Surrogacy ends in abortion and ends a friendship

[OhHolyJesus]

This is an 'altruistic' surrogacy story between two friends in New Zealand.

A woman offers herself for the pregnancy for her friend called Jane for the purposes of the article (who had a very traumatic pregnancy and labour with her daughter and she was told a second pregnancy would keep her in hospital for months at best).

"Jane's friend piped up with the offer of a lifetime. "Out of the blue, she said, 'I'd make a good surrogate because when I had my pregnancy, I didn't really feel it,'" recalls Jane. "She said she'd talk to her husband and get back to me." Not long after, they began the process of surrogacy."

All seemed to go well with separate legal and medical advice but he surrogate mother struggled and her and her husband were clearly traumatised:

"When the Weekly approached the surrogate couple to share their side of the story, they asked to remain anonymous. The surrogate's husband said, "We entered into the agreement with a genuine desire to help. Unfortunately, things did not go to plan and she became very sick with prenatal depression. This is probably a more complicated story than it appears on the surface. Jane and John do not really know the whole situation."

(So not every pregnancy is the same, even if you have had easy pregnancies in the past, perhaps the depression was connected to a sense of inevitable grief?)

"Today, the couples are no longer in contact and Jane still doesn't know why their baby was terminated. "On reflection, it started to go downhill while prepping for the embryo transfer, but John and I didn't see it," she says. "The surrogate didn't like the process at the fertility clinic or the one choice of counsellor we had. I think she felt like she was let down."

Their baby.

To me, Jane appears to believe she has rights to force her friend to continue with the pregnancy.

""It was our biological baby and Jenny's biological sibling. I could've explained how it was going to affect the rest of our lives. Even though everyone has walked away from this and even though it's painful, I'll talk about it. I never expected I'd have to worry about someone terminating our baby. It never crossed my mind."

The article mentions that law reform is being discussed, or rather looking to be enforced:

"Labour MP Tāmati Coffey, who, with his partner Tim Smith, welcomed their son Tūtānekai by surrogate in 2019, currently has a members' bill in ballot calling for modern laws for modern families. It includes reform of birth certificates, providing a way
to enforce surrogacy arrangements and creating a register of potential surrogates."

www.nzherald.co.nz/lifestyle/kiwi-mums-heartbreak-after-surrogate-terminates-her-pregnancy-i-went-into-shock/52Y6PO5M4LV73RGZF67TX5E4LU/

It was a disaster for both sides. Imagine your biological child being terminated and you have no say over it. Its a bad idea.

Lots of sad stories. The media seems intent, mostly, on painting surrogacy through rose tinted spectacles, or if things go wrong on blaming the Surrogate mother.

Sorry, I didn't mean to be flippant Soubriquet , I succeeded in posting before I had fully thought out what I meant to say and didn't correct it. But that is an awful case, I suppose if the SM decided to renege on the deal whilst not wanting the baby herself then social services would arrange adoption. I wonder if they considered the CP at all or perhaps there were reasons why she wasn't offered the chance to adopt the baby.

None of this is good for babies.

There were no winners here. I think that many people underestimate the needs of the surrogate, as well as the child, in these arrangements. At the end of the day, it is always important to think why people believe they have a right to a child by surrogacy. Particularly when there is always risk to the mother as well as the foetus.

And any healthy pregnancy, without any lasting issues, and delivery of a healthy child may be more luck than anything else.

In the article it’s interesting that Jane describes her daughter as “caring” - it’s as though she expects everyone always to put her feelings first, even her daughter. She says she could see the surrogate mother, her close friend, was not happy with the fertility clinic but they still went ahead. Again, presumably Jane’s feelings were the first priority.

providing a way to enforce surrogacy arrangements and creating a register of potential surrogates

These are both very chilling for women's rights (the registry makes it sound like surrogacy would be a profession!)

And how, exactly, do they intend to enforce surrogacy arrangements? If a woman has a high-risk surrogacy pregnancy, would there be ways to protect the fetus over her own health so she 'delivers' the baby per the contract? I find this all so horrifying.

It wasn't too long ago that it was common for teen girls and women to expect that pregnancy and death in childbirth were very real possibilities they had little control over.

