….At 22 weeks into a surrogate pregnancy, Brittney Pearson, 37, of Sacramento, received the devastating news of her breast cancer diagnosis in May. Brittney described her reaction to the news saying, “My main focus was that I could continue the pregnancy and that the baby would be OK.”
According to Pearson’s account, medical professionals at Sutter Health Medical Center in Sacramento initially told her that she could undergo a pregnancy-compatible form of chemotherapy treatment. They planned to induce her at 34 weeks gestation — a plan that, initially, was acceptable to the two men who had hired Brittney.
A comprehensive, full-body MRI scan revealed the full extent of the disease.
At 24 weeks, Brittney learned her cancer had metastasized. She would need a faster-growing, more aggressive chemo. Since Brittney would now require a different chemotherapy, doing so would put the baby she was carrying at risk.
Brittney decided to deliver the baby at 25 weeks in order for her to receive the chemotherapy necessary for her own health, with minimal risk to the health of the baby. However, the couple who contracted Brittney as a surrogate refused to accept any possibility of early labor, as they were concerned that the baby, if born prematurely, would have serious medical needs.
While Brittney was struggling with this life-altering revelation, the homosexual couple who had hired her as a surrogate changed their minds and used legal threats to exert pressure on her to terminate the pregnancy. They even threatened Brittney’s oncology team with legal action, wanting to direct Brittney’s care. “I felt like just a rented uterus,” Brittney said. “I feel like they didn’t care about me.”
“I cried the whole week leading up to the delivery,” Brittney said.
Multiple families were arranged to adopt the baby in the event the prospective fathers refused to welcome the child. They not only refused to bring the baby to their home, but using their legal right to the child, the two men refused the baby lifesaving medical care, and the boy died shortly after being delivered on Father’s Day.
“I did surrogacy to give people a baby, to try to help in ways that not everybody could,” Brittney said. “They took the whole experience and just completely ruined it.” The couple only wanted the cremated remains of the child….
From Our Sunday Visitor
Surrogacy is just plain wrong.
You were “just a rented uterus”. You were having a baby (not your own, conceived with your spouse) for money. Every level of this story is sad.
Early in her final pregnancy, doctors discovered that Gianna had both a child and a tumor in her uterus. She allowed the surgeons to remove the tumor but not to perform the complete hysterectomy that they recommended, which would have killed the child. Seven months later in April 1962, Gianna Emanuela Molla was born at the hospital in Monza, but post-operative complications resulted in an infection for her mother. The following week Gianna Molla died at home, and was buried in the cemetery of Mesero.
Gianna Emanuela went on to become a physician herself. Gianna Beretta Molla was beatified in 1994 and canonized 10 years later. Her liturgical feast is celebrated on April 28.
She was willing to be used as an incubator by two people slightly less scrupulous than herself. Surrogacy is an evil and mostly unregulated business that Catholics must reject in it’s entirety.
Really sad.
Prayers for the baby’s soul.
Prayers for the surrogate’s healing.
Prayers for the conversion of the couple.
Gays don’t care about life nor love, no matter what the propagandists try to make people believe. The act of sodomy is lifeless, celebrating sterility. Gayness is sterile. Gays consider children to be lifestyle accessories, not human beings with dignity. Sure, they have some defective form of what they call “love” for each other and for their “kids”, but it’s not genuine love. It’s ultimately selfish, as demonstrated by the gay men who despicably allowed a child they had legal control over to die rather than relinquish the child to a loving family.
Compassion and sentimentality lead many, including some Catholics, to support surrogacy and in-vitro fertilization. Yet, those practices are beneath the dignity of human persons. Help those struggling with infertility, yet, do so appropriately. Many priests and deacons seem fearful to speak in opposition to abortion, artificial contraception, IVF and other “controversial” practices. And, I’m sure I’ll get critics here. Yet, I pray that a healthy “fear of the Lord” always motivates me more than an unhealthy fear of what some others might say.
