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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

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Original poster

Surrogacy BBC show

26 replies

Blinkingheckythump · 11/02/2022 21:43

So I've just watched the series on BBC about surrogacy and I'm really surprised about how it's made me feel. Prior to watching it I thought surrogacy was an amazing thing and that anyone who does it is selfless and incredible. And now I just feel like surrogacy is maybe not healthy mentally for the majority of the birth mothers.
Out of all the surrogates shown on the show the only one who didn't seem to have elements of mental health issues was the one who was a surrogate for someone she actually knew. The others all seemed at a minimum to have low self esteem. And one seemed slightly unhinged in how desperate she was to be needed and wanted by a couple wanting a surrogate, she even attended a meet up to find a new couple 2 weeks after giving birth!

They state that a surrogate cannot be paid, only have expenses covered. Yet one surrogate had clocked expenses of over 7k. How does it cost a person 7k to be pregnant?! And all of the surrogates were noticeably poorer than the intended parents.

Aibu to feel that in a way that the majority of surrogates are vulnerable woman who really shouldn't be renting out their womb either for "expenses" or to boost their sense of self worth?

I'm actually really surprised by how this show changed my view on surrogacy.

OP posts:

IcedPurple · 11/02/2022 21:45

I am totally against surrogacy in all its forms, including 'altruistic'.

It's an ethical minefield however you slice and dice it. It's sad that some people don't get to have a baby 'of their own', but we don't have a right to get everything we want in life.

MrsTerryPratchett · 11/02/2022 21:46

I agree. We don't allow the selling of internal organs, you shouldn't allow them to be borrowed or rented either.

There's a thread running in feminism about it.

Original poster

Blinkingheckythump · 11/02/2022 21:47

@MrsTerryPratchett

I agree. We don't allow the selling of internal organs, you shouldn't allow them to be borrowed or rented either.

There's a thread running in feminism about it.

Do you have the link to it? Thanks

OP posts:

Onceuponapotato · 11/02/2022 21:48

Interesting, I’ll have to watch it. I used to think it was lovely, in an airy fairy kind of way. Then I worked in a job which brought me in to contact with some of the seedy side of it. That truly opened my eyes to how utterly exploitative and misogynistic the vast majority of the industry is.

Ponoka7 · 11/02/2022 21:48

Overseas surrogacy is even worse. The women get a small amount of the fee paid and little after care. However if you have to give up work etc, then it could easily cost £7k.

DorothyZbornakIsAQueen · 11/02/2022 21:54

You will NEVER EVER see a rich woman being a surrogate for a poor woman. It's always the rich 'buying' from the poor.

All pregnancies carry risk to the woman, including death, and a baby isn't a commodity to be bought and sold.

The surrogacy farms in places like the Ukraine, are just disgraceful. Vulnerable women, paid to have babies for rich folk, who then couldn't collect the child due to the pandemic. Dozens of babies left to be looked after by not 1 single person who had a family connection to them, until they could be 'collected', if they even were.

Women's bodies are not for rent and babies cannot and should not be bought.

Original poster

Blinkingheckythump · 11/02/2022 21:55

@Ponoka7

Overseas surrogacy is even worse. The women get a small amount of the fee paid and little after care. However if you have to give up work etc, then it could easily cost £7k.

She didn't work before she fell pregnant.

OP posts:

AnotherDelphinium · 11/02/2022 21:55

If I was pregnant I’d be moved into a different role as soon as I declared it, with no opportunity for overtime, that alone would cost about £800 a month…

DorothyZbornakIsAQueen · 11/02/2022 21:56

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/womens_rights/4478157-Why-surrogacy-should-be-banned

There are other threads re. surrogacy on the feminism boards, but this is the most recent I think.

ToykotoLosAngeles · 11/02/2022 22:00

I thought it was just a nice thing to do - and then I had a baby. The thought of carrying my little boy, whether he was made from donated eggs/sperm or not, and then handing him over and going home makes me feel faint. A lot of my maternal feeling towards DS come from my pregnancy.

MatildaTheCat · 11/02/2022 22:02

I think I saw that series. It really did demonstrate how difficult a subject this is to navigate. The only way is be comfortable with it is for example where a sister caries a baby for her sibling or possibly a really good friend. And there lies the problem- how do you quantify that?

