Becoming a Surrogate: How To Talk To Your Natural-Born Children About Their Surrogate Sibling
In some cases, you may be a parent who has been able to have a few natural-born children already.
Yet when you tried to have another, your fertility wasn’t as healthy as it used to be. This may have led you to look for “surrogacy near me” in order to locate a surrogate agency. In this case, you may have to talk with your natural-born children about their surrogate sibling once you find a surrogate.
On the other side of the spectrum, if you’re a surrogate mother or a woman who is planning to become a surrogate, then you may have a slightly different conversation at hand. In your case, you may have natural-born children. They may mistake your pregnant belly for another sibling. Talking with them about surrogacy and the surrogate sibling can be difficult.
This article will prepare you for both sides of the conversation.
Intended Parents
For intended parents who have natural-born children already and are expecting another through surrogacy, the conversation can be difficult to explain. Your children may not understand where this new baby came from. They may even believe that it’s adopted and not actually their blood relative. Concepts like surrogacy and genetics can be difficult to explain to young children. It isn’t impossible, however.
One way to help them understand that they’re going to have a brother or sister is by introducing them to the surrogate. At our surrogate agency located in Roseville, CA, one of the surrogacy qualifications is for surrogates to have had a prior successful pregnancy. So, you can be sure that your surrogate will be comfortable around young children. They’re mothers, themselves.
When they’re pregnant, you can introduce your children to them. They’ll be able to see the surrogate’s pregnant belly and slowly put together that their sibling is in there. If the surrogate is comfortable with it, they should touch the belly. Physical touch can be just as informative as seeing it with their own eyes.
With the surrogate before them, you can attempt to explain surrogacy in California. While you may need to brush over the details like IVF and an embryo transfer, you can explain that the eggs and sperm from you and your spouse were used to make the baby. That baby was then placed inside of the surrogate for safe-keeping.
Introduce Them To Your Surrogate
Depending on the age of your children, they may not even remember these moments when they’re older. However, it’s still a good idea to make them part of the process of surrogacy and make sure they are introduced to your surrogate mother. They’ll feel closer to their surrogate sibling and mentally adopt them as part of their family.
You can include them by taking them with you to appointments. The ultrasound appointments can be great moments for them to be part of. They can see their sibling inside of the surrogate. Throughout this appointment, you should try to reinforce the fact that the surrogate baby is their blood relative. They all come from the same genes.
While they may not be present at the birth of the baby, they should still be brought to the hospital later. When they are introduced to the baby for the first time, you should be the one holding it. Seeing you carrying the baby will forge that connection in their minds that the baby you’re holding is their little brother or sister.
You can also allow them to hold the baby. This is a great moment for them to connect to the baby and accept them as their sibling.
Talking about pregnancy can be difficult.
It’s up to your own beliefs, values, and methods of parenting that determine how involved the conversation becomes. However, you should trust your children to be able to handle the information well. Children are far more accepting of others than their adult counterparts.
Surrogates
On the other side of the spectrum, surrogates face a different kind of conversation. When you become a surrogate, you’re going to be carrying the child of another couple, and understandably your own children will likely think that you’re pregnant with their next sibling.
Since surrogacy qualifications require that their surrogate mothers have had at least one successful and healthy pregnancy in the past, you likely have a child or two before you become a surrogate. As such, you need to be prepared to have this conversation with them.
When you join a surrogacy agency in California after submitting your medical records and jumping through the hoops, you might be able to find a few resources detailing how to approach this conversation with your children. You may even be able to speak to other surrogates and learn about how they talked to their natural-born children about becoming a surrogate.
One of the methods that you might want to utilize is to frame it like a job. In a way, becoming a surrogate is basically a job. Sometimes you have to go somewhere in order to receive your fertility treatments, you have ‘coworkers’ that you work with, and you receive compensation for your services.
Explaining the Process of Surrogacy To Your Children
With this mindset, you can explain the process of surrogacy to your children. You can tell them that it’s your job to help parents who can’t have babies on their own. You can explain that you have to have treatments done to help your body have their baby. Then you can tell them what a healthy pregnancy is like and why you’ll be carrying it for nine months.
Just like any job, you receive money for it. After you give birth, the job is over. While being a surrogate is often more than just a means of making money, linking it to a job might make it easier for children to conceptualize.
You might also explain the difference between naturally-born children and surrogate children. You can tell them about the difference between how they were born and how the baby that you’re carrying is going to be born.
Perhaps the most difficult part of the conversation is explaining that the baby that you’re carrying isn’t their sibling. It may be considered their surrogate sibling, but it isn’t their actual sibling because it belongs to another set of parents. Because they’ll see you growing bigger with each month, they’ll likely keep forgetting that the baby growing inside of you isn’t your own.
You’ll need some patience in order to remind them gently that the baby isn’t yours. You might also want to introduce them to real parents. By putting a face to their names, your children might have a better idea of understanding surrogacy in California.
Another way to help them understand is to include them in the process.
To ensure you have a healthy pregnancy, they can join you at your appointments. By being there with the parents, they can continue to forge that distinction between their real sibling and the surrogate sibling.
Name the Baby
Some of our most successful surrogate pregnancies end up with surrogate mothers and intended parents having a great friendship.
It’s an amazing thing once the surrogate child is born if the surrogate’s family has a chance to meet the baby. At Made in the USA Surrogacy, we have had great success with surrogates who have children that know the surrogate baby by their name.
Their children still to this day remember the baby when they talk about him, such as “baby Ryan.” This allows them to disconnect from the idea that the baby was born to their family, but having a name makes them a family friend!
Patience and Commitment
Speaking with your natural-born children about becoming a surrogate, pregnancy, and everything else involved with it can be difficult. Yet it isn’t impossible. Children are often smarter than their parents realize.
If you’re searching for “surrogacy near me” and want to join a surrogacy agency in California, then consider us. We just need your medical records to get started. We make “surrogacy near me” easier than ever. Fill out our form to begin the adventure.
