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

Personally I can't see the difference between selling your body as labour and surrogacy. People do jobs all the time where they risk their health or their lives (firemen, policemen, deep sea divers, etc etc etc). Why is this any different?

That is extremely interesting insight @SpiderHunter aThank you. I really appreciate you sharing a personal experience.
It is really difficult to find out these details. My local hospital, where I work doesn't do IVF, so I was confused where the young women I met had been treated, especially as one specifically said she had her treatment on the NHS. I subsequently discovered that my hospital refers patients who are eligible for NHS treatment to the private clinic and pays their costs. I wanted to do a Freedom of Information request to find outstrip rates of ovarian hyper-stimulation syndrome but then found out that FOI only applies to public institutions so do not apply to private clinics. Of course those patients requiring hospital treatment/ICU are picked up by the NHS and so the numbers almost certainly won't be recorded by the private clinic. And meanwhile neither are the admissions picked up by the NHS so hard facts are very difficult to come by.

Even genuinely altruistic surrogacy cannot resolve all potential conflicts. I’ve posted this before:

So whose rights are most important? Consider these scenarios:

At 12 week prenatal testing it’s discovered the fetus has a severe abnormality. The surrogate wants to abort, should she be allowed to? What if the adoptive parents are religious and don’t want her to? What if the adoptive parents want to abort but the surrogate is religious and doesn’t want to? What if the pregnancy will threaten her life but the adoptive parents don’t want to abort? What if the adoptive parents decide that if she continues with a pregnancy resulting in a child with a severe abnormality they won’t have anything to do with it?

What if the pregnant woman has a major complication like a pulmonary embolism? What if she can’t return to full functioning afterwards? What if she can never work again as a result? What if she can’t look after her own family?

What if there is a conflict between parties about timing and mode of delivery? Who gets to decide? What if there’s a severe hypoxic ischaemic injury to the baby as a result of this decision? Is it anyone’s fault? Should a woman be forced to undertake a Caesarean section?

What if after a severe hypoxic ischaemic injury the adoptive parents decide they don’t want to look after a child with severe spastic quadraplegic cerebral palsy? Who does the baby belong to?

What if the pregnant woman developed gestational diabetes and didn’t look after herself? Ditto high blood pressure?

What if there’s an intrauterine fetal death? What if it’s discovered the pregnant woman smoked and drank? What if she ate something considered high risk? What if she undertook an activity deemed high risk? Should blame be apportioned? Could someone sue someone in this scenario?

What if, in the postnatal period, the birth mother develops severe postnatal depression or psychosis? Who looks after her? For how long? What if it stays with her for years?

These are just some scenarios that I thought of. Now can someone who supports surrogacy please explain how, before any conception occurs, an arrangement can be constructed that covers all scenarios that might eventuate and how each party in the agreement would react to those scenarios? Even in cases of true altruism and love?

Oh thanks loopsdefruit
The many and varied options truly are a pick and mix! I struggle to keep up and as an ex midwife still working in the nhs but not as a midwife I like to think I have a bit of background knowledge.
It must be very confusing and difficult to navigate for those going through the process.

These are just some scenarios that I thought of. Now can someone who supports surrogacy please explain how, before any conception occurs, an arrangement can be constructed that covers all scenarios that might eventuate and how each party in the agreement would react to those scenarios? Even in cases of true altruism and love?

In my country the surrogate is the patient, so she makes the decisions abput her pregnancy and birth. The parents receive the child the way it is born, so if it is born unhealthy then it's unhealthy. To be honest, if you have your own child you get what it is as well, you can't choose if a baby is healthy or not. As for termination for medical reasons, that is a medical procedure so the choice of the surrogate to do so, or not.

NotBadConsidering
You have covered many more scenarios than the law commissioners have covered in what they think is a watertight legal document, of 500+ pages and 118 questions/proposals! I am totally using you as a reference in future correspondence. Thank you!

I have seen it said (sorry, no reference and if anyone has one I'd love to see it) that more surrogacy arrangements breakdown due to the commissioning parents dropping out than due to the surrogate mother changing her mind and wanting to keep the baby. I'm inclined to believe this.
Relationship breakdown is a major reason and so is the baby being born less than perfect.
Most women entering a surrogacy arrangement already have a complete family, and are doing it for financial reasons so they are strongly motivated to close the deal, they do not want another baby unrelated to them.