I’ve worked with this situation and it was very uncomfortable.

CatJumperTwat · 11/02/2022 22:03

I think the tide is beginning to turn in the UK. Hopefully we'll soon be one of the many countries that bans rent-a-womb.

IcedPurple · 11/02/2022 22:06

@MatildaTheCat

I’ve worked with this situation and it was very uncomfortable.

I think even that situation is an ethical minefield.

What if the woman feels pressurised into becoming a surrogate, just to be 'kind'?
What if she changes her mind?
What if the 'prospective parents' change their minds?
What will her existing children think when they see that mummy is pregnant but that the new child will not be their sibling but their cousin?
How will baby feel when they grow up and discover that Aunt Sally is also mummy?
What if the baby has a genetic defect which might make him or her less 'desirable'?

And so on.

So many 'what ifs'. So much potential damage to women and children. On the other hand, someone doesn't get to have their 'own baby'. It's very clear to me what is the more ethical side.

Franca123 · 11/02/2022 22:14

That TV programme totally opened my eyes to how wrong the vast majority of surrogacy is. I now fully think it should be banned. It's a feminist issue. It's completely indefensible.

DorothyZbornakIsAQueen · 11/02/2022 23:49

The only way is be comfortable with it is for example where a sister caries a baby for her sibling or possibly a really good friend. And there lies the problem- how do you quantify that

I would NEVER ask my sister or accept an offer from someone I loved, to put their health and wellbeing at risk, to produce a child for me.

Footsanitiser · 11/02/2022 23:57

I think I saw the programme last year. There was a very young single mum being a surrogate for a gay couple. She said something about it being the most meaningful thing she had done (or words to that effect) and I felt really sorry for her own little toddler when she said that.

EishetChayil · 12/02/2022 00:02

Purposefully creating babies to be separated from their mothers is unthinkably cruel.

This was brought home to me when I gave birth to my daughter. My body was all she knew. It was primal.

WorkEvent · 12/02/2022 00:05

I’ve come across surrogacy a few times in a professional capacity. One case I can remember being particularly sad was a woman who had children of her own. The family had social services involvement because it was felt that the woman was putting surrogacy (she had done it numerous times) ahead of the needs of her existing children. Her pregnancies were becoming increasingly risky but she still continued because of some pathological need to be needed I suppose? I felt very sorry for her children and very critical towards the parents who had ‘hired’(?) her. It was obvious that something was amiss with this woman and yet they didn’t care.

stinkycheeseman · 12/02/2022 00:09

I think it is like prostitution, in that people with healthy minds, on the whole, won't do it . So you are left with the poor and vulnerable people (women) doing it, and that sits wrong with me.

RedToothBrush · 12/02/2022 00:20

Its sanitised baby trafficking for the respectable well off with high social status.

Surrogacy is just a euphemism for selling babies.

Altruistic surrogacy is riddled with coercion and emotional blackmail.

Surrogacy is never ok.

Original poster

Blinkingheckythump · 12/02/2022 14:00

@Footsanitiser

Yeah she was only 23. She was the one who had racked up 7k of expenses. She was having this baby, using her own egg, for a rich gay couple with good jobs who had a lovely big home, whilst her and her son lived in a tiny studio flat and she was unemployed. She was basically selling her baby

OP posts:

IcedPurple · 12/02/2022 14:00

I've just read that American TV personality Anderson Cooper has welcomed another son 'via surrogacy'. I really hate that expression. It makes the mother sound like an Amazon delivery driver.

TheKeatingFive · 12/02/2022 14:12

I can't believe buying and selling babies is allowed in the modern world. It's sickening.

Even so called altruistic surrogacy is an ethical minefield

IcedPurple · 12/02/2022 14:16

@TheKeatingFive

I can't believe buying and selling babies is allowed in the modern world. It's sickening.

Even so called altruistic surrogacy is an ethical minefield

What's worse is when it's dressed up as being 'progressive' or even 'feminist'.

I imagine future generations will look back at it in horror, not so differently from how we regard slavery.

DDIJ · 12/02/2022 14:20

This reply has been withdrawn

Message from MNHQ: This post has been withdrawn

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