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Outlook: The secret surrogate

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The secret surrogate

20/07/2020 GMT

BBC World Service - Outlook, The secret surrogate

A surrogate mother describes what it's like to carry another couple's baby

Surrogate mother "Ana" describes what it's like to carry another couple's baby, and then hand that baby over.

“Ana” (not her real name) lives in Georgia and is a single mother with two children of her own. She has also given birth to two other children for couples who couldn’t carry them themselves. In return, she received a payment. In Georgia, commercial surrogacy is legal but it carries a stigma so great that Ana didn’t even tell members of her own family what she was doing. She spent the final months of her pregnancy almost entirely behind closed doors. Ana recently gave birth to a baby boy, the son of Patrick and Enitan, a couple from Zimbabwe and Nigeria respectively, who now live in Canada. 

Mya Rose Craig is sometimes known as “Birdgirl”. The first picture of her birdwatching, with a lot of parental encouragement, was taken when she was just 9 days old. Her enthusiasm for spotting birds has landed her in the history books. At just 18, she is the youngest person to have spotted half of the world’s known bird species. She has also become a powerful advocate for more diversity in conservation.

Presenter: Emily Webb
Image by Alice Haworth-Booth for BBC Woman's Hour

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