Surrogate dies in childbirth, leaves behind two of her own kids

[ConfessionsOfTeenageDramaQueen]

"According to the post, Michelle and Chris decided to help another family who wasn't able to have children after they were done having kids of their own.

Michelle was on her second surrogacy for the same family when she lost her life.

Like any other pregnancy, surrogate pregnancies involve the same medical risks of carrying a child and giving birth."

This makes me really angry. Link below.

www.foxla.com/news/california-mother-of-two-dies-giving-another-family-the-gift-of-life?fbclid=IwAR2RgBrXZnWZa1DES4PQWDYMifkY7YCpLy6WVEOoHj6cD145L9Xof1Iy4mI

Great post cat except one teeny tiny thing
'Choice' isn't an either/or: in capitalism

Everything you have said about choice is compelling and accurate but has nothing at all to do with capitalism. If we did not live in a capitalist society, choice would never exactly the same.

*be exactly the same.

My iPad is possessed.

The research you linked MopsRUs is widely considered to be problematic for several reasons, including small sample size as the Law Commissioners acknowledge whilst making liberal use of it to prop up their proposals in the consultation into new surrogacy law in the UK.
I notice they frequently use that most scientific of measures, the word "most" presumably totally ignoring the poorer outcomes associated with the few who fell out of the most.
"The rate of multiple pregnancies varied from 2.6 to 75%" - I have no idea which centre was producing a rate of multiple pregnancy at 75% but that is a shocking statistic, sounds like they were selling a BOGOF to me.
"Cases with hysterectomies have been reported". So a very serious obstetric complication requiring life saving emergency surgery then.
I suppose the positive outcome is that presumably the mother survived unlike the UK mother (not a surrogate pregnancy) whose death due to haemorrhage and poor hospital emergency care is currently being reported in the press.

RESULTS:
The search returned 1795 articles of which 55 met the inclusion criteria. The medical outcome for the children was satisfactory and comparable to previous results for children conceived after fresh IVF and oocyte donation. The rate of multiple pregnancies was 2.6-75.0%. Preterm birth rate in singletons varied between 0 and 11.5% and low birthweight occurred in between 0 and 11.1% of cases. At the age of 10 years there were no major psychological differences between children born after surrogacy and children born after other types of assisted reproductive technology (ART) or after natural conception. The obstetric outcomes for the surrogate mothers were mainly reported from case series. Hypertensive disorders in pregnancy were reported in between 3.2 and 10% of cases and placenta praevia/placental abruption in 4.9%. Cases with hysterectomies have also been reported. Most surrogate mothers scored within the normal range on personality tests. Most psychosocial variables were satisfactory, although difficulties related to handing over the child did occur. The psychological well-being of children whose mother had been a surrogate mother between 5 and 15 years earlier was found to be good. No major differences in psychological state were found between intended mothers, mothers who conceived after other types of ART and mothers whose pregnancies were the result of natural conception.
CONCLUSIONS:
Most studies reporting on surrogacy have serious methodological limitations. According to these studies, most surrogacy arrangements are successfully implemented and most surrogate mothers are well-motivated and have little difficulty separating from the children born as a result of the arrangement. The perinatal outcome of the children is comparable to standard IVF and oocyte donation and there is no evidence of harm to the children born as a result of surrogacy. However, these conclusions should be interpreted with caution. To date, there are no studies on children born after cross-border surrogacy or growing up with gay fathers.

What makes you think there would be a bad outcome for the baby?

From link posted earlier:

"a now-adult surrogate child highlighted the pain of commodification thus:
“I don’t care why my parents or my mother did this. It looks to me like I was bought and sold.... When you exchange something for [m]oney it is called a commodity. Babies are not commodities. Babies are human beings. How do you think this makes us feel to know that there was money exchanged for us? . . .Because somewhere between [the] narcissistic, selfish or desperate need for a child and the desire to make a buck, everyone else’s needs and wants are put before the kids’ needs. We, the children of surrogacy, become lost.”

I’m angry she lost her life in childbirth but it was her choice and she knew the risks. Besides, in the US they have different laws. You can sell your eggs for example. I don’t think the OP is right to want to limit women’s choices.

If a quick google is to be believed, babies know the sounds they know in the womb, the smells of their mother,,.if separated then the baby experiences stress that can lead to long term mental health issues.

