am I being unreasonable to offer to be a surrogate after failed IVF

[MiniMischiefMakers]

My bother and SIL have struggled with infertility for almost ten years and has come to the end of the road with IVF. After many failed transfers, they don't want to try again. They still have some high quality frozen embryos, and they've ruled out adoption. I'm in my mid thirties with a four year old and a seven month old, and I feel our family is complete. I conceived quickly both times and had healthy, uneventful pregnancies and births.

I'm seriously considering offering to be their surrogate. I understand pregnancy and birth always carry risks, but given my history I'm comfortable with them. My brother and SIL are a wonderful aunt and uncle and would make incredible parents. It would be purely altruistic, and I wouldn't want or expect any compensation. I’m a SAHM so it wouldn't affect my work. I just love them so much, I can see how much they’re hurting and want to do whatever I can to take it away. I also can’t help but feel that I’m effortlessly living their dream life and I feel some guilt over that (all on my end, they have never said or implied that at all, even when we announced our second pregnancy). It just feels so much joy could come from nine months of my life, they’d have their long awaited baby, I’d gain a niece or nephew, my children would have a cousin. It just feels right to me to offer.

I know they may well decline, having already been through so much. If I do offer, I want to be completely certain first so I'd love to hear from anyone who has been an altruistic surrogate, been born or had a baby through altruistic surrogacy, or has experience of it with family or friends.

Surrogacy is human trafficking. Yes, even in 'altruistic' surrogacy. A baby is being created to be given to someone else. The effect of removal from the birth mother can be significant, or even life long, to that baby.

And that's before even considering the potential fallout for everyone else concerned - what does your DH think of this? You realise he'd be on the birth certificate as the father?What about your DCs feelings when they're older? What if your DB and his DW have ideas on parenting that you strongly disagree with? What if you are permanently injured or disabled from this pregnancy and that impacts on the rest of your and your family's life?

It's easy to say 1 DSis who finds pregnancy easy + one BD who can't have DC = solved by altruistic surrogacy, but it's not that simple.

Too many what ifs and hard questions to answer.

Who has final say on any medical decisions? Including abortion decisions.

I’m really not a fan of any paid for surrogacy.

But in this instance, I’d be thinking the same thing.

It’s immensely generous, but think very carefully first.

I had my child through IVF and it was horrible, just awful. If after another round and no baby my SIL has said "oh don't worry I'll have a baby for you" then I would have thought it a smug and self satisfying way of her saying "I'm so fertile and good at being pregnant and you're not".

Why would her husband be on the birth certificate?

I think it's an incredibly cruel thing to plan to do to a newborn. Have it and give it away. We have have learnt so much about the trauma that this causes.

But everyone will think you very kind.

Altruism is a concept that has no place in reproduction. It is in direct contradiction to our existence as mammals.

The above and this sentence "I also can’t help but feel that I’m effortlessly living their dream life and I feel some guilt over that" ring alarm bells. Go and get some good therapy before you go any further with this.

No. All surrogacy is immoral. You talk about how you’d be fine with it - all too easy in the abstract - but what about the baby? The woman who grew him or her did so knowing she’d give them away as a little gift to cheer some other people up and feel warm and fuzzy about herself. Grim.

What a lovely post. What a wonderful offer to make for somebody. Even if they don’t feel able to accept, this offer will surely mean the world to them.

This post I don’t agree with. She is the father’s sister. Assuming no biological concerns it’s a wonderful thing to do, and will be nice for baby to know he grew in Auntie’s tummy because she loved Daddy and Mummy so much and she could grow a baby but Mummy couldn’t.
It’s entirely different from gay couple pay Filipina stranger.

It’s a truly wonderful thing to offer!

My advice would be first to discuss the idea with your DH. He needs to be as willing as you are for this to work.
The for you and DH to both have some counselling sessions, separately, and if you are both still wanting to go ahead, then more sessions together.
Only after that to make the suggestion to your brother and SIL.
If you all decide to go ahead you should also draw up some mutual agreements ahead for how every step will work. It’s their baby, but it’s your body.

As someone who had five failed attempts at IVF, I think you are wonderful to even consider this!

Does no one else think it's weird that she'd be carrying her brother's baby?

The whole thing is weird

How is removing a newborn baby from it's mother okay if it goes to her brother Stan, but not okay if it goes to Stan in the next town?

It's weird. And wrong.

It sounds like a wonderful gift- but make sure you have insurance, if something went wrong your children and DH need to be protected, in case they lose you. Just because you have had 2 uneventful pregnancies and births does not increase the likelihood much that this one would be completely uneventful.
My partner used to work for DWP in benefits for the bereaved, and he once brought home the maternal death data- although it is far less common than in the past, it is still a very significant risk.

Ignore this weird post

although cut from same cloth as the Op

My concern with surrogacy is around your risk and life - pregnancy is not without risk, and what if the worst happens and either the baby dies or you’re left injured or you die? You cannot pretend it’s not a possibility, birth and pregnancy can be fatal - eclampsia, haemorrhage, blood clots, stroke, amniotic fluid embolism. I wouldn’t do it, it’s not your job to give them a kid because you have kids and they don’t.

Because they’re married so he is assumed to be the father

That's the law. The husband of the woman giving birth goes down as the father.

I personally couldn’t do it, the risks are too great and I also feel uncomfortable with removing newborns from their birth mother which is traumatic for the baby.

I can understand why you’re considering it but I think you’re being naive about the risks.

They already have embryos, so the parentage is her brother and his wife. It's not her brother inseminating her.

in your situation I would do this in a heartbeat. It would break my heart if I had DC and my sibling wanted them and could not have them. As it is we are lucky enough to have DC around the same ages and they are very close, and if you could make that happen for your family that would be such a gift. Obviously risks though.

True....

What normally happens in surrogacy cases though? Wouldn't there just be a transfer of parenthood?

What about your existing children? I can't imagine telling a 5/6 year old and a toddler that I was going to have a baby (with all the restrictions and limitations that places on you as a parent when you're pregnant and post partum) but they wouldn't be getting a baby brother or sister because I'd be giving it away to Uncle Jason.

I always assumed I would feel better about altruistic surrogacy than commercial, but in some ways it's more problematic because of the existing relationships and the fact that nobody truly knows how they are going to feel about babies/parenting/maintaining a close but non parenting relationship with a baby you birthed/carrying your brother's child or any of it.

And I just cannot see how it is best for the baby to be 'given' as a pity/guilt gift to parents who are choosing for it to live its whole life in this complex web of genetics and family relations.

Don’t agree. The OP’s feeling about this is absolutely normal and human, and she wants to help them as a result. I’d feel exactly the same if my sibling couldn’t have DC and I’d had them with no effort. I’ve also had IVF which colours my view a bit - I’m incredibly grateful to the medical advances which made this possible so I take a broad view on how children are made I guess.