While women still have all these problems, better maternity care, reliable birth control & abortion, better laws re: rape/divorce and more equitable economics have lessened the eventualities of dying in childbirth or being pregnant against our wishes. Now, women who want children choose the risk of pregnancy and childbirth, rather than it being forced on them...but these suggestions for laws do the opposite and turn us backwards.

There's a new campaign group to end surrogacy here

I don’t understand the language in all of this. It’s all so euphemistic and vague.

A surrogate mother is one who looks after a baby when the birth mother is unable to. When one of our sheep has triplets, or dies we try to find the orphan a mother who has lost her own lamb - she is the surrogate. In the past in humans a surrogate mother was the same, sometimes people even say ‘she was like a surrogate mother to me’ of their aunt or something if their own mother was useless. But now the birth mother is prefixed with surrogate (obscuring the fact that she is the mother) and the woman who wants to raise the child is called the mother. It’s all so manipulative and quite deliberate.

I don’t understand the language in all of this. It’s all so euphemistic and vague.

I think it might have been different if the friend who was actually the one who was pregnant had a chance to give her side of it, the husband spoke for her because she couldn't manage it I imagine.

The importance of language, as with gender ideology, applies also to surrogacy. With double mastectomies being referred to as 'top surgery', a surrogate mother is referred to as a kitchen appliance (an oven) or she herself might refer to her pregnancy as 'extreme babysitting'. (We pay babysitters otherwise it would be exploitation and if it was an under 18 babysitting, child exploitation.)

It's all very clever, it's rare to even see 'mother' follow 'surrogate' in mainstream media.

An example just from today in fact, in Style in The Times - "via surrogate", not via surrogacy or by a surrogate mother, just 'surrogate'.

I've read articles that will say something like the baby "was born via surrogacy" or "arrived via surrogacy". The woman who grew and birthed the child, completely erased (as is the natural born between mother and child, which the surrogate mother heralded tried to rationalise away during the pregnancy so she can 'hand over' the child.)

Sophie Beresiner is planning her second baby via surrogate — but is she ready?

www.thetimes.co.uk/article/3ecc12ee-abfb-11eb-b844-593e41a4a1a5?shareToken=921aa99c083a82ee3a728a4575424e0e

Just came across this and sharing it here as the woman who is pregnant would like to terminate her pregnancy as the order for the baby has been cancelled.

The couple had a change of plans.

Never ceases to amaze me that the people that go into these things don't seem to have ever considered the possible outcomes that differ from what is initially intended.

It is her baby. She chose to become pregnant and grow the baby. When the baby is born she is it's only parent, assuming she's not married/in a CP. Her choice now is whether to have the baby adopted, or raise the child herself. An abortion obviously isn't possible at this point.

This is the weird limbo of surrogacy-yes, it's not her and her SO's DNA...but it's her baby legally I assume and the baby will certainly understand her as mother like all born babies.

Nobody is thinking of the child.

Those commissioning parents are absolutely awful people...I secretly hope the baby will be better off

Sorry to post so soon again, but a baby is not some bespoke item you order with an option to cancel.

I would bet that the embryo was not made with the DNA of the commissioning parents, either. IVF mothers often mourn or worry over their remaining frozen embryos (which they took numerous jabs and hormones to create), so I think there is a real disconnect the further you get from the biological reality of mothers gestating and birthing their babies.

And while I'm 100% pro-choice, no woman lightly gets an abortion...and 23 weeks would be quite difficult!

What a mess.

‘It was a disaster for both sides. Imagine your biological child being terminated and you have no say over it. Its a bad idea.’

That’s the usual situation though whenever a woman has an abortion in most countries. Father’s don’t get a say, which is as it should be.

From the screenshot, this mother doesn't consider the baby to be hers, so I think that's part of the problem as she is now realising it very much is hers and it is her responsibility since the CPs are dumping her and the baby and moving abroad for a better job, a better lifestyle.

I wonder how much they wanted the baby in the first place if that is all it takes for them to cancel their order, like she says, like it's a restaurant reservation and their are no consequences.

Obviously an abortion isn't possible so she has to either hope something goes wrong and the baby dies (which is very much the opposite intention of what she started out with), she keeps the baby and raises him/her but as an unwanted child or she puts the baby up for adoption or fostering.

