Carrying someone else's child

2023 Author: Anita Thornton | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-08-25 11:16

It's hard to imagine leaving a child to another who has just been given life. Yet, for some, it's the best experience ever.

A mother who imagines herself carrying someone else's child immediately thinks of when she will have to part with it, after helping it grow and giving birth to it. We imagine sadness and loneliness, boredom and separation. However, after talking for an hour with Line Picard-Deschenes, it is possible that it is quite the opposite. This woman of exemplary generosity and nobility has agreed to tell us about her happy memories with a tenderness and humor that brings us back to the very essence of generosity, that which makes it possible to give life to those who wouldn't have had the chance.

To better understand this little-known intervention, here is the story of Line Picard-Deschenes, surrogate mother and author.

The Decision

Line Picard-Deschenes is one of those women who shines during pregnancy. After having two children of her own, this primary school teacher could not believe that this beautiful period was over. A colleague told me, 'You just have to be a surrogate if you like being pregnant so much!' At first, I laughed about it, II thought it was just good for hippies, she says laughing, but the idea ended up germinating”. After managing to convince her lawyer brothers who were against the idea and her worried mother, it was with the support of her husband that Line Picard-Deschenes took the plunge.

Good to know

In Ontario, pregnancy and childbirth are governed by Common Law and not by the Civil Code, as in Quebec. Here, surrogate mothers and parents have to rely on each other's goodwill, and the woman who gives birth automatically becomes the mother of the child. This is why there are more surrogate mothers in Ontario than in Quebec.

The choice

It's no coincidence that we don't often hear about surrogate mothers. Indeed, even if this solution is very interesting to help infertile couples to have a child, the laws, the impossibility of being paid to be a surrogate mother, the procedures preceding the insemination and the fear of having the feeling to abandon her child frighten many potential candidates. According to Line Picard-Deschenes, these fears are unjustified, but are still very real and will be conveyed until the legislation changes.

Despite everything, according to her, this scarcity allows surrogates to choose the parents with whom they will do business. “There are all kinds of parents. I was offered to send the embryos to me by Purolator and arrange for the baby to be picked up after delivery, as I was told.offered a room in the house so that we could all live together as a family until the birth. It's a chance for surrogate mothers to be able to choose someone with whom we feel good and that's what happened to me with Sylvie and Guy, a couple from Montreal, she tells us. I wanted to give them access to ultrasounds, childbirth and to live the whole experience of being a mother, to all that is pleasant about pregnancy. »

Preparations

In addition to the large doses of hormones that the expectant mother must take to help her body accommodate the embryos, everyone involved must undergo a psychological test. It's a very big act of trust for each of the adults involved and the psychologist must assess everyone's ability to live such an experience. He also gives us really relevant stuff so that we all start the adventure with a realistic perception”.

The future parents and the surrogate mother must also meet with a lawyer who will draft the details of their agreement, whether it is to provide for the consequences of a divorce, the death of one of the biological parents or the consequences of carry a disabled child. It is also this lawyer who helps determine the so-called “reasonable” expenses of the surrogate mother, which are the only amounts of money that she is legally authorized to accept.

To increase the chances of success, three embryos were implanted in the uterus of Line Picard-Deschenes and two of them survived, achievingfinally the dream of the biological parents. It is therefore a twin pregnancy that the surrogate mother carried to term.

As reasonable expenses are not regulated, it is imperative to determine them at the very beginning of the agreement between the parents and the surrogate mother in order to avoid paying huge amounts or giving the impression of 'to have paid the surrogate mother, which would be considered illegal and could even complicate the adoption procedures.

Explain to children

Since Line Picard-Deschenes has two daughters and a whole class of children to whom she had to explain that they would not meet this baby she had in her belly, she chose to explain this situation in his way. "The mother's belly is broken, she told them, the doctor did not know how to fix her belly so I lend her mine to grow her baby". This story allowed the girls to understand the altruistic aspect of this pregnancy and to accept that they would not have little brothers following this pregnancy.

Childbirth

During her delivery, Line Picard-Deschenes was accompanied by her doula and breastfeeding godmother, whom she had incidentally met on Mamanpourlavie.com. “Because I gave birth to twins, there were more medical staff in the room, even though the natural birth went well. It was like a party in the room, the parents were happy to welcome their babies, the nurses were jumping for joy, everyone washappy. I didn't feel like I was having anything taken away from me, I felt like my two little accomplices who I had spoken to about their parents throughout the pregnancy were finally giving them the lovely surprise we had prepared for them together,” she said.

The moment after giving birth is the moment that surrogate mothers dread the most and yet, When everyone left, I could have felt lonely and sad, but on the contrary - and I think that it has a lot to do with psychological preparation during pregnancy - I felt zen. I was at peace with myself and proud of what I had accomplished,” she tells us.

The secret of success

Our sweet surrogate loved this moment so much that she repeated the experience with another mother who, this time, found her on a forum. She therefore bore five children in total. According to her, the secret of success lies in good preparation. “I sometimes hear stories that took place illegally and without support or psychological follow-up and it is understandable that things go wrong. Future parents must put the odds on their side and take the time to surround themselves well. We are not talking about shopping for a car, we are talking about a human life…”, she adds.

Keep giving

For Line Picard Deschenes, it seems that her generosity was not concentrated in one-off events, but that she made it a way of life. Indeed, after giving birth to twinsof Sylvie and Guy, she decided to use the three months of maternity leave (without children) she had to write a book en titled Adventures in the land of storks – Diary of a surrogate mother(of which she even designed the cover page) in order to help infertile parents and potential surrogate mothers understand the ins and outs of this unusual and poorly documented experience.

She also shared her breast milk between the twins and another woman who was not producing enough milk to feed her daughter. During her second surrogate pregnancy, she also gave her breast milk to a mother of twins, one of whom had Down's syndrome and did not have the sucking reflex. Struggling to pump enough milk for this second child, Line Picard-Deschenes brought her the milk she needed.

Next

After all these adventures, Line Picard-Deschenes undertook to write and illustrate a children's book in order to explain to children born of a homoparental family, assisted procreation or a surrogate mother, all the details of their birth in words they can understand. For her, the pregnancies are over, but it is with a head and a heart full of emotions that she will continue to raise her two daughters who have inherited the generosity of their parents.

What does she remember from this experience?

“Everything one receives from life, be it luck, fate or god, whatever people choose to call itthe source, I believe it should be returned. I'm optimistic, I have a good husband, good children, a good network and I can afford to move on… We have a life to live and then it's over and it's nice to have a big house, but it does not feed me, if I did not live fully, I would remain hungry! »

Of course, she admits to having had more difficult times, but she hopes that other parents broken by the impossibility of having children will one day have the chance to meet the surrogate mother who will bring a child into their life.

To know the rest of this fabulous story, you can get his book or consult his blog which is no longer published up-to-date, but still a good resource for information.