Gay dads take surrogate to court after she bans them from seeing twin baby girls

[Cwenthryth]

www.dailyrecord.co.uk/news/uk-world-news/gay-dads-take-surrogate-court-21231692

This popped up on my Twitter this morning, I thought it might be an interesting case to discuss here. The details are very hazy, and there are two sides to every story, but on the face of it, reading this has challenged my thoughts around surrogacy a bit - poor dads fighting for their daughters sob story, ‘the surrogate’ is painted as manipulative and dishonest. However, I really dislike how the woman is referred to as the men’s surrogate throughout the article, rather than the baby’s mother, or anything in her own right, and there is no regard for the trauma she has been through with a twin pregnancy, premature labour and very very poorly babies. She risked her life to make those girls, we are all very aware how women’s mental health can be severely affected during and after pregnancy. The article doesn’t even reference the children’s point of view/relationship with their mother, ot is all about the gay couple, their wants and their experience.

I don’t really have any conclusions at the moment but wanted to open up a discussion with other FWRers. I think perhaps the current laws are not working as well as they could, reform is probably inevitable and surrogacy isn’t going to be banned entirely any time soon, so needs to be regulated somehow.

Wow, that story, OhHolyJesus.

It notes that this is thought to be the first time the surrogate kept the babies
I think it mentions 10 UK cases prior to this where the mother (the birth mother) kept the baby. This case differed because the eggs were donor eggs, unlike the previous cases.
Turns out trying to morally divorce the mother's body from the children she creates with it by using donor eggs doesn't work as intended. A mother goes through the same physical pregnancy and birth experience whether the eggs were hers or not. Attempting to rationalise that huge physical process into irrelevancy because:genetics can't be done.

A really interesting phrase leapt out from the article.
The babies' biological parents must now prove she is an unfit mother before they can apply for custody of their own flesh and blood.
Those babies are - literally - the flesh and blood of the birth mother, not the genetic parents. They may have been built from their genetic blueprint, the recipe. But all the ingredients, the energy, the physical matter of those children was literally derived, cell by cell, by the flesh, blood, and bones of the birth mother.
This is why I HATE euphemisms like 'carrier'.

That isn't what women do. Our own bodies build babies FROM our own bodies. Our bones are leached to build their bones. Our blood supply increases to build their bodies, from our nutrients, our energy. Babies are made OF us, BY us.

*Babies are made OF us, BY us.
*
Damn straight Barracker, I got distracted and didn't read the full article TBH, I did read enough to share and was struck by this simple line "the babies are not for sale - at any price". Says it all really. I'd love to know how Margaret and her family are. She's got balls of steel, I'd like to meet her, and I'd really like to get her in front of someone at the Law Commission...

Any idea what happened subsequently re custody / parental rights of the children?

Those poor children will now be 13 or 14, I wonder what they make of it all if that arrangement is still ongoing?

It's a mess really. Because providing the sperm makes you the father but providing the egg doesn't make you the mother.

There are now four potential parental roles

Sperm provision
Egg provision
Being pregnant with and giving birth
Bringing the child up.

Honestly wherever possible I do feel it's best for children if all these four roles are carried out by the same two people, necessarily a man and a woman.

That said life is complicated, stuff happens and children manage to thrive anyway.

But surrogacy does seem to introduce the worst complications.

Egg donation should be banned anyway. Harvesting them is not a safe process and there is evidence it can lead to infertility and cancer. It's also dangerous for mother and baby to be impregnated with someone else's egg. Its also my understanding that drugs need to be used to stop rejection - and who knows what effect they will have long term on mother and baby.

Surrogacy needs to be banned. If gay men want kids then they need to find women willing to enter a co parenting arrangement - not buy a baby.

It brakes my heart that any child is removed from their mum (which I understand is sometimes a necessary evil) but to do it on purpose. It show such a lack of understanding and empathy for the baby and their needs - that I question whether the person commissioning the surrogacy is fit to be a parent. And that's not even taking into account how the mother is commodified.

If gay men want kids then they need to find women willing to enter a co parenting arrangement - not buy a baby.

Or adopt?
Or foster?

Well ideal for children is that they are brought up by their genetic parents and that their genetic mother was pregnant with them (as has always been the case for all of human history until recent years).

That way there is no need to debate what is more important genetics / pregnancy/ upbringing. Clearly they are all important.

That said obviously sometimes people's parents can't bring them up and so adoption is also very important.

It seems to me though that firstly some people have an overwhelming desire for a child that is genetically related to them and also that for adoption or fostering to be a success you probably need to be a better than average parent. Because of the issues that come from a child being separated from their original parents.

So I don't think adoption or fostering is always the solution. I think co-parenting is an interesting idea. I don't think its completely optimal as effectively you start off in an amicable divorce style scenario but it seems about a million times better than surrogacy.

I can se why people might not want to co-parent that way though.

Even in fairly amicable divorces, parenting ties that couple together for life in a way that can be really frustrating and difficult to navigate. It can be difficult enough at times to come to parenting decisions when you live together and have a good relationship.

With co-parenting like this you will have a person you presumably like, but now they are in a sense family. You have to listen to them, you have to consider them if you want to do something like move for a career, go back to school and reduce your salary. They might find a new romantic partner you don't like or even think is dodgy. You might find out their biological family is pretty nutty.

In a way I think most people would be a little crazy to do that willingly. I see divorced parents all the time who really struggle with these kinds of things while trying to bring up their kids. And as someone with divorced parents, and lots of friends of divorced parents, I think it is hard on the kids.

I think that kind of consideration is part of why parents who use IFV, surogacy, or adoption often have wanted no contact.

I always wonder, if you were an 'altruistic' surrogate and stayed in contact with the family and disagreed with the way they raised the child you couldn't say anything as you have the baby up.

It could be a sister, cousin etc but it wouldn't make any difference, if you spoke up it would cause merry hell, and as you saw them grow you could recognise traits or mannerisms in them that are reflecting your own. It could be torture.

@Pulpfiction1
You may be interested to listen to this podcast which discusses the process of egg donation - the thought of forty plus needlesticks to suck out so many eggs actually brought tears to my eyes.
It's a process that has real risks which are simply not acknowledged, women going through the process are not warned about the dangers.

podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/venus-rising/id1481872967?i=1000458521512

I think I posted the link to the Resource thread before but here it is again, for those who want to find out more.

Surrogacy Resource thread : please post your links here www.mumsnet.com/Talk/womens_rights/3782983-surrogacy-resource-thread-please-post-your-links-here

What a disturbing story. My heart breaks for the two little babies denied a mother.

Coming up now on BBC2

www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-51148421