You have 3 kids and feel one is missing. You and your partner try for awhile to have that fourth baby only to discover it won’t happen without medical intervention. You go through the agonizing and expensive process of IVF. Recently riding the roller coaster of implantation, you eagerly await “that” call. The phone rings and the doctor says “CONGRAGULATIONS!”. You are beyond yourself with excitment….”oh, yea” they add, “we made a mistake and you have been implanted with the wrong embryo.”

That is exactly what happened to Sean and Carolyn Savage. Now, they are faced with a choice. Do they continue the pregnancy knowing in the end they will have to give the baby to the other couple? Or, do they terminate the pregnancy? They say termination was never an option. Perhaps the most heartbreaking part of the story, Carolyn will not be able to be pregnant again because of health issues, although they do hope to use a surrogate for the remaining embryos.

Here is the interview with the couple, Shannon and Paul Morell who will be adding a new little son soon. Hopefully they will be able to fully connect with the baby since they haven’t had the chance during pregnancy.

What happens when a woman can’t bear her own children (i can’t even imagine that pain)? She either adopts or goes through a surrogate.    i am mixed on the issue of surrogacy.  While i admire the women who offer their lives to help another couple, there are also many children who are waiting in poor conditions to be included in a family.  There have been a few articles put out recently about the rise in military women stepping up to offer their bodies and lives.  Some may argue it is about the money.  i believe that is may be a small aspect, however, i am sure these have to have their heart in it too.  Money is good but if you don’t like what you do, it becomes a chore to do it.  Military wives are seen as a good fit because they receive Tricare. 

Here is a great discussion of the Tricare system and how it pertains to surrogacy by A Soldier’s Mind:

In the military, while the service member pays a small monthly premium for their family’s health care, as long as that family member receives their health care on a military installation, there are no deductibles or co-pays. It’s apparent that surrogacy groups are taking advantage of that and putting other military families at risk of having their monthly premiums increased or even causing them to have to begin paying deductibles and co-pays. By using a military wife as a surrogate mother, surrogacy groups avoid paying about $20,000 for a standard surrogacy medical policy. They also don’t have to pay the deductibles and co-payments. Because of this advantage, some surrogacy groups will pay an additional $5,000 premium to military wives. After reading this article, I spoke to several military wives, wives of retirees, as well as Soldiers and military retirees. To a person, they all said that this angers them, because things like this drive the costs up for everyone else and they felt it was unfair that a military wife would take advantageof the Tricare medical insurance, in order to put some extra money in their pocket. I tend to agree with them. Tricare for retirees and their families doesrequire the retiree to pay deductibles and co-pays, as well as a much higher premium each month. We’ve all seen the news reports about retiree Tricare being on the rise. Things like this just make those rates continue to increase. Then you also have the issue that the military wives who are surrogates are committing fraud at the expense of American taxpayers.

Check out the piece ABC News had recently done.  One of the comments made me go..hhmm.  Someone mentioned the fact that our tax dollars cover the expenses of illegal immigrants. 

What do you think about this subject?