Adam Kay and his husband’s babies

[MatildaTheCat]

Apologies if this has already been covered.

I read in the paper this morning that AK and his DH have welcomed TWO babies into their lives, born to two different surrogates. One child is six months old and their sibling is two months old.

I genuinely cannot wrap my head around this. It seems so very odd to me. Is it a case of ‘one each’ or ‘get the baby stages over asap’?

Obviously nobody but the two parents can answer this but AIBU to find this really quite disturbing?

He uses the phrase “people with vaginas” in an article about how he felt on being told how to keep clean his newborn daughter’s vagina.

Good grief.

Is he the biological father?

Opinions on surrogacy aside, I don't think these are comparable.

People have different opinions on surrogacy, so while you may consider it 'a mother giving up her child' others consider it as someone helping a parent by carrying their child. A child raised with this thinking may not have this feeling of abandonment at all.

I'd think especially in cases where there is a mother and a father and the mother has used her own eggs as well (I'm thinking like Kim Kardashian).

I also think that adoption comes with additional traumas that could have led to your husband's issues. Things like abusive relationship causing a distressed mother during pregnancy, drug use/abuse etc. not to mention the whole 'origin' story of how he came to be with his parents.

With adoption you have a parent who, regardless of the reasons behind it, chose to give their child up. Surrogacy is viewed by some to be parents who always wanted children, who just used a different means. Much like IVF.

I'm not saying this in support of surrogacy, I'm just presenting the views that make it not so easily compatible to adoption.

100% this.

I have no doubt that the act of being separated from a birth mother shortly after birth has some impact on a baby. But the extent to which that creates long term difficulties for a child is really not very well evidenced.

Most studies in this area aren't specific to surrogacy, and carry particular challenges because in almost any other case where a child is removed from a birth mother at birth, there will be additional factors that will have potentially longer term impacts on the child. At the lowest level, a child born to a healthy, non-addicted, non-abused mother who wishes to place them for voluntary adoption will still likely have experienced elevated cortisol levels in utero because of the stress that an unplanned and unwanted pregnancy can place.

But more commonly, a mother who cannot keep her child at birth is likely to have experienced addiction, violence and very high stress levels. A child may be exposed to drugs or alcohol in utero, or physical harm, or extremely high cortisol levels.

So its not enough to look at whether children removed from birth mothers at birth have difficulty. You'd need to specifically look at the impact on children born through surrogacy. And in the studies I've seen, there is no evidence of significant lasting harm to those children.

Knowing that your mother has sold you before you were even born is going to cause trauma. Knowing that your father paid your mother specifically so that you would be removed from her - the only sound and smell you've ever known - is going to cause trauma.

The fact that there is no evidence for it is because it's such a new phenomenon, not because it doesn't exist.

Buying and selling human beings is morally repugnant.

TeaKlaxon · Today 12:45

So its not enough to look at whether children removed from birth mothers at birth have difficulty. You'd need to specifically look at the impact on children born through surrogacy. And in the studies I've seen, there is no evidence of significant lasting harm to those children.

Please would you send links to the studies you’ve seen? I should think they cannot be very extensive as surrogacy is relatively new.

As to the state of the mothers who are becoming surrogates, I wonder what living conditions or back grounds some of the more disadvantaged have experienced? Poor women are more likely to be surrogates.

My guess is there may also be a black market in this.

Are you still standing by your claim that I was wrong to object to the label ‘completely damaged’ to refer to children?

You can very easily google the studies if you wish.

Be good to see these studies, Tea. I've googled but didn't find anything.

I'm often reminded of the very wise words of MNHQ to posters when faced with things they find unbelievable - "So we always ask users to remember that not everyone on the internet is who they say they are"

Very good advice.

I can't find who used the phrase 'completely damaged' except you @TeaKlaxon

You said Those of us raising children who never knew their birth mother know that they are not damaged. And that it’s bloody ignorant and offensive to say they are.

I don't believe that. Any child who is removed from their mother at birth - whether they've been bought by another person or because their mother is incapable of caring for them - will be impacted.

Impacted =|= Damaged.

Also that quote of mine was in response to a poster who claimed such children were ‘completely damaged’.

With or without the ‘completely’, it is an ignorant and insulting thing to say.

Not direct personal experience but a very close friend was adopted at birth. Her birth parents were 16 (in Ireland in the 1980s so abortion was not available). There was no alcohol or drug issues or family trauma or anything that a pp has referenced that could also impact a baby. She has been told that her mother was a model student and didn’t know that she was pregnant until the pregnancy was fairly advanced. She was adopted by loving parents who gave her a great life (and on paper she too has a great life - excelled academically and now a doctor). But she has really struggled mentally and emotionally with being adopted and has a number of mental health issues now.

