New developments in technology are often seen as providing solutions to many problems, some of which were unknown until the solution came about. An age-old problem, or a set of problems, has been unwanted or unneeded human fertility (fecundity, to use the technical term) and conversely, infertility when children are desired. In 1978, Louise Brown, the first baby conceived through in-vitro fertilization, was born. In spite of some people’s fears, she was perfectly normal. She carried her parents’ genes, so it was simply a matter of implanting the embryo in her mother’s uterus.

Since that time, in-vitro and other assisted reproductive technologies have been developed and become much more common, although they remain quite expensive. They now account for 1.5 percent of U.S. births, according to an August 9, 2015, article in the Albuquerque Journal. Many of these assisted pregnancies involve only the parents’ eggs and sperm, while some may use donated (actually, the “donor” is usually paid) sperm or eggs. Some may use a mixture of the father’s and donor’s sperm. Some also involve a surrogate, a woman who agrees to carry the pregnancy and give birth, but the resulting child is not hers biologically and she has previously agreed, usually in a written contract, that the biological parents will immediately receive the baby. In sane cases, there is financial compensation to the surrogate. There have been several articles concerning this practice taking place in India, where a doctor may run a “clinic,” where he/she houses women who are pregnant surrogates, for U.S. or European couples or individuals, who pay the doctor many times what the woman eventually receives.

Another scenario, which was detailed in the Journal article, is that of a couple deciding, for reasons of their own infertility or just because they want to do it, “adopting” frozen embryos and having the embryos, or some of them, implanted in the wife (or an individual woman might also do this), carrying the embryo(s) to term, and giving birth and raising the child(ren) as their own. In these cases, there is no legal process of adoption required, because the mother carries the child and gives birth. There is only one birth certificate, no written documentation whatever, except maybe a contract or receipt, that this child is not her, nor her husband’s, genetic child. In times past, this would have been seen as a “perfect” solution. She can even show the child, and family and friends, the ultrasound picture, she gets to experience pregnancy and birth, and perhaps no one is the wiser, except she and her spouse/partner know, and, of course, those from whom they purchased the embryos. However, like many new technologies, the ethics and actual happenings are not so simple.

Many of these embryo “adoptions” take place because when a couple, or a woman, freeze embryos for future use, they usually freeze quite a few more than they anticipate will actually result in a live baby. Usually more than one such embryo is implanted at a time, since not all those embryos actually develop, and repeated attempts at gestation are quite expensive. Actually, it is an expensive procedure to fertilize and freeze the embryos in the first place, and storage of them costs, on average, $600 annually. So, if and when a couple or a woman decides they have produced enough children from these embryos, or have reached an age or a circumstance where they do not wish to have another pregnancy or more children, sometimes there are still several frozen, stored embryos.

The new problem is what to do with them. Some will just quietly have them disposed of, which is legal. Some will decide to quit paying the storage fees. Some will know of a couple or individual who wishes to have a child to gestate and raise, and they will truly donate the embryos to them. Other situations are more complicated. Many couples and adoption agencies, who are quite vocally opposed to abortion, or even contraception, but are not opposed to assisted reproduction, may seek to obtain some of these embryos, either for their own pursuit of producing a child, or to assist others in their quest for a child.

Whole agencies, some of which previously handled adoptions between birth mothers and adoptive parents, have become involved in these transactions. A national program, mentioned in the article, is called Snowflakes Embryo Adoption. “Snowflakes” sounds a little cutesy for something that is basically a financial, and perhaps legal, transaction, but that appeals to some. Although the term “adoption” is used, there is no legal adoption involved, another appealing fact for some considering the procedure. Couples are said to “donate” the embryos, and some do, while others may be compensated. In either case, the receiving couple (these agencies are primarily geared toward married, middle-class, heterosexual couples), does pay fees, which the article did not detail. In the case of the couple featured in the article, the husband had children from a previous marriage, but his current (and considerably younger) wife wanted children, did not seem to be able to conceive, and was not interested in a conventional adoption, so this seemed to be a great answer. They “adopted” seven embryos donated by a couple from the Pacific Northwest; the “adopting” couple live in the Dallas, TX, area. Nothing was explained about how the embryos were transported, or if they traveled to the Northwest to obtain them.

