In all these talks about new fertility treatments, surrogacy, etc. a very important person is usually left out of the equation... The baby. Not a commodity, not a right - a baby who will one day grow up and have to grapple with their beginnings. Babies in utero hear their mother's voice (or their surrogate's) - they come into the world s…
In all these talks about new fertility treatments, surrogacy, etc. a very important person is usually left out of the equation... The baby. Not a commodity, not a right - a baby who will one day grow up and have to grapple with their beginnings. Babies in utero hear their mother's voice (or their surrogate's) - they come into the world seeking that voice, that comfort. Likewise a woman's body is leaking milk, hormonally wrecked as she prepares to care for this infant. Biology demands one reality - we, 'post biology' - demand another.
I write this while nursing my second child, 2 and a half months old. I just wonder how much is being lost, for both mothers and their children, when we pretend the most vital of all things - life - can be turned into an industry. I wonder how many memories will be coming out 20 years from now from children who have to learn just how much money and human capital was exchanged for them to exist at all.
Katie I shook my head at the line about the surrogate's work being "done" after the birth "except a few months of pumping breast milk". Nursing a newborn is a full time job in and of itself. Pumping for a few months would be difficult and time consuming, not as simple as it sounded in the article.
Yes! Breastfeeding is so hard. Pumping included! I had to exclusively pump with both my daughters for the first six or seven weeks due to latch issues. It's a full time job and then some. Pumping for a few months is no small thing.
I’ve seen this done and usually the woman is compensated quite well. Not saying that it isn’t hard (also nursing my 4 month old at the moment) but they’re not usually doing this as a free service.
I think most children would be pretty perturbed by the amount of money involved in this whole process. I don't really know if you can compensate for the loss that the child will someday feel over this whole bizarre science experiment. I guess I just don't think there's a dollar amount on these sort of things.
Agreed. That said, I have a dear friend who used a gestational carrier to have her two children. She anatomically could not carry a child, but she and her husband were able to create embryos. Their gestational carrier was a nice woman they met through an agency. Although they didn’t know her prior to the pregnancy, they have become very close and she remains an important part of their lives. It hasn’t been as transactional as this article or commentators have portrayed…it was something that was very thoughtfully considered…the risks, the potential for heartache on all sides…this couple and carrier talked through it all before proceeding.
Yes, this industry has huge potential for exploitation and abuse, but it’s not super simple. Their oldest child is now 7 and they’ve explained that while she grew in someone else’s tummy (the child knows the carrier), she is 100% their child because they used mom and dad’s material to make her…they just needed some help getting her big enough to come home with them. Kind of simplistic explanation, but I know they’ve tried to explain it in a way that honors their gestational carrier and makes clear that she is not some mysterious amalgam of genetic material between the three adults. It’s hard, I’m sure, but I don’t sense this is going to be an identity problem for her.
Perhaps is this is a fringe case, but of the three different couples I know that have utilized gestational carriers, all of them seem more like this situation than the transactional/exploitative ones described in this article. Again, maybe they’re more rare than I realized.
On the whole, people misunderstand and misuse the word "right" IMO. There are only two "god-given" rights: the right to think one's own thoughts and the right to die. All the rest are legal agreements, which can generally be improved upon the more money one has.
This reminds me of a discussion I had with an attorney who was certain there were "rights," to many things. I only realized several months later he was referring to "Staturory rights," which is to say rights granted by a particular law that may or may not have anythign to do with God given rights.
Great point! And the ‘right’ to have it all paid for by insurance! Eighteen years ago I utilized IVF services for my second child. Because I was healthy, but of advanced maternal age, and naturally not able to conceive on my own, we paid for this ourselves and we borrowed the money. Completely fair! I never expected anyone else to pay. Why is this so hard to understand? Insurance pays for sick care, not well care!
