It is dangerous to split motherhood into separate jobs on a production line: egg donor, surrogate, wet-nurse, care-giver (and now mitochondrial donor). Powerful people are working hard to change public opinion about what does or does not constitute a realmother. A woman who wants to carry a child and raise it but decides to use an egg donor proclaims genetics don’t make a mother, it’s who carries, gives birth, nurses, and raises the child who is the real mother. A woman who can not carry a child, but uses her own eggs plus a surrogate, may proclaim pregnancy and giving birth is not what makes a mother, it is the genetic connection that really matters. And a person who uses both an egg donor and surrogate may say neither genes nor pregnancy and labor make for a real parent. This equals mass confusion, and some tricky legal predicaments.
Cindy Close was shocked when, after risking her life in a complicated birth to twins, the hospital staff approached her saying, “I understand we have a surrogacy situation.” Close had used donor eggs paid for by a man she thought would be her co-parent, and was horrified when he attempted to “dupe” her out of motherhood. Some protest that if we just had better contracts and more legal involvement, these kinds of situations would not arise. But should we really let those with the best lawyers decide who is or is not a real mother?