New York Times rich person-chronicler and plastic surgery enthusiast Alex Kuczynski wrote the cover story for the this Sunday's Times Magazine about having a baby through a surrogate. A couple of things are evident: Kuczynski worries too much about what her peers think, she is fairly flippant about the things her enormous wealth allows her to do, and that women face a ridiculous amount of judgment about their mothering choices.Kuczynski talks about the deep pain and secrecy many women face when they are infertile, and "the terrible, wishful math" she tortured herself with each passing month because of her own infertility. Alex wasn't getting any younger and at age 39 enlisted a surrogate to carry her and her husband's baby to term. Kuczynski is self-aware enough to know that paying a ton of money (about $25,000) for a baby-carrier when so many foster children need a good home will be considered by some to be immensely selfish, and this is how she explains her unremitting desire for a biological baby.
What began as wistful longing in my 20s had blistered into a mad desire that seemed to defy logic. The compulsion to create our own bloodline seemed medieval, and I knew we could enjoy our marriage - our lives - without a child. Yet I couldn't argue myself out of my desire…Die without having created a life, and die two deaths: the death of yourself, and the death of the immense opportunity that is a child. Not being pregnant suddenly seemed like a public statement, one that left me feeling exposed and vulnerable.
The thing to remember is that, for all women, regardless of socioeconomic status, decisions surrounding fertility are fraught with incredibly deep and often ambivalent emotions. In 50 years we're all going to be gestating babies in free floating artificial uteri anyway, so everyone needs to give other ladies a damn break. Her Body, My Baby [NY Times Magazine — not online yet] Earlier: Scientists Predict That Babies Of The Future Will Be Born To Centarians With Artificial Wombs