

I am originally from a country which is a surrogacy tourism destination and I am very uneasy about it.
I know someone who went to such a country for a surrogacy arrangement. It was heartbreaking - the women don't live with their families for the gestation, instead just seeing their kids at approved visit times. The women and families were hugely appreciative as this was a huge amount of money and no doubt the clinic coached them on what to say. But who knows what pressure was put on the woman to participate?
The other concern was the rejection of the baby. This particular clinic just dealt with mother or donor eggs, and the surrogates literally rejected the babies at birth - the birth mothers didn't hold them or have a lot of interest in them. Could the babies have picked up on that vibe? Quite a few went to special care when delivered, though possibly that was a way for the clinic to increase costs for the parents.

I have huge respect for altruistic surrogate mothers in this country where money doesn't change hands. But that is totally different to getting a mother in the developing world to carry your baby.

thighofrelief You carried and grew your baby for 9 months. Your baby will have known you are its mother. So it will have made absolutely no difference that its father held it first.

I think all the talk of how bad surrogacy is for women in developing countries shouldn’t detract that it’s not great for poor women in ‘developed’ countries either, ie America.

It’s still selling your womb, or worse, your baby, because you need money.

But who knows what pressure was put on the woman to participate
As every exploitative relationship, it is not all black and white. The financial reward is huge compared to the local earnings, and participation is voluntary. There is also a strong myth, when it comes to "straight" surrogates, that "in the West" a grown-up child can demand for the identity of the biological mother to be disclosed, and at some point in the future they will come looking for her and will probably help her and their half-siblings in some way, given that they were taken into an affluent western family.
But then there's also the attitude as the one described in the article linked above, where the parents blame the clinic for allowing the pregnant surrogate to travel, which, in their opinion, led to a very premature birth (and it looks like no one wanted these children anymore). If that's not a slave owner's mentality, tell me what is. Presumably the clinic had to handcuff the woman in question?

I think all the talk of how bad surrogacy is for women in developing countries shouldn’t detract that it’s not great for poor women in ‘developed’ countries either, ie America.

This is a really good point. I've seen people defending their use of surrogates from the US (even on MN) because it's a 'developed' country, seemingly ignoring the massive wealth inequalities, highest maternal mortality rates in the western world and completely draconian surrogacy contracts.