Gestational surrogacy is one of the most impressive and powerful forms of reproductive technology and health care available today. If two partners want biological children but struggle with infertility, they can use this kind of reproductive medicine to have children but still have a biological child.

This practice has become so common that many surrogacy agencies exist just to make different types of surrogacy much easier. If you are interested in surrogate motherhood as a way to enter parentage, you’ve come to the right place!

Here is everything you need to know about a gestational surrogate, how to operate in this field of reproductive medicine, and how surrogacy contracts generally work.

What Is the Definition of Surrogate?

Surrogacy is a process by which a married couple, known as the intended parents, hires a woman (known as the surrogate) to carry their child and be the birth mother.

As with any legal contract, though, there are restrictions on who can become the legal parent of the child:

The mother and father must be married or living in a long-term relationship.
The surrogate must not be related to the intended parents or each other.
The surrogate’s eggs cannot be used for general donation.
Surrogacy is not an option if one of the partners has a severe illness or disability that makes pregnancy dangerous.

Surrogacy can also happen when someone doesn’t have healthy eggs available to donate and wants to include their partner in a child’s life. It’s also available when someone wants to create more than one family and donates eggs, sperm, or both to make multiple families all at once.

What Is a Surrogate Mother?

A surrogate mother is a woman who carries a child for another person or couple, often for payment.

Surrogates may be considered gestational carriers because they don’t give birth to their biological children: they carry someone else’s baby from conception through delivery. In fact, this type of arrangement has become so common that there are now companies that help connect intended parents with surrogates who meet their needs.

How Does Embryo Transfer Work?

The process of transferring an embryo from a surrogate’s uterus to the intended parent’s uterus is known as embryo transfer. It can be done during an in vitro fertilization (IVF) cycle or as part of a frozen embryo transfer (FET).

Here’s how it works: A doctor uses laparoscopy to insert a catheter into the surrogate’s fallopian tube and retrieve one or more eggs that have been retrieved earlier during this IVF cycle.

Then, he retrieves some sperm from the male partner and combines them with the retrieved eggs; once they are combined, they form embryos which are then transferred into your uterus via IVF treatment.

The egg donor is not a surrogate because she’s not providing any of her genetic material; she simply provides her own eggs from which embryos are created and then implanted into another woman’s uterus.

An egg donor is also not a surrogate mother because she does not carry the resulting baby to term; instead, she only has one fertilized embryo implanted into her body so that it can generally grow inside her womb.

How Does Artificial Insemination Work?

In the case of a sperm donor, the intended father or donor provides sperm. The woman who receives this sperm is called the recipient of the father’s sperm or the surrogate mother.

A man can be a sperm donor if he does not have a partner and wants to help another couple have a child. Many men decide to donate their sperm because they want to help an infertile couple become parents.

In the case of surrogacy, pregnancy occurs via artificial insemination. The sperm donor is present for the entire process, typically done at a doctor’s office or fertility clinic. The mother-to-be is given hormone injections to stimulate egg production and ovulation.

Once ovulating, her eggs are retrieved from her ovaries via ultrasound-guided needle aspiration and then combined with the donor’s sperm in a lab dish. A single embryo is placed back into her womb and allowed to grow until it reaches term (about 40 weeks).

A woman who becomes pregnant using donated sperm is known as a gestational carrier or surrogate mother. She may also be called an egg donor in some situations. Sometimes, she and her husband may choose not to raise their children.

Instead, they allow another couple (the recipients) to raise them with the intention that they will always know that they were born from other people’s eggs and/or sperms (known as non-anonymous donors).

How Does a Surrogate Pregnancy Work?

Surrogacy is a highly supportive process between all parties involved and can be very rewarding. If you’re considering becoming a surrogate mother or if you know a potential intended mother who is looking to conceive a child through surrogacy, keep these points in mind before deciding which type of arrangement would be best for your situation.

In a traditional surrogacy process, the surrogate parent receives payment for her services and may be covered by some insurance providers, depending on the surrogacy arrangements. She will undergo routine medical tests and ultrasounds throughout her pregnancy to ensure that she and her unborn baby are healthy. This process is also intentionally processed to ensure minimal legal issues and complications.

Conclusion

Surrogacy is a highly supportive process between all parties involved and can be very rewarding. If you’re considering becoming a surrogate mother or if you know someone who is looking to conceive a child through surrogacy, keep these points in mind before deciding which type of arrangement would be best for your situation.

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Sources:

SURROGATE | Cambridge English Dictionary

Surrogate Definition & Meaning | Dictionary.com

Surrogate definition and meaning | Collins English Dictionary