Womb Transplants

[SweetSouls]

I’ve noticed an increase online in the discussion of the possibility of womb transplants for trans women, to allow them to be pregnant and give birth to children.

This is increasingly presented as something in the very near future, largely because of the success of womb transplants into women.

Is this at all realistic? Presumably the mechanics are slightly more complicated than ‘just’ needing a womb transplant, and will this become an ethical debate?

I can’t quite wrap my head around it - mainly because I’d never considered it achievable.

It wouldn't be a transplant but an implant.

Fair point.

So like breast implants then. Instead.

@ShortBacknSides

Other kinds of transplants are to save people’s lives. A womb transplant is clearly not. And it requires the death of a woman. It just seems one more way that men think female bodies are for their use (surrogacy is another).

If I were of childbearing age, I would be opting out of organ donation for this reason.

I have opted out of organ donation because I couldn't see a way to specify that I don't want reproductive organs donated. Instead I have informed my next of kin of my wishes for organ donation.

@AlfonsoTheMango

It wouldn't be a transplant but an implant.

True, and I'm not a medical person but I still don't see how it would work. It's not like having a new hip or something is it?

@AlfonsoTheMango

It wouldn't be a transplant but an implant.

So far, it's been a transplant for women with DSDs and UFD.

For others, it would be an implant - yes (interesting point).

However, given the retrospective nature of new identities in some countries, I'm unsure whether it would be counted as a transplant for reproductive justice reasons even if it were an implant as a matter of natural history (so to speak).

Apologies for writing in such an unclear manner.

The mere thought of this is abhorrent. Whoever is experimenting on rats for such a pointless and disgusting endeavour should be locked up.

Whom does this serve? Who would benefit from men having surgery to implant a womb? It's autogynephilia taken to its extreme logical conclusions.

True, and I'm not a medical person but I still don't see how it would work. It's not like having a new hip or something is it?

I don't think it would work, to be honest.

So far, it's been a transplant for women with DSDs and UFD.

For others, it would be an implant - yes (interesting point).

From a medical point of view it would be an implant as it is not taking an organ like a kidney or cornea and transplanting in another person who had the same organ but needed to have it removed. It would be the insertion of a foreign body.

And apologies if I sound like I'm scolding anyone! That's certainly not my intention but his is an important point to me - so much language is being mangled by identity politics that I feel the need to fight for the last vestiges of accuracy.

The male body is in no way set up to carry a baby.

It's misogyny to think all you need is the gro-bag.

There's massive changes through the body. Where would the placenta come from? How would it be attached to feed the baby? How would it be supplied with blood containing the right mix of nutrients and oxygen? Women get calcium leached from to teeth for the baby. Not great for the woman! But how would that mechanism be triggered? Their bodies are a different shape, would they be a bit topply?! Is there room for the growing baby, does their skin stretch as well are their organs so shiftable? What about the different hormone profile? If on any kind it hormone treatment what's the impact on the baby?

How does their body react if there's a problem? Women can get bleeding as a sign, for example.

These would all have to be fairly early sections I'd think as there is no trigger for labour etc so when is the baby ready? Not an exact science obv.

You'd have to implant an embryo in a fully functional blood rich etc uterus.

Where are the eggs coming from?. More donors? Donating eggs is a difficult and risky procedure in itself.

No breastfeeding I assume.

These things always always focus on the man and never on the consequences impact on the child.

From a medical point of view it would be an implant as it is not taking an organ like a kidney or cornea and transplanting in another person who had the same organ but needed to have it removed. It would be the insertion of a foreign body.

I think we're in agreement (I may be wrong). In Sweden, and in Pennsylvania, the women with DSD had a uterus, and it was removed, and they received a donor one (time-limited).

Are you saying that women with DSD who receive one are having an implant not a transplant? (I need to think this through which is interesting because I may well just have assimilated the language in those settings without considering the nuance.)

I just tried searching uterus implant and was offered uterus transplant

Its an implant in a man as men dont naturally have wombs. Its a transplant in women who have had their womb removed.

@EmbarrassingAdmissions

From a medical point of view it would be an implant as it is not taking an organ like a kidney or cornea and transplanting in another person who had the same organ but needed to have it removed. It would be the insertion of a foreign body.

I think we're in agreement (I may be wrong). In Sweden, and in Pennsylvania, the women with DSD had a uterus, and it was removed, and they received a donor one (time-limited).

Are you saying that women with DSD who receive one are having an implant not a transplant? (I need to think this through which is interesting because I may well just have assimilated the language in those settings without considering the nuance.)

