Adoption or Surrogacy

[Dg33]

Hello. Looking for parents who've adopted a child or had a child through surrogacy. I'd like to know your experiences. What you found easy, hard, the process (if from UK) everything you're willing to share.

I can't carry another child due to medical reasons which would put both mine and baby's life at risk. Hubby and I are seriously looking into this and I'd love to hear from someone who's done it. We do have a child already. So we won't be ftp.

Thank you

To be fair to OP, it seems she can’t win. If she talks about how much she wants a child she’s told you musn’t adopt to fulfil your own needs, it’s about the needs of the child. If she says she wants to give a neglected child a safe home, she’s told not to have a saviour mindset.

It’s actually fine to say that you want to adopt to build your own family. There’s so much gaslighting by the powers-that-be that adoption is solely about meeting the needs of the child. It’s just not true. Adopters are human beings who are allowed to prioritise their own needs and wants too.

To be fair you should have a balanced mindset. Talking about fantasies from both perspectives is the problem.

She needs to be honest and realistic.

Your therapist's attitude to adoption is not unusual, sadly. Even therapists come to adoption with their own world views, which are often based on nothing more than watching Long Lost Family. In fact, for a while, anyone providing adoption related therapy to adults had to register with Ofsted - uninformed therapists were doing so much damage (they stopped this in 2024 as it was causing other problems but the underlying issue of uninformed and prejudiced therapists still remains and it still applies to children's therapy).

Anyway, if you want to adopt, social workers look very closely at any potential issues in your background. They would want to be assured thst you would cope with the challenges of parenting a child with kown or unknown issues and that the child wouldn't end up back in care.

This doesn't happen in surrogacy, which is one of the criticisms of surrogacy and also one of the reasons some people prefer it over adoption.

Previous setbacks are not an absolute barrier to adoption - you can actually use them and how you coped to show how resilient you are. But equally you do have to be realistic about whether you would in fact be triggered.

I adopted two girls supposedly without significant issues but tbh, before children start school, it is easy for social services to make out everything is fine. If it's not documented, they won't mention it. And the children are with foster carers, whose priority is keeping them fed and safe - they are not necessarily taking them to play groups or parties, where their differences/difficulties might be more obvious.

My biggest concern for you would be impact on your existing child. Jealousy perhaps. Your life can start to shrink as you can only do the things your adopted child can cope with. You may find they can't cope in childcare and you give up work. Other families won't do play dates. Family and neighbours get angry and start avoiding you. Teachers are infuriated with you. Clubs are increasingly unwelcoming. You end up massively isolated. This is what happened to me and it is whst happened to many if not most of the adopters I know. I didn't have a birth child in the mix or any big previous issues and I coped. I am proud of what I did and of how well my girls have done.

But it's a huge undertaking. I think it is very hard work and not for everyone and not just a way to create a family through Plan B. You have to start from the premise that you are offering a chance to a traumatised child. They generally need so much additional support. Imo a lot of adopters who run into problems do so because they tried to parent like the child was similar to a birth child and don't spot the early signs - and even somebof those who do everything they can, still run into severe difficulties because you cannot treat things like foetal alcohol syndrome or the ongoing effects of developmental trauma, drug withdrawal etc.

Lots to think about.

💐 OP. I’m glad you’ve discounted surrogacy. I think the idea of adoption is lovely and can understand why you have been thinking about it - daydreaming almost, I imagine, but the reality is very different- especially when there is an existing sibling. It’s really not in his interest at all and there is nothing wrong with putting him first. I don’t think adoption would help your issues - would you even be able to adopt with a history of ptsd etc, it doesn’t sound like a good idea for anyone. IME adoptions with different siblings have gone horribly wrong.

Adoption is the more ethical way. Neither though. Enjoy the child you have and don’t turn their life upside down as well as your own. I haven’t seen much good come from either. My friends son is violent and beats her up. He was raised from a baby. Felt desperately sorry for a baby at a play group. He was dumped to the side while she gushed over her miracle. Both similar ages. Must of found out she was pregnant during or after adoption. Quickly distanced myself from her. You could tell after a while if she could return the child to social care she would.

I haven’t read the full thread but I am an adopter and honestly, as much as I adore my son, I could never recommend adoption to anyone. Especially if you have a child already. My son came to us at 2 and is now nearly 9. On paper, he had exactly what you would want for an adopted child - removed at birth and stayed with the same foster family throughout his time in care. Yet, he has a huge amount of trauma from time in utero, contact sessions with birth parents and the transition to us, which was very badly managed. He also has other medical needs, a moderate learning disability, attachment issues and very challenging behaviour. We weren’t aware of any of this before we adopted him. I cannot tell you how challenging life is. We have had to fight for support and specialist schooling. Every single other adopter I know has a child/children with additional needs. They call it parenting plus. I wouldn’t change a thing as I absolutely believe I was meant to be my son’s mother but I wish I knew what I was getting into. If you are considering adoption, honestly stay away from programmes like long lost family and read up on developmental trauma.

