From the outside, the relationship looked precisely the way it had for 24 years: entirely solid, weathered by time, and anchored by a deep history. When their first surrogacy journey ended in devastating stillbirth, friends of the couple were convinced they would weather the tragedy just fine. After all, they were widely considered the "most together couple" anyone knew. But behind closed doors, the reality was starkly different.
For months, it had felt like two bodies fumbling to find each other in the dark. At home, their orbits rarely intersected. One partner recalls that her eyes barely landed on her husband, Ethan, and that there was a moment he did not even realize she was standing right behind him, accidentally closing a door on her. It felt as though they were suspended in the quiet, fragile space between structural cracks and a total crumble.
This emotional chasm did not materialize overnight. Long before they turned to surrogacy, they had weathered life-altering challenges together through their twenties and thirties. These hardships stemmed from severe, whole-body symptoms caused by endometriosis, adenomyosis, and early menopause—compounded by a medical system that repeatedly trivialized these conditions. The chronic illness rattled their physical intimacy, upended career paths, and inadvertently forced Ethan into the role of a caretaker. Furthermore, being undiagnosed for decades permanently cost them her fertility, depleting her ovarian reserve and resulting in repeated miscarriages through IVF and intrauterine inseminations.
Though they were not living the life they had originally dreamed of, and lingering guilt weighed heavily regarding the burden placed on Ethan, they managed to maintain the joie de vivre that had defined their relationship since they first met—right up until the moment they turned to surrogacy.
The decision to opt for an egg donor and a gestational carrier had been an act of compromise. Although she had always felt ambivalent about motherhood, the idea of coparenting with Ethan had gradually filled her with tenderness and curiosity. Yet, after years of debilitating illness, she desperately wanted a hysterectomy. Ethan, meanwhile, still deeply desired to be a father. Neither of them wanted to jeopardize her wellness with further hormonal treatments and agonizing pregnancy losses, leading them to take what many around them casually referred to as the "easy way out." Although medical professionals criticized her for giving up on her eggs and uterus "too soon," the decision to pursue surrogacy felt profoundly liberating at first.
They assumed that finding a gestational surrogate would unquestionably be the hardest part of the process. As it turned out, they were entirely mistaken. Instead, they found themselves completely unprepared for the subtle, corrosive ways that surrogacy would alter the foundation of their marriage.
The Three Mistakes Made in Surrogacy That Nearly Broke the Marriage
In the beginning, neither partner verbalized the early red flags they both noticed. Their initial surrogacy experience serves as a cautionary tale they now share with other intended parents. They entrusted an agency with their fate and their financial resources, placing the organization in charge of introducing them to a surrogate and acting as an intermediary to reimburse pregnancy-related expenses on their behalf. At the time, they were completely unaware of the agency’s proven fraudulent history.
Not only were Ethan and his wife entirely new to the complex world of surrogacy, but they also felt profoundly vulnerable—perhaps even desperate. They felt privileged to have found someone willing to carry a child for them, and they desperately wanted to be generous and grateful. Furthermore, intended parents often lack control when their unborn baby is developing inside someone else’s womb and their funds are tied up in a corporate bank account. Consequently, they ignored glaring red flags, such as inflated reimbursements demanded by the agency and jarring mood fluctuations from their surrogate.
Had they shared these mounting worries with each other early on, they might have had a vital chance to course-correct. At the very least, she would not have felt so utterly alone in carrying that heavy angst in her bones. During a second-trimester ultrasound, she vividly remembers resenting Ethan for maintaining his jovial demeanor while he chatted with their active baby boy through the screen, while she stood hunched against the wall, struggling to feel present. It was not merely that the pregnancy felt unbearably abstract for a mother who contributed neither her genes nor her womb; she was also growing increasingly skeptical of the agency and felt she was walking on eggshells with their surrogate. The surrogate would keep them at arm’s length one week, only to accuse them of not being supportive enough the next. Having never carried a pregnancy this far, it should have been a joyful milestone. Instead, she bottled up her distress, suffocating under the invisible weight of it.
Compounding this emotional distance was an uneven distribution of responsibilities. During that first surrogacy experience, Ethan allowed his partner to bear the absolute brunt of the communications with their surrogate. Believing he was adopting a supportive background role, his absence from the forefront placed an unfair burden on her shoulders, draining her time, energy, and mental headspace while sparing him. She was also the one handling all the complex legal and financial paperwork, alongside the relentless administrative correspondence with the agency. While Ethan was genuinely grateful and proud of her for managing tasks he considered outside his wheelhouse, she experienced paralyzing stress and deep resentment at having to tackle these high-stakes duties entirely on her own during such a vulnerable chapter.
The breaking point, however, was ultimately triggered by their vastly contrasting ways of grieving. While she naturally tended to dig deep into painful topics and complex emotions in an effort to make sense of them, Ethan preferred to compartmentalize. At the hospital following the delivery, Ethan preferred to leave the room while she stayed behind to spend a few quiet moments with their stillborn son. She needed the loss to feel tangible and real, whereas he preferred to hold onto the joy of earlier memories, such as watching the baby move on ultrasound screens. Neither approach was inherently wrong, but the divergence left them profoundly disconnected.
