Soon after her 8th birthday, a little girl whose surrogate refused to terminate her pregnancy has died. In 2012, Seraphina Harrell's surrogate mother, Crystal Kelley, was halfway through her pregnancy when she learned that the unborn baby had several severe birth defects. The couple who hired Kelley to carry their baby then offered her $10,000 to terminate the pregnancy — but she refused and fought to keep her. At the time, the case drew national attention, and on July 15 Seraphina's life came to an end.
The original plan for Kelley's pregnancy radically changed when she went in for an ultrasound in 2012.
The Daily Mail reports that Kelley agreed to be a surrogate for an unnamed couple's fourth child during a meeting at a playground in Vernon, Connecticut. She was implanted with two frozen embryos on October 8, 2011. One of those embryos would go on to become Seraphina.
In 2012, an ultrasound revealed that Seraphina had a cleft lip and palate, a cyst in her brain, and severe heart defects. She also had holoprosencephaly, which is a birth defect where the brain does not fully divide into separate hemispheres. Seraphina also had, heteotaxy, a condition where several of her internal organs were in the wrong place, and she had two spleens.
At the time, doctors said Seraphina would most likely survive the pregnancy.
But she had a small chance, only about 25%, of living a "normal" life. She would also need to undergo several heart surgeries.
Kelley recalled to CNN in March 2013, the exact moment the couple who hired her, whose identity has been kept private, believed there was a problem with the pregnancy.
"She kept saying, 'There's something wrong with the baby. There's something wrong with the baby. What are we going to do?'" Kelley recalled. "She was frantic. She was panicking."
The couple ultimately asked Kelley to terminate the pregnancy, but the surrogate refused, wanting to give the baby a chance.
Ultimately, the couple offered Kelley a large sum of money to have the procedure.
At the time, Kelley's midwife and genetic counselor wrote a letter that summed up the conflict completely.
The couple "feel that the interventions required to manage (the baby's medical problems) are overwhelming for an infant, and that it is a more humane option to consider pregnancy termination," she wrote.
"Ms. Kelley feels that all efforts should be made to 'give the baby a chance' and seems adamantly opposed to termination," she added.
Part of the problem was that the couple had three children before Seraphina and all three of them had been born prematurely, with one of them spending two months in the hospital. So the couple felt they had seen first hand how things can go wrong so quickly with pregnancy.
Kelley eventually moved from Connecticut to Michigan where state law allowed her to be considered Seraphina's legal guardian.
It was a move to further remove the couple's rights to terminate her pregnancy. And the disagreement led to both sides obtaining legal representation, the Daily Mail reports.
The couple eventually agreed not to terminate the pregnancy, but did say that they planned to enter her into the foster care system after birth.
"Once I realized that I was going to be the only person really fighting for her, that mama bear instinct kicked in, and there was no way I was giving up without a fight," Kelley said at the time.
Seraphina was born full-term on June 25 at 6 pounds, 9 ounces.
And the Harrell family in Massachusetts adopted the baby girl.
As CNN notes, at the time there was less discussion between lawyers, surrogacy agencies, surrogates, and parents before conception about what would be done if a fetus was found to have abnormalities. Seraphina's case helped highlight this oversight in the industry.
"People heard about this case, and they got scared about skipping steps. That's good for the industry," Melissa Brisman, an attorney who specializes in surrogacy explained to the news outlet.
For the next eight years, Seraphina lived a happy life with her adoptive family.
Seraphina's disabilities did cause her to face some challenges. She needed three heart surgeries and other minor surgeries through her short life. And although she was mostly nonverbal, she did learn American Sign Language to communicate.
"What drove the conflict when Crystal was pregnant with her, was whether or not she'd have a meaningful life. And I think without hesitation, the answer to that question is yes, she did. Seraphina had a very, very meaningful and happy life," Rene Harrell told CNN.
"What I heard over and over from so many of her doctors was they could never imagine that someone with Seraphina's level of need could do as well as she did or be as joyful as she was," she added. "She could get herself around in a power wheelchair like nobody's business."
Seraphina's favorite sign was "I love you."
"She'd sign it and always add a little kissing sound," Harrell said. "She was so loving. If you looked sad, she would comfort you. If you got even the slightest little poke, she would sign 'sorry' and then kiss your boo-boo."
"When her baby cousin cried, she would sign 'Baby, cry, Mama, milk,'" her adoptive mother recalled.
The Harrells have seven older children, some of whom also have disabilities. On Halloween in 2019, the kids all dressed up as the seven dwarfs from Snow White and invented a special eighth dwarf called "Bossy Dwarf" for Seraphina.
"She had the most confident, self-assured personality, and she told everyone what to do," Harrell recalled.
"Nora and Nathan read to her. Laney painted her nails. Derecc played Darth Vader wars. She fought with the 9-year-old twins. Clare was her true playmate, because even though she is 18, in practice she and Seraphina were both around 3, so they liked the same things," Harrell added. "They all miss her terribly. She was the centering part of our family. She was our heart and soul."
"For the eight years she lived, she had a full life," her adoptive father, Thomas Harrell, added. "She had a lot of joy in her life and gave a lot of other people joy in ways that sometimes weren't expected."
A GoFundMe was started to help raise funds for Seraphina's funeral.
