Good article
in the New York Times summarizing options for families with excess frozen embryos left over after IVF. It also covered the options for families considering embryo donation (also known as embryo adoption).
Embryo donation is becoming an increasingly popular option for families who have not been successful with IVF or adoption. The number of donated embryo transfers nearly doubled from 2009 to 2013, with 1.084 embryos being donated in 2013. Both donating and receiving families have options to consider. This article did a good job of covering these options.
People get way too caught up in the abstract idea of “were it not for that we would not have this”. You can do that about anyone’s life….were it not for my dad taking a wrong turn that Wednesday morning he’d never have knocked mom off her bike in the cross walk and fallen in love I’d never exist. Were it not for uncle Milty introducing my parents I would not exist. Bottom line is we are born and it makes no difference who was thinking what or who caused what prior to our birth. *Something* good, bad, or vaguely memorable spurned our parents to the act of reproduction that eventually resulted in our birth and we remember none of it. Should our rights be dependent upon the reason the two of them reproduced? If we were born because Dad raped mom violently does that mean we don’t deserve child suhpport? Do we not deserve social security death benefits or military death benefits if our father dies before our 18th birthday just because of what they were feeling at the time we were conceived? Don’t worry about why or how a child gets born just focus on how we treat that PERSON (not child) when they are born. Ensure their treatment is fair equitable and just with no exceptions to the rules ever and then we are on the right and proper path to equal rights. Make exceptions and forgive abuses of human rights claiming they would otherwise not be born if they had to be afforded equal rights and that just sounds like a bigot talking right?
It’s amazing that anyone would think it’s a great idea to bring people into this world specifically to be donated away to strangers as a gift because they couldn’t have kids of their own! How would you like it if your parents promised a couple that you’d be the stand in for the child they could not have? You could not just be yourself you had a job to do a roll to play and were supposed to feel so wanted but wanted by whom and at what price to your dignity and identity? It may feel like a win for the couple who lost their chance at having a biological family together but how will it feel to the person who actually does loose legal and physical connection to real live biological family in order to make those people feel happy and whole? Not a reall win win more like a toss and take
Marilynn, while that is one way to look at it. Another way is to acknowledge that there was no way this embryo would have been transferred and grown into a child unless it had been donated.