Saying “completely damaged” is extreme but it would be naive to think that there is no impact of losing your mother at birth.

@TeaKlaxon
“And in the studies I've seen, there is no evidence of significant lasting harm to those children.”

From what you said these seem to be specific studies so I would be interested to read them. So far I can only find some reporting on the mother’s interaction with the child during their early years, age 1, 3, and a little at age 7, but nothing about the outcomes as the child goes through adolescence, or in adulthood.

But nobody said there is no impact.

But it is totally ignorant to refer to any child, regardless of the trauma they have had, as 'completely damaged'.

The ones I've seen go to age 10, and include assessments of children's psychological development.

Incidentally, there's a lot more to this than what you've posted.

When did she find out she was adopted? What life story work was done with her as a child? How much did she know as a child about her birth family? How was it handled and addressed by her adoptive family? How did her friends and extended family treat the fact that she was adopted? Were her adoptive family of a similar cultural background? What did they do to promote her identity?

It's hugely simplistic to say that because she had a loving family, that her adoption might not have been handled in a counter-productive way. The way we think about children's interactions with adoption have changed massively since the 1980s.

I didn’t post any of that stuff because it’s not relevant. She always knew she was adopted. Her adoptive parents were amazing and she loves them. All same cultural backgrounds and in fact she physically resembles her adoptive mother.

I never said anyone was completely damaged by anything. But my friend (who has direct personal experience) believes that she has suffered lasting harm as a result of being adopted. Of course you may say (and want to believe) that her struggles were caused by other factors but ultimately who can say. I can only go on what she believes herself.

Yes, I found one that specifically said they couldn't find any data beyond age 7.

But hopefully Tea can furnish us wth the study they are referencing.

As has been noted, outcomes and impact seem to vary with age.

They're not irrelevant.

When a child finds out they are adopted and how it is spoken about, how their life story work is done, how others treat it etc are massively important to their outcomes.

Now perhaps her adoptive parents and those around her were uniquely progressive. But in general, adopted kids in the 1980s and 1990s did not experience the same openness about life story that is encouraged now.

i meant they are not relevant to my point, not that they are not relevant to the question of how adoption impacts a child.

I met my friend when we were in our early teens and unsurprisingly we didn’t have in depth discussions about how her adoption was handled. All I can say is that she believes it was handled as well as it possibly could have been AND she believes that her mental health struggles (which did not emerge until she was in her late teens/early twenties) are due to the fact of being adopted.

Fundamentally whatever work you do with a kid, they have to live with the knowledge that they were separated from their birth parent (in whatever circumstances). It is incredible that anyone would suggest (if that is what you are actually suggesting) that there are no lasting impacts from that.

And that’s before you get on to a child born to a surrogate coming to the realisation that they were created as part of an exploitative commercial transaction.

Thank you for the timely reminder

But it is relevant to your point, because we now know that there are ways that the trauma of adoption can be mitigated (which is not to say it can be completely eliminated), and those mitigations were not common in the 1980s or 1990s.

I also don't think it's a given that being conceived through surrogacy would be an exacerbating factor compared to adoption at birth. For many adopted people, a lasting feeling is one of not being wanted, not being good enough, of parents having to be found for them because their biological parents 'didn't want them'.

I don't think it's straightforward to say that a child will have more trauma to cope with because of being conceived through surrogacy. Yes, they will have to wrap their heads around being conceived with the intention of not having contact with one of their biological parents. But on the other hand, they also know that the decision not to be raised by one biological parent was made before they even existed and so cannot possibly have been a reflection on them (of course the fact that someone was adopted is also not a reflection on them, but that can be harder to rationalise).

In addition, unlike the adopted child (in the case of stranger adoption), the child conceived by surrogacy has at least one of their biological parents in their life.

None of which is conclusive - but the blanket claims that surrogacy must be incredibly damaging for a child (to the point that non-existence would be preferable) has no real basis in evidence, and the reality is much more complex.

Are you suggesting that any of that is done with children acquired through surrogacy?

Do they have life story books, photos of or contact with their bio mother, information about their genetic history, are they brought up always knowing they were conceived and born to order etc?

Because you seem to arguing with yourself a little here. If that stuff all mitigates the impact of adoption then shouldn't we consider it may be needed in surrogacy?

Indeed. The work done before parents can adopt is extensive, to the extent that many people give up. All surrogacy appears to needs is a fat wallet and a lack of concern about the trade in human beings.