The last option would mean the baby would find a loving home you would hope if she feels she can't offer that - what a mess. The poor kid.

The couple who paid for it to be created have no ties, despite the contract they can't be legally forced to take the baby, and even if they were, that wouldn't be the best start for the baby either.

In this case it would be in the best interests of the child if it has never been created in the first place.

This is the thing about the Law Commission proposals to give commissioning parents legal parentage before birth. They claim this will make surrogate mothers feel safer
They also state that in situations where the CPs renege on the deal then social services will step in the same as they do for any other new mother/parents who reject their baby. So it makes no different except the CPs will have to take time out from their grand new plans to sign off the papers. Should the SM decide to step up to her responsibilities to the baby she has carried and keep it I'm not sure if that will be straightforward paperwork or if it will be more complex given she won't be the legal parent. I don't recall seeing anything in the consultation paper that mentioned that but since it was a 500 page paper I probably missed it. It would be ironic if a woman was to give birth to a baby she had decided to keep and social workers stepped in and took it to a foster home while they decided if she actually could keep it or if they had other adoptive parents lined up.

That screenshot is heartbreaking. what a mess.

This must be seen as a sign that not all is rosy when people 'commission' children in this way. We are seeing more and more negative outcomes. And to think there people out there who will cancel their 'orders'. These are infants, they are human beings. Not an accessory.

God, that poor child. Do you know what country that's from, OhHoly?

Sorry I should have said, it's from the US but I don't know what state.

I imagine that the 'contract' is weighted to the CPs and as Fanny says they just need to sign some paperwork and the surrogate mother will be asked if she suddenly wants this child she is not genetically related to, nor wanted. She wanted money and to 'be kind'.

Can someone sign a contract to force them to be a mother to a child they intended to sell? How might that work?

This kid hasn't even been born yet and no one involved in his or her creation wants anything to do with him/her.

This whole thing is a mess. We don't, as a society, seem to have any clear agreement on what constitutes a mother. If a woman gets pregnant using donor eggs, that woman has no more connection to the baby than a surrogate pregnant with couple's embryo, yet in one case the woman would be considered the mother and in the second case, maybe not (depending on where she lives).
I would consider a baby that was made from my DNA to be mine, regardless of who was pregnant with that baby, but not everyone does. I'd be absolutely heartbroken if a woman who actively volunteered to act as a surrogate for me then chose to terminate. Unless we are going to ban it (which is the best outcome imo) then we do need to update laws.
Personally, I consider changing your mind and keeping a baby that isn't genetically yours to be unethical - so we need to make sure that women really are fully counselled before entering into this. Equally we need to prevent couples from ignoring the needs of the woman pg with their baby from treating her like a commodity. I'm not sure how to do that, outside of banning it completely. It does feel like people are buying babies. And no one is thinking about how babies bond.
There used to be a great documentary on YouTube about the industry in the Ukraine - I really recommend watching it.

I’ve never been pregnant and don’t have children (or want them) so I offer my opinion with some circumspection, but I see it exactly the opposite. I think the person who grew the child in her body has more claim to be the mother than the genetic mother. This is partly because of the unbreakable bond that relationship creates, but also/mainly because most of the substance of that child, what the child is, comes from her body. She’s not just an incubator: she is providing every bit of the nutrients that go into making the child in an absolutely unique way.

I'm entirely comfortable with banning all surrogacy.

Me too.

In some theoretical world where there weren't myriad ethical minefields around every single aspect of it - consent, physical health, birth, motherhood, breakdown of relationships, changing of minds - I would have nothing against surrogacy. But we're in the real world, and I'm finding it more and more unbelievable that we are seeing these nightmare scenarios playing out and yet people are fine with it? There's no thought for the babies being born either.

Fertility is declining, people are not able to have babies for all kinds of reasons, I feel huge sympathy - but this is not the answer.

@Viviennemary

It was a disaster for both sides. Imagine your biological child being terminated and you have no say over it. Its a bad idea.

Imagine your biological child being gestated in someone else's body, for your benefit, not theirs, because you'd rather risk their health and life than your own.

THAT is a bad idea.