I just tried searching uterus implant and was offered uterus transplant

No, not at all. From female-to-female it would definitely be a transplant. From female-to-male it would be an implant.

My apologies if I haven't been clear or have sounded scolding!

Why is the implant / transplant point so important and DSD being raised?

We're talking about bog standard male bodies here.

No, not at all. From female-to-female it would definitely be a transplant. From female-to-male it would be an implant.

Ah - I was distinguishing them but wholly accept that it's not possible to be as clear as I would like.

Yes - in that case, every instance that I'm currently aware of is a transplant.

I know that Sweden are looking to move ahead right now in researching/looking to implant.

The further unhelpful point I was making was that in some healthcare systems, like the 4 in the UK, given a GRC (say) it's feasible that even if a transplant/implant distinction were to be made in other healthcare systems - they would both be counted as transplants in the UK.

Oddly enough, the only group who would logically be categorised as needing an implant, but otherwise meeting the criteria for what would be a transplant might be transmen who had started to transition early and had developed atrophy of the uterus/ovaries.

A recent WHRC had a Swedish author who reported that she had been contacted by a Swedish infertility clinician who claimed to be seeing increasing numbers of women in their 20s who (after testing) have atrophy of their reproductive organs. These are women who had been treated with puberty blockers and cross hormones at a young age and gone on to have difficulty with conception. (It seems that they had detransitioned but this wasn't entirely clear.)

'I know that Sweden are looking to move ahead right now in researching/looking to implant.'

Is this in women who have been born without a womb. Had it removed?
Or about physiologically normal males?

There is a not small number of men who fetishise the pregnant body isn't there?

@Doyoumind

It wouldn't surprise me at all to hear it's probably easier, cheaper and more viable to gestate a child in a synthetic uterus in a lab than by transplanting a uterus into a male. And that would be horrific.

Oh there was an article on this in the Guardian a few weeks ago and how it's not far off and I was sort of horriied at the reaction BTL. Great majority thought it was the best thing ever, it chilled me to the bone

'It wouldn't surprise me at all to hear it's probably easier, cheaper and more viable to gestate a child in a synthetic uterus in a lab than by transplanting a uterus into a male. And that would be horrific.'

Like I said earlier growing babies without women has been a long time male preoccupation which is all over books films etc for an awfully long time.

The bag approach also is the same misogynist underestimating of the part the woman's body plays.

Hearing her voice. The only thing the baby knows for months is her heartbeat. Oxygen and nutrient levels varying though a variety of complex mechanisms.

Will a bag produce a child that is emotionally, psychologically, even physically as healthy?

@NiceGerbil

'I know that Sweden are looking to move ahead right now in researching/looking to implant.'

Is this in women who have been born without a womb. Had it removed?
Or about physiologically normal males?

I'm distinguishing between a transplant (female to female) and an implant - as per the above discussion. I realise the discussion isn't clear.

Sweden is researching a uterus procedure for transwomen. I don't know anything about legal or medical definitions of 'transwomen' in Sweden.

I think discussion around this is pure propaganda and fantasy. All the mechanisms of pregnancy aren't fully understood in females never mind trying to do it in a male body not equipped for it.

As someone up thread said they'd have a better chance with head transplants.

Also, where will the wombs come from? A lot of women don't want their wombs to go to men, and would rather opt out of organ donation than allow that to happen.

This! I would rather give no organs at all than risk my womb being transplanted into a man. I'm not even sure how I feel about transplantation of organs that aren't essential for living anyway but I'm wholeheartedly keen to donate what I don't need when I die bar this. I just feel like it's part of the wider commodification of women's reproductive abilities.

@NiceGerbil

Why is the implant / transplant point so important and DSD being raised?

We're talking about bog standard male bodies here.

No, we're not.

Women with DSDs - these are women with MRKH and other differences of sexual development (also known as intersex) that have had an impact on their womb so they've had a transplant procedure. (Examples where these women have had transplants and given birth have been cited earlier in the thread.)

The implant/transplant issue has been explained as clearly as is possible. I know it's unclear.

A cross-sex implant is not imminent - there is a lot of research that would have to happen in this area. However, the research was halted in Sweden because of COVID–19 and it's now resuming. Allegedly, there are research centres in the US about to start up in this area.

There are several relevant papers posted earlier in the thread.

Yes...I know. They are female.

This thread is about people with standard male bodies isn't it?

'A cross-sex implant is not imminent'

So you believe it can be done.

And not imminently surely means not in the immediate future but also not miles down the line.

Why do you have that opinion?