In all these talks about new fertility treatments, surrogacy, etc. a very important person is usually left out of the equation... The baby. Not a commodity, not a right - a baby who will one day grow up and have to grapple with their beginnings. Babies in utero hear their mother's voice (or their surrogate's) - they come into the world seeking that voice, that comfort. Likewise a woman's body is leaking milk, hormonally wrecked as she prepares to care for this infant. Biology demands one reality - we, 'post biology' - demand another.
I write this while nursing my second child, 2 and a half months old. I just wonder how much is being lost, for both mothers and their children, when we pretend the most vital of all things - life - can be turned into an industry. I wonder how many memories will be coming out 20 years from now from children who have to learn just how much money and human capital was exchanged for them to exist at all.
This was beautifully put. I am a mother as well. When we deny biology we deny ourselves and our babies ease and dignity.
Katie I shook my head at the line about the surrogate's work being "done" after the birth "except a few months of pumping breast milk". Nursing a newborn is a full time job in and of itself. Pumping for a few months would be difficult and time consuming, not as simple as it sounded in the article.
Yes! Breastfeeding is so hard. Pumping included! I had to exclusively pump with both my daughters for the first six or seven weeks due to latch issues. It's a full time job and then some. Pumping for a few months is no small thing.
I’ve seen this done and usually the woman is compensated quite well. Not saying that it isn’t hard (also nursing my 4 month old at the moment) but they’re not usually doing this as a free service.
I think most children would be pretty perturbed by the amount of money involved in this whole process. I don't really know if you can compensate for the loss that the child will someday feel over this whole bizarre science experiment. I guess I just don't think there's a dollar amount on these sort of things.
Agreed. That said, I have a dear friend who used a gestational carrier to have her two children. She anatomically could not carry a child, but she and her husband were able to create embryos. Their gestational carrier was a nice woman they met through an agency. Although they didn’t know her prior to the pregnancy, they have become very close and she remains an important part of their lives. It hasn’t been as transactional as this article or commentators have portrayed…it was something that was very thoughtfully considered…the risks, the potential for heartache on all sides…this couple and carrier talked through it all before proceeding.
Yes, this industry has huge potential for exploitation and abuse, but it’s not super simple. Their oldest child is now 7 and they’ve explained that while she grew in someone else’s tummy (the child knows the carrier), she is 100% their child because they used mom and dad’s material to make her…they just needed some help getting her big enough to come home with them. Kind of simplistic explanation, but I know they’ve tried to explain it in a way that honors their gestational carrier and makes clear that she is not some mysterious amalgam of genetic material between the three adults. It’s hard, I’m sure, but I don’t sense this is going to be an identity problem for her.
Perhaps is this is a fringe case, but of the three different couples I know that have utilized gestational carriers, all of them seem more like this situation than the transactional/exploitative ones described in this article. Again, maybe they’re more rare than I realized.
On this note - do we have a RIGHT to children? This article grapples with this question well -- https://www.plough.com/en/topics/life/parenting/is-there-a-right-to-have-children
On the whole, people misunderstand and misuse the word "right" IMO. There are only two "god-given" rights: the right to think one's own thoughts and the right to die. All the rest are legal agreements, which can generally be improved upon the more money one has.
This reminds me of a discussion I had with an attorney who was certain there were "rights," to many things. I only realized several months later he was referring to "Staturory rights," which is to say rights granted by a particular law that may or may not have anythign to do with God given rights.
And what is a "god given" right? I mean, besides the two that I enumerated?
Great point! And the ‘right’ to have it all paid for by insurance! Eighteen years ago I utilized IVF services for my second child. Because I was healthy, but of advanced maternal age, and naturally not able to conceive on my own, we paid for this ourselves and we borrowed the money. Completely fair! I never expected anyone else to pay. Why is this so hard to understand? Insurance pays for sick care, not well care!
Just left a comment about this. There’s a narcissism to these types of articles that rubs me. It’s always about adults getting what they want.
Yes. It’s ALL about Narcissism...Worship of self is the religion of choice these days.
Conforming the world to your ideology of what reality should be is how I would describe it
Katie, agree 💯
*memoirs