Did you catch Meredith Vieira’s interview with Carolyn and Sean Savage on the Today show yesterday? The couple are parents to three other children, and have had multiple difficulties with conception and pregnancy. With five remaining embryos, they implanted one in the hopes of conceiving a fourth child. When the doctor called, they received the best and the worst news, all rolled into one. Carolyn was pregnant, but the doctors had made a terrible mistake. They implanted the wrong embryo and Carolyn was forced to make a heart wrenching decision. She could either terminate the pregnancy or carry it to term and hand the child over to his biological parents. To make matters worse, for the sake of Carolyn’s health, this was to be her last pregnancy. Because of their religious convictions, they could not terminate the pregnancy. They chose to continue with the pregnancy, and Carolyn is expected to deliver in about two weeks with the biological parents present. Because Carolyn cannot get pregnant again, they plan on using a surrogate mother to carry their remaining embryos, since they believe in giving each embryo a chance at life.
Can you imagine such a tragedy? I cannot imagine how I would react. At first, I would feel as though the baby were mine anyway and I would have a hard time grasping the fact that I could not keep the child growing steadily inside of me. I think I would feel as though I had been forced into becoming a surrogate, a role I had never chosen, and I would initially resent the doctors who had made the mistake. Eventually, I hope I would come to grips with the fact that I was making another couple’s dreams come true and focus on that in order to cope, otherwise it might be too difficult to handle. The birth would be very happy and sad. I cannot imagine watching another couple take “my” child home with them.
How would you react if this scenario happened to you? What do you think should happen to the doctors who made this mistake? Is it right for the couple to be forced to give up the child once he is born? Who is the real mother, the one who contributed the egg or the one who carried the child to term? What does it mean to be a mother: is it simply a matter of genetics or is there something more?