Now I guess a study on the effects of surrogacy in particular on the long term outcomes for babies has ever been carried out, but it seems clear that stress effects will be felt by the baby being removed from the mother

And obviously a surrogate baby is unlikely to be brestfed, which if possible does give better life outcomes for the child.

Yes, many children need to go into an incubator or fail to thrive, but to design a scheme whereby baby can't be given the best start in life to satisfy an adult wish seems wrong to me

Why aren't about 50% of them men?
Because they don't have the biology? Although, I wouldn't consider a surrogate my mother unless I was conceived from her egg.

All being said, should we chastise women who choose to have a 2nd or 3rd child of their own, who then die in childbirth and leave their kids behind? Surely the "selfish" argument can be used against her too, as there was no reason to need to have a 2nd or 3rd child other than "because I want to", putting their maternal desire above the needs of their already existing children.

It's that surrogacy deliberately and intentionally causes babies to be born into difficult circumstances purely to make adults happy.

In almost all situaitons, we priorities the needs of children above those of adults. With surrogacy, this is inverted. Why is this and why are you arguing in favour of it?

Plenty of parents plan to bring babies into crappy circumstances, just because they want children. If you can't see that then you are deluded.

And obviously a surrogate baby is unlikely to be brestfed, which if possible does give better life outcomes for the child.

Not necessarily. Adoptive mothers are able to breast feed.

Plenty of parents plan to bring babies into crappy circumstances, just because they want children. If you can't see that then you are deluded.

individuals may do, yes. But as I've said before, unless you demand that all prospective parents be 'perfect' there is nothing we can do about that.

However, as a society we don't generally approve of or actively support, for example, drug addicts becoming parents. With surrogacy, however, we're supposed to ignore the fact that people - for their own selfish reasons - actively choose to create a child knowing and insisting that it be separated from its mother at birth. Why do you think this is OK?

"horrible comparison of pregnancy and childbirth to 'babysitting'"

It isn't an unusual analogy, and certainly isn't meant to be flippant or "horrible".

There's a real-life surrogacy story in today's Guardian. She said she’d be babysitting our embryo: what’s it like to carry a child for a friend?

And in The Metro 9th June 2019 "surrogates act purely to be able to help someone else have their much wanted child, and to keep someone else’s baby goes against everything we believe in. We are merely babysitting for nine months, donating our womb and volunteering to help do something for someone who is unable to do it themselves. When the baby is born, surrogates look to see the joy on the parents’ faces. That’s the moment surrogates are waiting for – seeing a family created, seeing the look of love the parents have for their baby."

Yeah, the average gay male couple can breastfeed just grand,

Just because some people bring children into crappy circumstances .....Just because somethings are not great is not an excuse to say let's allow all bad things

I don’t think the OP is right to want to limit women’s choices.

Sometimes choices should be limited by the state in order to protect the vulnerable.

Especially when there might be the rise of industries designed to exploit vulnerable by pressurising them into making those damaging choices, through overt (e.g. financial) or more subtle means (psychological).

Yes it might occasionally affect people who want to make that choice entirely uncoerced, but that’s a price that has to be paid to protect everyone else.

Why aren't about 50% of them men?
Because they don't have the biology?

But the person I was responding to said a surrogate is no different to a babysitter. Why couldn't a man do that? Or is surrogacy in fact radically different from babysitting?

Although, I wouldn't consider a surrogate my mother unless I was conceived from her egg.

So if a woman conceives via IVF donor egg with the intention of keeping the child, you would insist that she is not the mother of the child she gestates and gives birth to?

Slight derail as it doesn't relate to a surrogate birth, but childbirth carries risks and this UK case is currently in the news.

www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2020/jan/17/mother-bled-to-death-after-childbirth-due-to-medical-staff-failings

I often wonder how women felt about pregnancy and childbirth in the days when everyone would have known someone who died in childbirth. My Grandmother was one of seven and her mother died after the last one. I think it must have been terrifying knowing you had a high chance of dying, but I suppose people were more religious in those days and perhaps trusted in God to keep them safe.

It isn't an unusual analogy, and certainly isn't meant to be flippant or "horrible".

It is horrible. You are reducing 9 months of growing a child and then giving birth to it to mere 'babysitting', presumably because you want to devalue the mother's indispensable biological role in creating her baby.

