Surrogacy for convenience

[mom2rtk]

Don’t we do that all the time in other ways, though? Plenty of us don’t want to risk our lives fighting wars or running into burning buildings or disarming bombs so we pay people who are willing to take that risk to do those things for us. Military, police, firefighters, doctors and nurses exposed to infectious diseases, lifeguards, oil rig workers, animals control personnel removing a dangerous animal from your yard… lots of people get paid to do risky things. Why should surrogacy be any different? If one person isn’t comfortable taking a certain risk but another is and can be paid for their service, what’s the problem? It sounds like a win-win situation to me.

Somewhat, although with many of those examples it's a situation where average people aren't and can't be trained to handle it for themselves. People don't hire doctors and nurses becuase they don't want to take the risk themselves, they really just have to hire out.

I just view growing your own little human differently than those other things.

 

[Jennasis]

How other people choose to create their family is of no concern to me.

 

[mom2rtk]

How other people choose to create their family is of no concern to me.

So you'd be OK if someone chose to buy a baby?

 

[Jennasis]

So you'd be OK if someone chose to buy a baby?

Did I really need to specify with the word "legally"? Sheesh.

 

[EilonwyWanderer]

I didn't have dangerous or really difficult pregnancies but I hated being pregnant, each time.

I HATED being pregnant. Loved the outcome, hated the pregnancy part. I had morning sickness all day through the first trimester with my first and then CONSTANTLY with my second. My second also wrecked my thyroid and gave me acne--I never even had acne as a teenager!--that still flares up now. It was uncomfortable and for the last three months of BOTH pregnancies I couldn't sleep longer than 45 minutes at a time and rolling over felt like my pelvis was splitting apart. It was so painful I would SCREAM every time, which I guess prepared the neighbors for a newborn!

My first pregnancy ended in an emergency c-section after two days of labor not progressing (my water broke and then I felt like...maybe a couple bad period cramps), them pumping me full of everything they could think of, and then saying they were out of ideas. I was absolutely delirious at that point since I had barely slept, had a bad reaction to the epidural, and recovery was AWFUL. Especially when two weeks after my first was born I felt something tear. Hello umbilical hernia! It seriously took me over a year to recover from everything that happened and the mental trauma of it all.

The second one was a planned c-section since everything appeared to be going the same way as the first and no way was I going through that again. Recovery was much better but, as I mentioned earlier, that pregnancy SUCKED and I'm now on thyroid medication for the rest of my life, hooray.

If a person wants to choose surrogacy good for them.

 

[mom2rtk]

Did I really need to specify with the word "legally"? Sheesh.

Laws in a field like this are bound to change quickly over time. What's illegal today might not be tomorrow. Just curious about the ethical side of it more than the legal side of it.

 

[PollyannaMom]

I had a great pregnancy...for the first six months or so. Loved the feeling, no morning sickness, etc. Then all you-know-what broke loose when they found out my platelet count was dangerously low. DS and I both came through, though, and I was advised not to roll those dice again.

We ended up embracing the advantages of one, but if we had decided we really wanted more, we would have adopted an older child (or older siblings). I think surrogacy would have been too emotionally confusing a path for me.

I don't begrudge it to someone else, though.

 

[TippyThomas]

I had a great pregnancy...for the first six months or so. Loved the feeling, no morning sickness, etc. Then all you-know-what broke loose when they found out my platelet count was dangerously low. DS and I both came through, though, and I was advised not to roll those dice again.

We ended up embracing the advantages of one, but if we had decided we really wanted more, we would have adopted an older child (or older siblings). I think surrogacy would have been too emotionally confusing a path for me.

I don't begrudge it to someone else, though.

Thanks for thinking of the older children waiting for families. I was one of them and my life changed when someone finally decided to take a chance.

 

[MrsPete]

You were very fortunate. Many women have difficult and /or dangerous pregnancies.

Certainly some women have difficult /dangerous pregnancies -- I know some of these people -- but I'd disagree with the descriptor "many".

I totally understand the motivation; not questioning that at all. Just out of curiosity though, why such a radical approach when tubal ligation would have done the job?

I was wondering the same.

I never once said my experience was easy. Just that generally the rearing of said child (well beyond the newborn stage) is a lot harder than pregnancy itself. Regardless of how hard the pregnancy was.