The months that followed were pure agony. Doctors refused to counsel them on why the baby had died, citing the technicality that she was not the pregnant patient—as though they were not the child’s rightful parents and did not deserve answers. She spiraled into a deep depression, flying into a fury every time Ethan told his parents that they were doing fine. While he was merely trying to protect his family from burden, she refused to mask their harrowing reality for the sake of other people’s comfort. For 24 years—surviving long distance, chronic illness, and grief—they had prided themselves on being the strong couple who never argued. Now, caught in the intricate complexities of surrogacy, they found themselves snapping at each other because Ethan desperately needed a semblance of normalcy while she needed to dwell in the darkness.
The Three Shifts That Saved the Marriage During Surrogacy
Rebuilding a relationship when the prior version of it has essentially ceased to exist is a monumental task. Over the course of nearly a year, driven by self-awareness, an enduring mutual respect, and mandatory therapy sessions that Ethan initially despised, the couple successfully implemented three tiny shifts that ultimately saved their marriage.
First, they learned how to form a genuine team for every single step of the process. When they eventually met a second surrogate through an agency known for being far more ethical, transparent, and supportive—one that did not demand funds be held in a blind trust—Ethan and his wife formed an authentic trio with her. It helped immensely that this surrogate actively considered them a team and insisted on their deep involvement in medical appointments, major decisions, and her daily life. She used the word "together" so frequently that it initially triggered skepticism, feeling entirely foreign after their traumatic first journey. Yet, Ethan made it an explicit priority to participate actively in conversations and reply to group texts when his partner was overwhelmed. The three of them shared everything freely—fears, dreams, victories, recipes, and silly inside jokes—building an unexpected level of intimacy. Even when it was just the two of them, their surrogate remained a constant, comforting presence in their thoughts, as though their marriage had naturally expanded to encompass her.
Furthermore, Ethan stepped up to share the challenging legal and financial administrative tasks. He actively tracked the emails he was copied on during the day and sat beside her through tedious paperwork, offering physical reassurance with a comforting hand on her back whenever she grew overwhelmed.
Second, they learned that grief requires a system of turn-taking. When they suffered another devastating loss—losing a baby with their second surrogate at the end of the first trimester—they grieved as a unified front. The trio sat intertwined, hands piled together in her lap. At home, Ethan proved far more receptive to her needs on difficult days, listening patiently or simply sitting quietly. Witnessing him show up in those moments brought them closer together. In return, she developed a deeper understanding when he turned to social activities as an outlet to blow off steam. Ethan also became far more honest with friends and family about their ongoing emotional and financial distress, ultimately agreeing to ask for outside help and secure a loan to regain their footing after two heartbreaking surrogacy journeys compounded by thirteen years of steep medical expenses.
To protect their mental health, they established clear boundaries, deciding never to discuss surrogacy topics over the weekends or immediately before bedtime, giving their nervous systems a vital chance to unwind. Dark humor also became a coping mechanism; they occasionally whispered jaded comments to one another when triggered. When imagining creative milestones they would have shared with their child, they would simply tell each other to "file it under never." During the holidays, Ethan offered a poignant toast: "Cheers to not losing a child this Christmas!" Holding space for their contrasting grief responses helped dissolve lingering resentment.
Third, they made a conscious vow to remember that they were not defined solely by what they carried. Fertility treatments and surrogacy can easily consume a couple’s entire existence, a risk heightened after decades of chronic illness and loss. Being formally diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder following their first surrogacy experience had further destabilized her identity. To counter this, they made deliberate efforts to reconnect with the core elements that made their early life and love special. They reminded themselves that they were far more than the burdens they carried or the losses they had suffered.
Alongside carving out dedicated periods for play, immersion in nature, and grief-free conversation, they pushed themselves to proactively set aside money for leisure and travel—ensuring they had positive events on the calendar to look forward to and savor together.
Ultimately, they discovered that the most manageable way to rebuild their future was simply to focus on tending to the present. Often, the only thing they could handle was the next half-hour: deciding where to take a walk, figuring out what to make for dinner, or learning how to support each other in that exact moment. She worked hard to keep her eyes focused on Ethan until eye contact felt natural once again. Even now, as they carefully weigh whether and how to continue pursuing their family-building goals, moments of emotional distance are met with a conscious choice to drop everything, embrace, and reconnect physically.
Neither partner ever anticipated that the tenderest gift they attempted to give one another—the chance to grow a family through surrogacy—would so profoundly shake their enduring marriage. Having naively believed that the path of surrogacy would be smoother than the grueling medical road that preceded it, they emerged with a transformed perspective on how to show up for one another through both joy and profound sorrow. While they cannot guarantee what lies ahead, they have built the resilience required to navigate the dark and find their way back to each other.