“Not many of you should become teachers, my fellow believers, because you know that we who teach will be judged more strictly.” (James 3:1)
May God heal and bless this woman in all ways. And, may those two men experience conversion, freedom and true and everlasting love.
Thank you, Deacon Anderson, for your post and fortitude. You always seem to say things far more eloquently than I. In spite of any criticism you might get, I am sure you have saved many more lives along the way.
Keep up the good work!
Amen to that Anne. Deacon Craig Anderson is a shining light here at Cal Catholic. I need his contributions for my own good.
Me too.
I take umbrage with the use of the plural “fathers” to refer to the two homosexual males who had legal custody of the baby they ordered and were paying a woman to gestate in her womb. Even if one of them contributed sperm to the zygote that was implanted in the surrogate’s womb, only that individual male is the father. A child has only one biological father, not two.
How long before Amazon.com starts incubating babies to order from a laboratory?
St. Joseph was not Jesus’ biological father.
Jesus did not have two human fathers. Jesus did not have a biological father.
I’ve seen homosexual Christians wear shirts that state “Jesus had two dads, so why can’t I?” You’ve given in to that flawed logic.
People here always assume the wrong thing.
They are so combative that they invent enemies.
I think your assumption that people here always assume the wrong this is a wrong assumption. But that might just be a wrong assumption on my part.
One thing that has not been said here is that the unnatural way used to get this woman pregnant more than likely contributed to her cancer and the exacerbation of it. Look up all the horrid things they have to do to women to get them to produce eggs unnaturally in some of these situations.
The surrogate is not necessarily the egg donor.
That is why I said “in some of these situations” in my last line. No situation is exactly the same.
Correction: no two situations are exactly the same.
My point was that all the stress from all the unnatural situations this woman went through contributed to her cancer. People who live more serene, healthy lives do not get cancer as often as those who have a lot of stress.
Peggy: Saint Gianna Berretta Mola was a doctor and a truly a remarkable woman who gave her life so that her child would be born.
Peggy: Furthermore to my post Gianna Beretta Molla was canonized by Pope John Paul II on May 16, 2004. She was the last saint to be canonized by John Paul II.
St. Pope Paul VI, pray for us…
There is no hero/heroine here.
These were all adults making adult decisions.
The baby was a commodity. She was paid money to carry a child. She ended up not getting the money. Now she presents herself as a victim.
Am not buying it.
She offered herself to those two fruitcakes who were buying a “pet baby” like you would at “Pet Smart”.
The whole bunch are nauseating.
You are right. Many others have been put in the same or similar situations and have made the right choices. We can all learn from this. As St. Paul said God always gives us a way out.
“Lead us not into temptation but deliver us from evil (evil one)”
Anyone over the age of 15 who colors her hair purple or any other gaudy color like blue or pink or green has issues.
Therre are tons of missing pieces and incompatibilities in this story. –
-Why did the child die? It just doesn’t make sense that refusal to accept the adopted child resulted in not getting medical care and hence their death.
-What is “fast growing chemotherapy”? I don’t think chemotherapy “grows”.
-She chose to deliver the child early, obviously due to difficult and sad circumstances, but what did the contract say?
-Why do people go after the 2 guys, yet she is being portrayed as the heroine, even though she offered her womb as rental property.
If we really had compassion here, we’d all be asking what happened to her? Was she able to get the treatment she needed to save her life?
This woman tried to do something nice for someone. Most of the women in the US who are surrogates are generous people who think they are helping a couple fulfill the dream of having or expanding their family.
TV shows and celebrities doing this have contributed to the idea that it is much simpler than it is.
It seems like the baby died right after birth. She said that her mother got to hold him so it seems like maybe the couple had rights to deny NICU.
She needed a different chemotherapy that was not safe for pregnant women.
I would assume that since the gay couple were threatening to sue everybody involved that they had some kind of contractual rights.
There is a gofundme that her sister set up for her.
Never, EVER financialize the human experience
of Motherhood & Fatherhood.