There's a real-life surrogacy story in today's Guardian.

Here you go with your syrupy links again. As I said above, it's all very well and good for individuals to sing the praises of 'giving the gift of life' but surrogacy brings up profound ethical issues which all the twee terms in the world won't hide.

Why do you think this is OK?

Because on the whole, I think a much wanted, planned baby is better, regardless of the circumstances of its birth. I don't think that a baby born via a surrogate is the worst set of circumstances that a baby can be conceived and born under.

Noblegiraffe
Sometimes choices should be limited by the state in order to protect the vulnerable.

Not the choice to be a surrogate imho. That kind of reasoning has a very slippery slope too. Should we not allow people to choose to eat unhealthy foods because of diabetes and obesity being the #1 cause of cancer? Not allow them to binge watch anything because of risk of stroke/heart disease?
The whole limit choices to protect the vulnerable gets us a totalitarian state.

Because on the whole, I think a much wanted, planned baby is better, regardless of the circumstances of its birth. I don't think that a baby born via a surrogate is the worst set of circumstances that a baby can be conceived and born under.

That's a dismal argument. So because something isn't the 'worst' possible outcome, we should actively support and plan for it?

The whole limit choices to protect the vulnerable gets us a totalitarian state.

But even the most liberal and progessive states limit choices.

We can't sell our organs.

We can't buy certain drugs (at least not legally).

We can't have abortions after certain dates.

And so on.

Plus, surrogacy is different from the examples you mention as it involves the creation of an innocent child who did not ask to be born with the intention of being taken away from its mother at birth.

Fanny,
“I often wonder how women felt about pregnancy and childbirth in the days when everyone would have known someone who died in childbirth.”
There is a diary of a 1700s midwife Martha Ballard called “A midwifes Tale” which has that in there. This isn’t fiction. It is an actual a diary .

Although, I wouldn't consider a surrogate my mother unless I was conceived from her egg.

So if a woman conceives via IVF donor egg with the intention of keeping the child, you would insist that she is not the mother of the child she gestates and gives birth to?

If my mum told me I was conceived through IVF and it used another woman's egg, then no I wouldn't consider her my "real" mum, the same as if I were adopted, or if my surrogate decided to keep me as her own. Just like a sperm donar is my real dad, not the adoptive dad that raised me.

I mean if other people want to consider their parents under si ilar conditions their real parents, that's no skin off my nose, it just wouldn't work for me

You are completely failing to grasp the point that what happened in Mexico is just part of the ongoing continuum of turning babies into commodities.
I’m not ‘failing to grasp’ anything thanks. Don’t you realise that the vast majority of stem cell research (gathered from embryos) has concerned a wide range of diseases completely unrelated to fertility - spinal cord injuries, cancer, bone disease, heart disease...
Do you think that any drugs or procedures that have been developed to treat these other conditions should also be banned, or is IVF a special case? If so why?
I’m not trying to argue the case for stem cell research, just pointing out that medical research and treatments often operate distantly from each other. It is possible to oppose the methods and ethics at the research end, while still wanting the best for patients at the treatment end.

No not in the slightest. Just using the language that those promoting surrogacy use. Surrogacy's end result is a baby. In this particular case I think it is useful to point out that the embryos in the Mexican case are babies.

I think anyone supporting surrogacy should think long and hard about the morality of research in deliberately creating an embryo, implanting it in a woman (which if left in the womb is more than likely to emerge as a baby) extracting it and killing it.

We are talking about IVF not surrogacy, I never said I was pro-surrogacy (and apologies to the rest of the thread for de-railing). I found your comments about IVF offensive. But in any case, like it or not, the scientific term is embryo and anything else is just deliberately provocative (or ignorant) and only serves to undermine your argument.

If my mum told me I was conceived through IVF and it used another woman's egg, then no I wouldn't consider her my "real" mum, the same as if I were adopted, or if my surrogate decided to keep me as her own. Just like a sperm donar is my real dad, not the adoptive dad that raised me.

Well, at least you're consistent.

I bet most of the people claiming that a 'surrogate' isn't a 'real mother' - just a long-term babysitter - would twist themselves in knots trying to explain why a woman using donor eggs with the intention of keeping the child is, in fact, a 'real' mother.