The woman, Christy, stated, “We thought that’s a really cool way to go about building a family.” Later, they use the term “growing” a family. Both terms are a little off-putting to this writer, sounding more like building a structure or growing a crop. At any rate, they had three of the embryos thawed and implanted, which resulted in one embryo developing into a pregnancy and a child, now four years old. Then in 2012 they actually conceived a genetic child, to which she gave birth. So now, they had two children, quite close in age, one their genetic child, the other from the donated embryo. They wanted more children, so had the remaining four embryos thawed, but two did not survive the thawing process. The other two were implanted and resulted in twins.

All of this raises several questions, to which there may not be real answers. One wonders if the couple views their genetic son differently from the three who are theirs by way of pregnancy and birth, but not genetically theirs. Will this change as time goes on? What do they plan to disclose to the various children, and when? They are all very young now, so one assumes they have not disclosed anything yet, unless it is a frequent topic of conversation. Since they have had media interviews, one assumes the children will, at some point, know the facts. Do they have any further contact with the donor couple or the agency involved? What do they put down for medical history when they take the children to the doctor? Does their current doctor know all the facts? If they need updated medical information, can they obtain it from the donor couple or from the agency? Now that they have these four children, plus the husband’s two from a previous marriage, will they need to explore ongoing or permanent contraception? How is all of this influenced by their own religious beliefs? The husband, it was noted, is a student at Dallas Theological Seminary, a conservative institution.

The article states that there are now an estimated 600,000-plus unused embryos being stored in liquid nitrogen, some released for “adoption,” while others are still held by owners who can’t bear the thought of either discarding giving them away. A Dallas attorney, David Cole, whose practice, Little Flower, focuses on adoptions and on assisted reproductive technologies, says, “It’s tough.” Aside from the very cute name for his practice, one wonders how tough it is for him, where he gets his clients, what his fees are, and if any of his clients have had legal papers drawn up to clarify their situations.

It is also interesting that the article states that, in 2002, Congress established funding to promote embryo adoption as “a family building option.” It is interesting that the federal government took this step, while trying to cut assistance to families in need, and cutting off funds for various forms of contraception. Why was Congress so concerned with surplus embryos?

The children’s book, Are You My Mother?, comes to mind, in which a bird hatches while his mother is off looking for worms to feed the imminent chick, and not seeing her when he hatches, goes around asking various animals, even machines, “Are you my mother?” The mother bird shows up, worm in mouth, just as the baby bird is about to give up. One wonders if these children will one day ask, “Are you really my mother?” or “Where are my genetic parents?” One even wonders if this classic book will be part of the family’s usual pre-school reading material?

Comparing embryo “adoptions” with legal adoptions, are there in-person or even online interviews for the prospective “adopters” or for the donors? What about when only eggs or sperm are “donated?” Are they really donors or are they sellers? What would be some honest terms to use for all these circumstances, not euphemisms but also not pejorative? For many women, another question they might ask themselves is, “What is my strongest motivation—to have a child, to experience pregnancy and birth, to pass on our genes, or to raise a child?” There are no right or wrong answers to this question, but each person must surely determine their own best answer before getting involved in either embryo “adoption” or in conventional adoption, or even in conceiving a child themselves.

How do persons involved in donating or receiving frozen embryos view the failure of particular embryos to survive thawing, or failure to develop into fetuses? Do they view such happenings as deaths, as miscarriages, as tragic, of little consequence, or what? These are complicated situations, and even a given person might view a situation differently at different times.

Finally, how much should children resulting from assisted reproductive technologies, whether involving donated genetic material or not, know of their origins? When? For that matter, how much should “regular biological children” know? There are still some who think adoptees should not be told of their origins unless and until it becomes “necessary,” so what would they think about these other situations? Should parents wait until a DNA test becomes necessary for other reasons? If they’ve never been informed, and have a DNA test themselves when they are grown, and confront the parents who raised them with their lack of genetic connections, what do the parents tell them? Is it a burden or a right for the children to know some or all of the facts as they grow up?

Because technology has brought about all these possibilities, it raises more questions than it provides answers. That is not to say that the technologies involved should be outlawed, but we should all consider the possible consequences. In Aldous Huxley’s 1932 novel Brave New World—which is set in London and New Mexico, oddly enough—the author posits a dystopic future where children are not only conceived outside the human body but also gestated artificially and programmed for specific roles and purposes; all human emotional connections have been severed or discouraged, and the ultimate conclusion was that, in such a world, human emotion could only result in tragedy. Using donated embryos does not equate to that—far from it—but prospective parents might want to re-read this classic book to help them sort out their own feelings, fears, and decision-making processes.