A brief overview on surrogacy and its types

Surrogacy is the most popular Assisted Reproductive Technology method where the infertile couples hire a lady to have a biological child to establish their family. Apart from sterile couple, LGBT (Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender) couples hire surrogates to realize their dreams of paternity. Infertility affects more than seven million people alone in the United States of America and the most shocking part is around 12% of the total women population in the USA are suffering from infertility. Most of the sterile couples overcome their struggle and choose surrogacy to realize the dreams of paternity.

Once the intended parents decide to choose surrogacy, they need to contact the best agency such as surrogates across America to find the suitable surrogate. The agencies explain the terminologies, legal issues and the complication revolve around surrogacy. Meanwhile, even intended parents need to do research on surrogacy and its types. There are two types; traditional and gestational. Gestational is the most common and most popular type of surrogacy as it is legally less complicated and the baby born through this process and completely unrelated to the genes of a surrogate mother. This mean the baby through this process is genetically related to the intended parents or donors (if their sperm or egg is used).

Traditional substitute process is legally more complicated and in some states and countries, this type of substitute method is completely banned. Since the baby born through this process is genetically related to the substitute mother and intended father, most of the state laws consider the surrogate and intended father as the legal parents of the baby.

Therefore, while entering to the agreement read the conditions, legal rights and the compensation part carefully. If you are not sure about the process and terminologies, ask your agency to clarify the same. 

A brief overview on surrogacy and its types

Surrogacy is the most popular Assisted Reproductive Technology method where the infertile couples hire a lady to have a biological child to establish their family. Apart from sterile couple, LGBT (Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender) couples hire surrogates to realize their dreams of paternity. Infertility affects more than seven million people alone in the United States of America and the most shocking part is around 12% of the total women population in the USA are suffering from infertility. Most of the sterile couples overcome their struggle and choose surrogacy to realize the dreams of paternity.

Once the intended parents decide to choose surrogacy, they need to contact the best agency such as surrogates across America to find the suitable surrogate. The agencies explain the terminologies, legal issues and the complication revolve around surrogacy. Meanwhile, even intended parents need to do research on surrogacy and its types. There are two types; traditional and gestational. Gestational is the most common and most popular type of surrogacy as it is legally less complicated and the baby born through this process and completely unrelated to the genes of a surrogate mother. This mean the baby through this process is genetically related to the intended parents or donors (if their sperm or egg is used).

Traditional substitute process is legally more complicated and in some states and countries, this type of substitute method is completely banned. Since the baby born through this process is genetically related to the substitute mother and intended father, most of the state laws consider the surrogate and intended father as the legal parents of the baby.

Therefore, while entering to the agreement read the conditions, legal rights and the compensation part carefully. If you are not sure about the process and terminologies, ask your agency to clarify the same. 

Tips for intended parents seeking surrogacy

Finding responsible, healthy and committed surrogates in the western world is a heart breaking job. Amongst all the hurdles, the one difficulty that intended parents has the face that each state has different surrogacy law. Some state laws also consider that a surrogate is the legal mother of a child since she gave to the birth of a new born. Some states have strong moral barrier against surrogacy. The process of surrogacy may cost in and around $100,000 and there is no guarantee that intended parents bring healthy baby to the home.  Therefore, to overcome all the hurdles are to make their journey simple and fruitful, sterile couples search for the different and healthy ways to realize their dream.

Sterile couples can take help from the surrogate agencies to find suitable and committed proxy to realize their dream. The agency will take care about the legal procedures and medical appointments. The agencies assist both intended parents and surrogates with paper work, coordinating appointments, schedule testing, appointment with psychiatrist etc. If couples want to speak about compensation directly with the proxy, they will feel bit inconvenience. Therefore, agency takes the middle role and explains the rights and responsibilities of both intended couples and a surrogate mother. When the matter comes to handling the monetary transactions, agencies are the best. They handle the financial transactions made between the surrogate and sterile couples through ESCROW account and help establishing a good relationship between both parties.

The agencies also hire an attorney to make a legal contract that briefly outlines the compensation paid to a proxy, rights and responsibilities of both parties. 

What is gestational surrogacy?

Infertility is a problem that hits many people around the world where lot of female partners struggle to conceive. When women come to know that they are not able to conceive, it is totally difficult for them to grasp the truth and it can be very troubling and stressful. A ray of hope for sterile couples emerged with the advancement of medical technologies. The infertile couple can fulfill their dreams of parenthood by hiring a surrogate mother. The baby born through a surrogate is genetically relevant to the intended parents and unrelated to a surrogate mother. A proxy lady can give birth to a baby that is harmonically not relevant to her through In-vitro fertilization procedure. It is a part of gestational surrogacy where women is conceived when embryo created by IVF is transferred to her uterus.

