Has anyone been a surrogate for a family member?

[Okkitokkiunga]

That's it really. I am in my early forties and considering offering to be a surrogate for a family member. They have one child naturally in amongst MMC. I believe secondary infertility is now being considered.

I will have to have a c section. In my last pregnancy my waters went at 32 weeks though I kept him in till 36 weeks. I believe DH would support this if medically got the go ahead. If it makes any difference it would be for my DB and SiL, host surrogacy. It has never been mentioned and I don't even know if they'd be interested.

Any words of advice? Thank you.

My sister struggled to conceive, I had already made up my mind I would offer to carry her child. Luckily it didn't come to that and she had a ds and then a dd. I do the same for my daughter if I was still young enough. I think it would be an amazing thing to do for someone you love.

This might be totally irrelevant but myself and DW (gay marriage) have had a very male friend casually mention in conversation that he would be happy to be a sperm donor. It was a very subtle way of letting us know that we could ask if needed- we don't but it was a very nice way to go about it and much appreciated as it's a very daunting thought of asking someone out of the blue.

Lol that should say lovely male friend not very male friend

There are lots of FB groups for surros and IPs where you'd get lots of advice from surros

For GS (host surrogacy) it's mandatory to have full implications counselling and as part of the welfare of the child guidance clinics should be assured that the pregnancy would be safe for both surro and baby

It's possible therefore that with a given obstetric history, a clinic may recommend against or even refuse a transfer into a surrogate where there is reason to think the pregnancy could present health issues for either party

I'd suggest getting guidance from surrogacy UK and joining the FB groups (many are secret, but some are visible by searching and you can request to join)

If they've got secondary infertility is there any reason to think that surrogacy would even be indicated? Have they had multiple failed IVF already and the suggestion been that your SIL is unable to sustain a pregnancy ie the problem is with the uterine environment and not the embryo?

I say this as someone who is at the end of her infertility journey with her own body, and as my uterus isn't up to the job, the only way DH and I will be able to have a baby is to transfer one of our embryos into someone else's

They would need to have embryos created for host surrogacy, and unless there is a strong medical indication for the problem being with the uterine environment, most clinics wouldn't recommend a first IVF cycle be transferring into a surrogate in the first instance. If they have had multiple failed cycles with recurrent failed implantation or recurrent pregnancy loss, then there might be indication for surrogacy.

Point being that surrogacy is only really an option to pursue for infertility if there is good reason to suggest the problem is with the soil (the uterine environment) and not the seed (the sperm or egg - unless donor sperm or eggs will be used)

You still need healthy embryos for surrogacy to succeed - so if they've not mentioned being at the end of their IVF journey, it's potentially unlikely that host surrogacy would be the logical next step