What if the pregnancy will threaten her life but the adoptive parents don’t want to abort?
As a student midwife (a long time ago) I remember a woman who was diagnosed with breast cancer during her pregnancy. She did not want to put the baby at risk and carried on the pregnancy, but many breast cancers are hormone dependent and I think in most similar cases advice would be to deliver asap (or abort if before third trimester) She was terminal by the time the baby was born.
If a woman was pregnant with a surrogate pregnancy and was diagnosed with cancer my firm advice would be "think about your own health, your own life, your own children and family".
But wouldn't commissioning parents have a vested interest, emotional and financial, in encouraging the woman to keep going for a few more weeks until the baby is at a more advanced gestation? It would be very hard for a woman in emotional turmoil to resist this sort of pressure, but those few weeks could be crucial.

In my country the surrogate is the patient, so she makes the decisions abput her pregnancy and birth.

That is the firm advice from the NHS in documents relating to hospital policies for managing surrogate pregnancies.
However I think it underestimates the dynamics of the likely relationship between the commissioning parents, who have strong financial and emotional investment and the surrogate mother.

I attended a public consultation meeting relating to the proposed new laws to regulate surrogacy in the UK. A couple there gave me a taste of the sense of entitlement and aggression that commissioning parents may exhibit:

One of the proposals is that all parties (commissioning parents and surrogates) should have (compulsory) counselling and legal advice. This couple objected on grounds that the woman was a solicitor and did not need legal advice. Their objection was smoothly slapped down, as the recommendation is to protect all parties and the fact one person may feel they don't need it is irrelevant.

Then we went on to the proposed minimum age for a surrogate - 18 years old. As the mother of an 18 year old I had a strong objection to this but the husband (of the couple) countered that this was the legal age of adulthood so what was the problem? I encouraged my 18 year old who had accompanied me to this event to fill in a response to the public consultation. She answered the proposal for a minimum age of 18 very thoughtfully, saying that although she was officially an adult she still felt like a child and felt she deserved protection from (older) adults. She felt 18 year olds would be vulnerable to coercion and abuse.

Then questions moved on to the proposal that there should be no limit (in law) on the number of surrogate pregnancies a woman could undertake. I pointed out that even dogs have more protection in law, as licensed puppy breeders may not use a bitch for more than six litters (the Kennel club further limits this to four, for pedigree dogs). One surrogate mother who died in the USA was having her fifth surrogate birth.

https://www.huffpost.com/entry/american-surrogate-death-bb8298930?guccounter=1&gucereferrer=aHR0cHM6Ly93d3cuZ29vZ2xlLmNvbS8&guceereferrersig=AQAAABcuGPrnLkxjKk4CRlIGV1cLxrhBa6EahSZfyj76h3DqbvYCieXridJRRpn-5rzWZE54V-f95Rq9IjOqdXsmXJaa_V8tdj0RYjwGbf7gpGSC0vKmdt6dqR4CORt4RyQvdQm4tjIxdb6WhJqWcqtFmSJbnk2wKl4OVbiKbHBpJEKkI

And in the UK we have our very own Carol Horlock trying for her 16th baby (I think that would be her 14th surrogacy, give or take a few sets of twins). I mentioned this and the husband angrily countered that women can have fifteen natural pregnancies so what was the problem?
The fact is that aggressive, entitled couples like this will be heavily invested in any pregnancy once "their" "surrogate mother" is pregnant and will be likely to put strong emotional and perhaps financial pressure on the woman to ensure that any decisions are the ones they choose. It really isn't as simple as the woman who is pregnant making all the decisions.

www.thesun.co.uk/fabulous/10027092/surrogate-commercial-mum-52-sixteenth-baby/

If being a surrogate is so wonderful why aren't there lots of rich women with time on their hands not choosing to do it?

I think a newborn baby ideally needs their birth mother. There are cases where that is not possible but we shouldn't create situations.

Also you know sometimes life is a bit shit. I can't have kids because I'm single and have no money so even if I fell pregnant I would see it as irresponsible for me to have a child. Let's put children and women first and do what's best for them.

The parents receive the child the way it is born, so if it is born unhealthy then it's unhealthy

Are they compelled to by law? What if they change their minds and say no?

"The parents receive the child the way it is born, so if it is born unhealthy then it's unhealthy "

Many cases where those paying for a baby refuse to take a baby born disabled
So the surrogate mum is left literally holding the baby

It is in practice impossible - and would be very dangerous for the baby - to force the "baby customers" to take an imperfect product

The massive difference to all those queries about women choosing to do dangerous jobs,
is that none of these involve taking a baby with them into danger

No firefighter or soldier takes a baby with them into a blazing building or a war

Parents wishing to adopt have to go through a long process
and they are not allowed to adopt unless they pass all the checks

SS rightly focus entirely on the child, not on the desire of adults to have a child

Legally, anyone can choose to use a surrogate if they have the money and / or a willing donor
The focus is on their wishes to have a healthy newborn