Everyone keeps adding their stories, and I feel for them. But nobody heading into a pregnancy really knows how it will go for them. Which honestly makes me feel more strongly that I don't like paying someone else to take that risk for you.

Agree -- no matter how tough a pregnancy is, it's going to end in less than a year, and you'll have lots of medical help. Raising the child for 18+ years, going through multiple stages as the child grows older, managing education and finances and potty training and teaching the child to drive ... that's immensely more difficult than the most difficult pregnancy.

Agree again -- no guarantees about whether you'll get the easy or difficult pregnancy, especially the first time.

It really does feel like whatever choice a woman makes in regards of having kids or not, they can't win.

1. Depends upon whether you're influenced by other people's opinions of your choices.
2. I've never felt judged by my choice to have children (or maybe I just didn't notice).

 

[Smugpugmug]

1. Depends upon whether you're influenced by other people's opinions of your choices.
2. I've never felt judged by my choice to have children (or maybe I just didn't notice).

Oh, I absolutely do not feel pressured into having kids because other people don't respect my choice. But I certainly do feel judged about my choice from what I said in my previous post. I don't judge anyone else's choice about what they do in terms of starting a family or not because ultimately it's not at all my business. I wish I got that courtesy in return.

 

[Mackenzie Click-Mickelson]

1. Depends upon whether you're influenced by other people's opinions of your choices.
2. I've never felt judged by my choice to have children (or maybe I just didn't notice).

I think you're missing the point. It's not whether you would be influenced or not. It's that people either verbally or non-verbally give you their viewpoint on that matter.

A woman doesn't have to feel influenced by someone to feel like people need to shut up about their choice to not have kids, have 1 kid but not 2 have 5 kids instead of only having 2, and any other choices they make out there.

 

[mom2rtk]

I think you're missing the point. It's not whether you would be influenced or not. It's that people either verbally or non-verbally give you their viewpoint on that matter.

A woman doesn't have to feel influenced by someone to feel like people need to shut up about their choice to not have kids, have 1 kid but not 2 have 5 kids instead of only having 2, and any other choices they make out there.

Eh. I just think it’s human nature. It took more than 8 years to have our first. And we sure heard our fair share of needling comments. Even as we navigated infertility for several years. I certainly learned from that not to do the same. Although that doesn’t keep me from having an opinion on someone wanting to subcontract out a pregnancy for convenience (non medical necessity). Regardless, I would never say something to someone in real life about it.

 

[TipsyTraveler]

Agree -- no matter how tough a pregnancy is, it's going to end in less than a year, and you'll have lots of medical help. Raising the child for 18+ years, going through multiple stages as the child grows older, managing education and finances and potty training and teaching the child to drive ... that's immensely more difficult than the most difficult pregnancy.

Unless the complications from pregnancy last more than a year. Or for the rest of your life. Or if they cause you to die. Dying has got to be worse than potty training.

 

[Mackenzie Click-Mickelson]

Eh. I just think it’s human nature. It took more than 8 years to have our first. And we sure heard our fair share of needling comments. Even as we navigated infertility for several years. I certainly learned from that not to do the same. Although that doesn’t keep me from having an opinion on someone wanting to subcontract out a pregnancy for convenience (non medical necessity). Regardless, I would never say something to someone in real life about it.

I'm not disagreeing it's human nature to be naturally inquisitive. You having an opinion, I mean who is able to really tell you not to have one? It's what you do with that opinion that we're talking about. And in the conversation with the PP and the other poster it was discussing a choice about kids in general not zeroed in on surrogacy.

Saying it's about how easily someone is influenced by others is grossly understanding what the topic was about.

I'm just going to repeat Mamabelle4's comment because it fits right in here

"No matter what women choose, people feel like they are entitled to pick it apart, criticism and condemn.

Had your kids at 20? "Oh. Are you sure you're financially secure?"
Had your kids at 35? "Goodness, are you even going to be around for your grandkids?"
Had one child? "Don't you think that's selfish to not give your child a companion?"
Had five children? "Can you provide for them and/or it's environmentally irresponsible to have so many children"
Heaven forbid you are a young, childless woman. You never hear the end of it.
Or heaven forbid you want your tubes tied while you're still in your child rearing years.

