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.

Equally, my children didn’t have any choice to exist. They’re here because their dad and I chose to have them and now they’re here we prioritise them and try to give them the best life possible life we can. If I do end up being a surrogate, we’ll do it in a way that respects the child the best we can. We’ll be honest about where they came from and hide no secrets. I’d still be a close part of their life as their aunt. But as with my children there is an element of having to hope that they are happy to be here in our family.

YABU. Humans are not objects to be created and given away.

I love that you are prepared to do this OP. The one thing I'd be worried about is as pp say, if the child has disabilities. You need to be 100% clear on what happens here..also legally, I don't know the system but you need clarity. I think you should go for it if both parties fully agree. I don't think its traumatising for the baby or your children as some suggest.

I agree and if it gets to that stage we’ll have those conversations with a third party therapist. At the moment they don’t even know this is something I’m considering so I don’t have any answers. I would strongly prioritise my life in my pregnancy for the sake of my children. When I was pregnant with my second, I had the same thought that this time my life mattered more because of my existing child.

I reckon they will politely decline

It's literally the plot of a Friends episode.

Must try harder.

What is the reason for their infertility, do you know that? Even seemingly high quality embryos may have chromosomal abnormalities that make successful pregnancy impossible. So a surrogate wouldn’t help. There is a risk of putting them through just more heartbreak without success…Generally I think you’re lovely for thinking to offer this!

You are not prioritising your own children though are you?
They are the only ones who don't have a voice and who will suffer the most should anything go wrong.

It would be the SIL's egg so genetically op would be carrying her niece or nephew.

It's a lovely thing to offer, but as well as talking to the IVF clinic I'd get legal advice.

The first person I'd be discussing this with is my own husband. It's a really complex issue. Surrogacy is fraught with risks for the birth mother and the child itself. Also, you already have one child who is old enough to want to know what you're doing and why.

I don't get why women would support and normalize another way of objectifying women.

In England a married man can be put onto a birth certificate by his wife. He can also register the birth without his wife. But if his wife registers the baby without him, and does not wish him to be on the certificate, then he isn’t.

I think you are coming from a good place in that you want to help them but the risk is so huge! There is the risk to your children and your dh, the risk to your wider family -families are destroyed over much less complex situations than this one and the physical risk. Most of all I wouldn’t do it for the sake of the child taken/given away at birth and the difficulties that causes them.

You’re right, they’re not idiots, which is why they’re capable of understanding and accepting that Mummy is helping to grow their cousin, not their sibling.

The baby would be growing up with their biological mother - the OP would be carrying an embryo created with an egg from her SIL, not herself, and is therefore never going to be the biological mother.

Re your point about adoptees - it is worth considering the accounts of babies born by surrogacy, but it’s not a like for like situation and therefore can’t be compared to the trauma suffered by adoptees, which is more likely to stem from rejection and unresolved questions. I’m not saying that trauma isn’t possible, but that talking to adoptees isn’t the correct approach here, as these are two different situations that you are conflating.

I think they might too. Another poster earlier said similar that they might be done (I find trying to find individual posts hard on the app) and wouldn’t blame them if they want to put this all behind them and plan for a future without children. But I don’t know for certain.

Yes you would be unreasonable. Why does nobody ever think about the baby in all this? Even if you didn’t use your own egg, the baby still bonds with you in utero and wants only you at birth. You would be the baby’s mother.

And what if you change your mind, or they freeze you out afterwards? That does happen in family arrangements. What of the confusion for your elder children, who would see you be pregnant and give the baby away.

Surrogate pregnancies are higher risk for complications including sepsis, pre eclampsia and postpartum haemorrhage because of the strain of pregnancy with an unrelated embryo. This could cost you dearly.

Google epigenetics and foetal microchimarism- and consider who the baby would want at birth: not your sister in law, that’s for sure.

If I thought there was a significant risk of this harming my children I wouldn’t do it. They’d also suffer the most if I got hit by a bus on the way to Parkrun but I still do it. The impact on my children is something I’ve given a lot of thought to. If I’d had any complications in pregnancy and birth then I wouldn’t do it, but other than one marginally low iron reading, everything was totally normal. Obviously I’m aware that an IVF pregnancy with an egg that isn’t mine is higher risk, and I imagine that part of the process will be establishing what that risk is by someone who’s looked at my medical records.

Agree here that they might, as lovely as this gesture is. I had fertility issues and my sister offered it to me and it was an immediate no. Just too close to home. You sound like such a wonderful sister, though (as is mine!)

Aside from everything else pps have mentioned about how badly this could turn out, and how it's not your job to give your brother a baby...

You keep assuming you'd be a close part of the baby's life as an aunt, but it's not unlikely that they may push you away after the baby's birth because of the baby. Your SIL might feel uncomfortable having baby's 'real' mum in the picture always reminding her that she didn't carry the baby and it's a 'gift' from you, as can happen in these situations, and (understandably in some regards) want to establish herself more fully as baby's only mum by mostly cutting you out of their lives. Would you be alright with that?

I wouldn't underestimate the unforeseen issues https://www.google.com/search?ie=UTF-8&client=ms-android-samsung-rvo1&source=android-browser&q=surrogacy+problems+sibling#lfId=ChxjMe

@MiniMischiefMakers
Just because it's a "high quality embryo" it doesn't mean it'll all go to plan
Also what if baby isn't "absolutely perfect" when born
Any idea what would happen then
Is your SIL going to be happy seeing you carrying the child she tried to
Will you really just hand baby over when born then step back completely
And if you've a partner, what do they think/feel about the situation
Let alone how your children will/the baby itself when it's old enough to be told?

What if they try to micro manage your pregnancy - dictate what you eat, the pain relief you can take, the activities you can do, the type of labour you have? Will they pay your expenses? Surrogates often get things like a hello fresh subscription. Think very carefully about the details.

I wouldn’t do it personally as wouldn’t want to put myself at any medical risk for my other children’s sake but think it’s a lovely /amazing thing to do if you feel you can.

New onset mental illness is higher amongst surrogate mothers too https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamanetworkopen/fullarticle/2836835

Severe complications higher risk https://www.acpjournals.org/doi/10.7326/M24-0417

A friend of mine was recently a surrogate for friends of hers. It’s been an amazing experience for her and her friends.