This is a terrifying story

[oursin]

When her son died in utero, a venture capitalist went to extremes to punish her surrogate.

Sometimes one gets the impression that some people don't understand that pregnancy isn't a straightforward and simple process and that if it goes wrong it's not actually a matter of blame:

Although America is the world leader in surrogacy, it’s also the developed nation with the highest maternal mortality rate and one of the highest stillbirth rates, a situation described by many as “a public health crisis.” Compared to natural conception, carrying a genetically unrelated fetus more than triples the risk of severe, potentially deadly conditions, a statistic surrogates are rarely given. IPs do not always have to disclose complete medical information, including histories of certain conditions that may harm their GCs. They don’t have to be honest about how many kids they have, why they are hiring a surrogate, or how many other surrogates they have simultaneously pregnant.

Things happen. VICTORIAN DOCTORS UNDERSTOOD THAT. (See Alfred Swaine Taylor, A Manual of Medical Jurisprudence, 1879, on Criminal Abortion).

The whole thing sounds like an entire nightmare (the surrogate was expected to cover pregnancy care via her own health insurance WTF?).

And do we think the intending mother fit to be a parent?

***

On people Being The Main Character: she's become a one-woman clean-up crew, sharing her efforts on social media and calling out the Canal and River Trust for what she sees as its failure to properly maintain the area:

In response, the Canal and River Trust said: "Elena might feel alone in tackling London's litter waste, however she is one of hundreds of volunteers who help our charity keep London's canals alive, picking up other people's rubbish and carrying out routine maintenance.
"We're delighted when more people take an interest in looking after their local canal."
However, the trust said it was "more effective" to collect bagged waste "when it's part of the regular organised volunteer events that our charity runs".
"These activities are scheduled alongside weekly clean-ups by our operatives and contractors, which ensures collected waste is removed and recycled or disposed of appropriately," a spokesperson said.
The trust also urged visitors to London's canals to take their litter home with them.

One feels that a little due diligence would have found her a spot on the volunteer rota and a supply of appropriate bags.

Comments

[conuly]

That is the second worst surrogate story I've ever heard.

(The first worst involves a set of twins, and the parents decided after the fact that they only wanted one of the two, the other one having Downs syndrome. This might not have been a surrogacy, it might've been a regular adoption. I think it was a surrogacy? Anyway, the birthing mother went to court to insist they either take both children or neither.)

[silveradept]

A thing that is carefully elided and backgrounded in the surrogacy article, outside of the "there was a live-in boyfriend" and the accusations of "rough sex" is how much this seems to read like a woman who was perfectly happy to have a woman of color (at least, I'm guessing that's the case) carry a surrogate pregnancy when things were going well, and was all too ready to ascribe racist reasons to why the surrogacy failed, and to then spend much more than whatever was invested in the surrogacy to ensure the life of the surrogate was completely ruined. And despite all this, it's still likely that the surrogate's life will be the one ruined, and the intended parent's life will continue on in riches. Or in something other than having been ruined in her zeal to destroy someone else.