In-vitro fertilization, popularly known as IVF treatment is considered a major medication for infertility. In this procedure, female egg is fertilized by male sperm outside the human body. This treatment is suggested when all assisted reproductive technology (ART) is failed. The fertilized egg will be in a fluid medium which is cultured in a laboratory for two to six days and then transferred to a surrogate mother’s uterus.

Normally, the IVF treatment is used to surmount female infertility. Women suffer from infertility when fallopian tubes make in vivo fertilization difficult. If there is a problem with the quality of male sperm, then intracytoplasmic sperm injection (ICSI) is used where a male sperm is directly injected into the egg cell. According to the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) guidelines, IVF treatment is specified in unexplained infertility for women where a female partner is unable conceive after 2 years of regular unguarded sexual intercourse. For a successful IVF medication, it requires healthy ova, sperms and a uterus to maintain pregnancy. The therapy is endeavored only when less expensive medications such as ART failed due to the huge cost associated with this remedy. 

Are you looking for a surrogate mother?

Establishing a sweet family is a dream for newly married couples. But when couple comes to know they can’t expect baby, they will feel depressed. Thus, to establish their sweet family, couples seek help from surrogate mother. There are many reasons that prevent a lady from conceiving a baby. Whatever the reasons may be, the ladies who work as surrogate mother really play a pivotal role in establishing the family of a childless couple. However, when couples decide to hire a lady as surrogate to complete their family, immediately the question which pop-up in mind is, how to find a proxy mum? There are numerous options to find the suitable mother. Couples can ask their sister, cousins, friend or other family member. If couples choose a lady who is close to them or within their relative circle, she will not feel emotional distress while relinquishing the baby. Couple who hire a surrogate from their family is known as altruistic surrogacy.

When the point comes to finding a surrogate mother and if you don’t have any ladies in your friends and family circle ready to work as a proxy, you can place ads in paper, magazines and online forum. Interview the candidate, have a fact to face talk before hiring. It is recommended doing background check or else one can take help from the surrogate agency to hire the best. There are so many advantages of choosing an agency as they help in legal issues, psychological issues, surrogate pregnancy as well as financial issues. 

How the surrogacy works?

A simple definition of a surrogacy is a lady accepts to become pregnant either through traditional or gestational process and hand over the baby to the childless couple after birth. It is a simple definition to understand the core view of surrogacy process. Couples who are not able to bear the child due to medical problem where all the ART process failed to show its results opt for surrogacy process. Couples who are seeking for the best surrogate mother need to understand that it is a very expensive process both in term of finance and emotions. In this blog, you come to know about different types of surrogacy and how it works.

Traditional surrogacy and gestational surrogacy are the two types of surrogacy. Most of the proxy agencies and doctors recommend gestational process rather than traditional. In traditional proxy process, a surrogate will become pregnant when the sperm of an intended father or a donor is injected to the uterus. The baby born through this process in genetically related to the surrogate and intended father or donor. Due to the psychological factors and the legal risks associated with this procedure, the agencies and doctors do not recommend traditional surrogacy.

In gestational procedure, the intended mother’s ova and intended father’s sperm is taken out. The ovum is fertilized by adding sperm in the laboratory. Doctors choose quality ovum and mix it with the best swimmers to form a healthy zygote. All these process are carried out in the laboratory. The resulting zygote is cultured in the lab for about six weeks. This zygote is later injected to the uterus of a proxy. The baby born through this process in genetically irrelevant to the surrogate where as the child is genetically related to the couples who are seeking child through this process. 

Know these factors before you opt to become surrogate

Surrogacy can be considered one of the selfless acts performed by women. To establish a family of childless couples, a surrogate will bear the pain, comforts and discomforts of pregnancy. However, surrogacy is involved with both physical and psychological risks. Couples who are seeking surrogates should understand that a lady will feel a psychological trauma at the moment of relinquishing the child born in her fetus. It is not as easy as it appears to the outside world.

The psychological risk faced by a surrogate mother is very difficult to imagine. Therefore, most of the proxy agencies recommend pre-screening tests as well as psychological tests where the surrogate mother is trained both physically and mentally to relinquish the child immediately after birth. The physiatrist mainly concentrates on the four areas which are contact, control, closure and ethics. The doctors encourage surrogate mother to establish a strong bond with the couples with whom they are working for, which helps a mother to hand over the baby after birth. If the bond with the baby is stronger than with the bond of couples; then she may feel difficult to handing over the new born.

Most of the agencies encourage couple and surrogate to establish a good relationship, enjoy each and every moment of the pregnancy. It will help both parties to gain a good relationship with the child. When you understand a person better, you need not worry about hand over your own baby to them.

A lady willing to become a surrogate should concentrate on all these facts and should question herself that is she ready to relinquish the baby after birth? After all, it is the matter of realizing the dreams of a couple who are keenly waiting for it.