You may ask WHY she needed an excuse - because we ALWAYS do. Everyone thinks they're entitled to tell a woman exactly when, how and why they should have children."

 

[mom2rtk]

I'm not disagreeing it's human nature to be naturally inquisitive. You having an opinion, I mean who is able to really tell you not to have one? It's what you do with that opinion that we're talking about. And in the conversation with the PP and the other poster it was discussing a choice about kids in general not zeroed in on surrogacy.

Saying it's about how easily someone is influenced by others is grossly understanding what the topic was about.

I'm just going to repeat Mamabelle4's comment because it fits right in here

"No matter what women choose, people feel like they are entitled to pick it apart, criticism and condemn.

Had your kids at 20? "Oh. Are you sure you're financially secure?"
Had your kids at 35? "Goodness, are you even going to be around for your grandkids?"
Had one child? "Don't you think that's selfish to not give your child a companion?"
Had five children? "Can you provide for them and/or it's environmentally irresponsible to have so many children"
Heaven forbid you are a young, childless woman. You never hear the end of it.
Or heaven forbid you want your tubes tied while you're still in your child rearing years.

You may ask WHY she needed an excuse - because we ALWAYS do. Everyone thinks they're entitled to tell a woman exactly when, how and why they should have children."

Been there. Done that. Recipient of some really hurtful comments mid infertility treatment. Got the other end of the spectrum when years later we decided to *gasp* go from the socially acceptable 2 kids to not as socially acceptable 3. I rolled my eyes and carried on with my extreme happiness at our good fortune. People are nosey. That's never going to change.

I will say this. It eventually stops.

 

[mom2rtk]

Unless the complications from pregnancy last more than a year. Or for the rest of your life. Or if they cause you to die. Dying has got to be worse than potty training.

So transfer the risk to someone else?

 

[Sinder]

So transfer the risk to someone else?

You make it sound like its being forced on someone. It’s an offer, and there will be those willing to accept it. They must feel that any risk is worth the benefit they will get. Don’t really see a problem with that.

 

[theMoreDisneytheBetter]

We used a surrogate for DD. We lost 3 premies, I was on strict bedrest for my entire second and third pregnancy, and I had serious medical complications with the third pregnancy in particular. DH said that there was no way we were trying again be we knew we wanted another child, and adoption isn't nearly as easy as people think it is (we looked into it as well).

We actually had all of the paperwork completed to use a commercial surrogate when my cousin called saying that our grandmother had mentioned what we were going through and wanted to volunteer. It was the most beautiful, selfless act I can imagine. We paid her, of course, but she was shocked when we told her our intentions. She just thought that if she had struggled having her boys she would have wanted a family member to help, so how could she not help when she was able to.

For those wondering about surrogacy in the US, the laws vary widely by state. Eg. surrogacy was illegal in NY when we looked, but CA (where she lives) was surrogate friendly.

Surrogacy certainly wasn't the choice we wanted to make, but every day that I hold my daughter I am grateful for the incredible gift my cousin gave us.

 

[TipsyTraveler]

So transfer the risk to someone else?

What @Sinder said. Also, the surrogate may be at lower risk for complications than the intended mother due to any number of medical reasons. Can’t imagine a lot of people would go into surrogacy if they were high risk for complications.

 

[MamaBelle4]

Unless the complications from pregnancy last more than a year. Or for the rest of your life. Or if they cause you to die. Dying has got to be worse than potty training.

Not to mention, again, one last time: people usually don't raise kids ALONE. They have spouses, parents, siblings, friends, day care workers, etc who help. Pregnancy is only felt by the pregnant person. My husband's thyroid wasn't destroyed by my pregnancies. His spine is in alignment. He didn't suffer through pre-eclampsia. I did. My body and my body alone went through that.

He did, however, suffer from new parent sleep schedules. He did get a vast array of bodily fluids all over him. He did help teach his kids to use the bathroom. He taught them to swim and he'll be the one to teach them to drive. Some nights he makes dinner, some nights I do. When the kids have a problem or a question, we address it as a team.

I am so glad that your pregnancy/pregnancies were so smooth that you can claim that pregnancy is easier than raising kids. I won't ever agree to that. My pregnancies resulted in the most delightful people in my life, but it absolutely wrecked my body permanently.