When a couple really wants to grow their family but biology gets in the way, there are so many options. Some of them will choose to adopt, whereas some others may prefer to explore all options for a biological child. The latter option can sometimes present complications that go beyond physical issues– it can put us at a moral crossroads as well.
For one couple, the choice to freeze embryos presented itself with a few moral issues they probably never expected to have to face.
As the mom on Reddit explained, she and her husband froze embryos for medical reasons.
After having four children from them, they were left with three additional embryos and were unsure what to do with them as they were (at the time) done having children.
The mom explained that her long-time friend who was having trouble conceiving asked for the embryos, but there is one issue: Her husband is terrible.
"We're all now in our late 30s, and they are now trying to have kids and can't (because they waited too long at HIS insistence)," she clarified. "They're now looking at donor material, and she came to me. Absolutely not. This man shouldn't be a father and definitely not to my at least biological children. I was vague and tried to avoid a real answer. But they pushed too hard on why 'we deserve to have all those extra embryos' and I lost my temper a little."
She absolutely blew up on the couple, and didn't hold back
"I ended up telling him that I/we think he's a terrible person, in no way should he have children, and she would only get my biological help if she 'dropped him' like a diseased fish. Honestly, I hate him so much," she said.
The couple wouldn't stop pressuring the mom and her husband to give them the embryos, and things took an interesting turn.
"This whole thing and the knowledge that we would only get more and more requests for them led us to the decision that we needed to use them ourselves. It worked and we had a single pregnancy."
Now, apparently, people are mad at them.
"We've been getting some comments from friends and family that we had a child out of spite and we're not better than anyone we have problems with," wrote the mom. "I don't know that that's true. We just couldn't destroy them and also couldn't trust anyone else."
Was it wrong of her to keep the embryos out of "spite?"
Some felt that the mom had every right to follow her instinct.
"You can refuse to give your embryos to anyone regardless of what kind of person they are," validated one user. "It's your embryos. It's nobody but you and your husband's choice alone. Just hope they don't hate that child and treat them badly."
Other thought she did do what family and friends accused them of and was spiteful.
"You did in fact have a child out of spite, and now it's quite likely that these 'friends' might eventually send your kid messages about the nature of their birth," another reader bluntly told her. "Good luck. I've a feeling you'll need it."
Others felt everyone in this situation was wrong.
"She sucks for badgering you for embryos she is in no way entitled to but you suck for bringing another child into this world after you decided you didn’t want more purely because she was bothering you."
These stories are based on posts found on Reddit. Reddit is a user-generated social news aggregation, web content rating, and discussion website where registered members submit content to the site and can up- or down-vote the content. The accuracy and authenticity of each story cannot be confirmed by our staff.