That means people who would never pass SS requirements, even those who are alcoholics, druggies, paedophiles can obtain a baby

The less harmful cases are those who want a brand new baby, rather than adopting a traumatised toddler
or those who don't want stretchmarks or a knachered pelvic floor and can pay to avoid it

My aunt and uncle couldn't have kids of their own so a friend agreed to be a surrogate. Would that make you angry too?

not angry CloudsCanLookLikeSheep, sad on behalf of the baby

I know an American lady on fb. She has 4 of her own children. She filled in one of those silly questionnaires, the questions where things like how many marriages, how may children etc. One question was how many time a surrogate - she put 2. I was really surprised that question would be put as somthing so normal, a part of life. I was more surprised that both her and other women had been surrogates.

It's seems in parts of the USA surrogacy has been normalises to be a job to be undertaken by the average women to help provide for her family.

I really hope the UK does not move to this attutite. With benefit cuts and low wages, it will end up a massive exploration of low income families. Kids could lose their mothers or their mother's health. Baby will be bought and sold as commodities never really knowing who they are or where they have come from, and not being givin the best start in life. Young girls will be exploited into egg donation having long term effects on their own fertility and health. And of course not being able to have a family will become somthing that only effects the poor as the rich pay for ivf and surrogacy.

All surrogacy cases invoke the same reasoning in me, whether it’s your aunt and uncle, a rich couple not wanting to bother with pregnancy themselves, a gay couple, or a paedophile buying a baby from Thailand.

The legislation has to cover all eventualities and scenarios and all people who may choose this route. Personally I think it is impossible to legislate and as a result should be banned.

After reading @BigChocFrenzy pots I'm interested to know if we have private adoption services in the UK and if so are social services involved.

I have always felt uneasy about the fact anyone can commission a surrogacy. Part of nature is that a mother (ideally) has the instinct to protect the child from harm. What happens when that mother is no longer present. A surrogate just has to hope the intended parents will adequately take on that protective role? Noone other than the surrogate is vetting that - a woman who may be vulnerable or coerced.

I favour the US surrogacy system ( I suspect it varies from state to state so I am not sure about all the states) rather than the UK regime.

In this case there was probably compulsory insurance and clauses in the contract about death etc. Death is a risk of any pregnancy., It is a very sad case. Did the baby live?

But don’t you think that’s bonkers? That in order to get the baby you crave you have to find someone who’s willing to sign a contract that specifies what to do in the event of death?

"Did the baby live?"
Yes, the baby lived.

The US surrogacy contracts are horrific. At a talk at Filia there was a harrowing talk about surrogacy around the world. In developing countries women living in poverty are being horrifically exploited - eg housed in places that amount to baby factories, away from their families for the duration, told what to eat or not eat according to the whims of their western buyers, only paid if they have a successful pregnancy - those who have health complications are not properly looked after. Impoverished brown women are giving birth to white babies for families - or even, sometimes, single men, they'll never meet. Anyone who wants to buy a baby, basically.

But in the West women are also being exploited.

There was a talk on Californian surrogacy contracts. As a surrogate you sign away all decision making over your health. This includes how many embryos to implant and how many to take to term.

That means, for example, if they implant, say 3 eggs, and all stay viable, the buyers may decide they only want one. If that happens, they can choose to terminate 2 of the babies and they wither in the womb while the other one continues to develop. The surrogate gets no choice about this, even if she doesn't want the fetuses inside her to be termiminated.

On the other hand, the buyer might decide they want to keep all 3 and the surrogate may not choose to reduce the number of features if she wants to.

The buyers take all health decisions. Even, we heard, if the mother ended up on a life support machine, she has signed over the right to choose whether to switch the life support machine off or not, to the buyers.

After reading @BigChocFrenzy pots I'm interested to know if we have private adoption services in the UK and if so are social services involved

No private adoption is illegal in the UK. All adopters must use an adoption agency. All adoption orders are granted by the courts. It’s highly regulated at every stage.

So if was pregnant by a random one night stand and didn't know the dad and wanted to put that child up for adoption - simply because I don't want the baby myself, both social services and the courts need to be involved in the adoption. The intended parents need to be vetted.

If I make an agreement to get pregnant by random donor sperm and give the baby to someone else in a surrogacy arrangement, neither social services or the court need to be involved. And the indended parent does not need to be vetted.

That doesn't seem right.

That means people who would never pass SS requirements, even those who are alcoholics, druggies, paedophiles can obtain a baby

What checks do people having a child the conventional way undergo before conceiving? Fertile people can have children at will without pre conception checks on them.