Many, many adult adoptees would argue that adoption is not the more ethical way.

Since adoption in the UK is overwhelmingly of older children who are not safe in their birth family, with ongoing contact with birth family, how is that not more ethical than surrogacy?

I have only one child. My first was stillborn at 42 weeks, my second miscarried at 10 weeks, and my surviving child developed cancer at 4 years old. She is fine now. None of these hardships entitle me to another child. Having a baby isn't a human right.

Are you going to tell us what mindset is allowed? You cant do it if you want a baby or to expand your family and you cant if you want to help a child.

Sometimes mumsnet isnt the hethiest place. I hope you find time to heal op.

@Arran2024 I wonder if that poster is referring to adult adoptees who were burn in Magdalene laundries or in similar circumstances where birth mother was not given the choice to keep their baby simply because they weren’t married

Poor OP,

I have no advice on what to do OP, but mumsbet isn't your place for advise, find people somewhere else who have actually been through both, rather than people who just want to voice an opinion

I've found the first couple of posts set the tone of the thread. You've had a hard time on this one, it's not all like this on mumsnet

People talking about OP feeling entitled to a child..... so what if she did feel that way? Every single one of us who have had our children felt entitled to have them in some way

There are people on here, myself included, who have given the OP the benefit, if that’s the right word, of our own personal experience. I find it interesting that the one poster who has been brave enough to stick their head above the parapet about their surrogacy has had a positive experience while several of us who are adopters have not recommended adoption as a means to growing the OP’s family.

I think both options are very problematic sadly 😞

Agreed.

It’s disingenuous for people to say they want to adopt to ‘help a child’. The truth is, adopters, in the main, adopt because they want to be parents. And that is okay to say. I personally find the prevailing narrative that adoption is ‘all’ about meeting the needs of the child very unhelpful. Nowhere have I said that you can’t adopt a baby, in fact my second came to me at 12-hours-old and my eldest at a year. Please don’t conflate other people’s posts and then dump them on me. I’m allowed as an adopter 20 years into the ‘game’ to say that I wholeheartedly would not recommend adoption. I don’t think that adoption as it stands is fit for purpose. We all know that there is an horrific lack of support to help us parent society’s most vulnerable and harmed children.

Its not a surprise that someone who has asked another woman to carry a baby for them, is positive about it, and their self report is that there is no issues for the child. This isn’t an indication that surrogacy is in some way a better option than adoption, or that the two are even comparable options.

Nor did I say it was. I simply said it was interesting.

I'm sure you are right but it is galling to be told, as an adopter of children who almost died due to starvation and who ended up diagnosed with all sorts of conditions which have been incredibly challenging, that I have behaved unethically. My girls would be dead and/or in a paedophile ring if social services hadn't intervened. I have given those girls all the therapeutic support and a warm family life at huge personal cost - this is the reality of current day adoption. What do adult adoptees want? For children like this to stay with their birth parents? Current day adoption is nothing like in the days when babies were relinquished by unmarried girls and women and it doesn't apply to the OP's choices unless she goes to the US and "buys" an unwanted baby.

100%. We’re talking about uk adoption here. And we need more adoption parents. There is also an enormous need for fostering.

In your situation, I would have therapy to help me to accept and love the family I have and grieve the larger family I wanted and try to be content with the child I have.

Surrogacy - just no. https://x.com/fondofbeetles/status/1963557630452051974?s=46

My AD1’s birth father hanged himself in prison on a life sentence for serious crimes. He had schizophrenia. Her birth mother has BPD and psychosis. She is an alcoholic drug addict who is so notorious for her one-woman crime wave that she was ASBO’d from her home authority to another region, where she lives in a caravan. She faces instant arrest if she attempts to enter our home borough. My AD2’s birth father was found, after two fact finding hearings, to have been responsible for the non-accidental death of a 10-week-old baby. Other siblings were found to have unhealed, probably non-accidental fractures.

My AD1 is blind as a result of her in utero exposure to drugs and alcohol. She has an A-Z of other diagnoses. She is violent, aggressive and verbally abusive. She makes false allegations against me. I have spent 21 hours in a police cell on the back of one of her false allegations. My AD2 and I live in a domestic abuse situation. There is no help. Our plight is not uncommon.

My AD1 is now 18, so chronologically an adult, and she says that she wishes that she had never been adopted.

I am not an apologist for adoption. I am glad that adopter and foster carer numbers are dropping off a cliff. The reason they are is that there is no meaningful support, especially since the ASGSF has been slashed by 40 per cent. I would refer everyone to the extensive BBC coverage on parent blaming and shaming of adoptive parents on 28.11.25. I would urge anyone interested to listen to the BBC File on Four Investigates programme about the state of adoption and then feel free to make up your mind.

So are we meant to put up and shut up to avoid putting potential newbies off? Sorry, I’d rather tell mine as a cautionary tale. There are very many hundreds of adopters like me. And there is a growing groundswell of adoptees who are not buying into the narrative that adoption is a happy ever after.