Relatable with Allie Beth Stuckey - Ep 887 ｜ What Do We Do with Frozen Embryos？｜ Q&A

00:00:00.620 What was my favorite part of my wedding day?

00:00:04.340 What do I think about pastors using artificial intelligence to write their sermons?

00:00:11.340 What was my biggest struggle in high school?

00:00:14.800 What do I think about embryo adoption?

00:00:16.660 We will be covering all of this and more on this episode of Relatable, which is brought

00:00:21.640 to you by our friends at Good Ranchers.

00:00:23.400 Go to goodranchers.com.

00:00:24.500 Use code Allie at checkout. 1.00

00:00:25.620 That's goodranchers.com, code Allie.

00:00:30.000 Hey guys, welcome to Relatable.

00:00:38.600 Hope everyone's having a great day and a great week.

00:00:41.260 Today, I'm going to answer some of the questions that you guys sent.

00:00:44.140 As always, we've got some good ones.

00:00:46.900 First question, what are my thoughts on pastors using AI, artificial intelligence, to help them

00:00:53.700 write their sermons?

00:00:56.420 Oh my goodness, what day and age are we living in?

00:01:00.860 I mean, I don't personally like it, but you're talking to someone who also refuses to allow

00:01:06.740 anyone to help me write anything.

00:01:09.400 Like my book, for example.

00:01:10.940 It's very common, and I'm not saying it's unethical or anything, but it's very common for authors

00:01:17.320 within my space to use a ghostwriter or to hire a researcher to write large chunks of

00:01:23.500 their books.

00:01:24.120 But I am so incredibly particular about my voice coming across in my writing and how writing

00:01:30.620 sounds.

00:01:31.100 And I was taught to write in such a particular way growing up that I can't do it.

00:01:35.580 I cannot allow someone else to write for me unless they came along and they were able

00:01:39.960 to really, really capture my voice and what I wanted to say.

00:01:43.560 I would accept help in that realm, but you will never find me using a ghostwriter.

00:01:48.800 I don't have someone that writes my monologues or anything like that.

00:01:53.280 Now, that is more common.

00:01:54.720 Other conservative commentators or conservative hosts, most of them, I would say, write their

00:02:00.780 own monologues that they put into the teleprompter because it's really difficult for someone to

00:02:06.940 be able to, no matter how good they are at their job, to be able to capture what you exactly

00:02:12.700 want to say and the exact words that you would use to describe something.

00:02:17.220 So, all that to say, what about pastors?

00:02:20.980 Do I think pastors should hire or use artificial intelligence to write their sermons?

00:02:27.280 I would say no.

00:02:28.740 I don't know if it's entirely unethical for them to use artificial intelligence to help

00:02:35.180 them in some ways, I guess, come up with some references, but I've never used chat GPT.

00:02:41.700 I don't want to feed the monster, but my understanding of how it works is that it wouldn't just be a

00:02:48.180 research tool, but that they would be supplying you with certain ideas that you didn't come up

00:02:53.200 with yourself.

00:02:54.260 I don't like that.

00:02:55.720 I guess I'm just now thinking about this, so I can't exactly put my finger on the reason why.

00:03:02.060 I think that that's just a little sketchy, especially if they're coming up with the words

00:03:07.820 and then you're reading them verbatim.

00:03:09.960 It just feels like lying.

00:03:12.000 It feels like cheating.

00:03:13.680 And it feels like relying on, in a sense, a higher power that is not the Lord.

00:03:19.820 Um, and so I, I just, I don't really like it, but you know, a lot of pastors out there, they

00:03:25.840 use each other's sermons.

00:03:27.720 They, um, they talk to each other or they listen to a sermon and then they will use very similar

00:03:36.380 metaphors or similar anecdotes, actually not even similar, the same in their own sermons as say

00:03:42.780 their friend, uh, did in their sermon across the country.

00:03:47.120 I don't like that.

00:03:48.500 I don't like it.

00:03:50.000 I think you should come up with your own stuff.

00:03:52.420 It's not really that tough.

00:03:54.120 I'm sorry.

00:03:54.800 It's not, it's not that tough to come up with a good sermon because you have the word of God.

00:03:59.520 Stick to that.

00:04:00.980 There are so many amazing commentaries out there.

00:04:03.940 There's so much good material, so many good resources.

00:04:08.080 The word of God itself is so rich with meaning and substance.

00:04:13.720 You don't need AI.

00:04:15.180 And if you do need AI, then you also might just need help in your ability to study scripture

00:04:23.660 and your ability to deliver exegesis.

00:04:26.740 And that might take some self-analysis for you.

00:04:30.160 I do think that pastors, while it's not necessary to be an excellent, eloquent speaker, I think

00:04:38.880 that there's a biblical basis for that, that it's okay if you don't know every nook and

00:04:43.960 cranny of every second and third tier theological issue in order to be a good pastor and to shepherd

00:04:53.540 your flock.

00:04:54.220 But I do think that there should be a greater emphasis placed on communication development

00:05:01.660 for pastors, for preachers, for people behind the pulpit, that that actually matters, that

00:05:09.820 you can be really smart, you can be a really good shepherd, you can really know your Bible

00:05:15.020 and still fail to deliver a message in a clear way.

00:05:19.160 And I do wonder if a lot of pastors, maybe pastors who like being in front of people and

00:05:24.920 they feel like they like communicating, they like the word of God, if they just don't think

00:05:28.800 that they really need help with communication development.

00:05:32.740 I do wish more pastors would focus on that because there is a way to communicate clearly

00:05:37.800 and there's a way to communicate confusingly.

00:05:40.260 There are sermons that are better than others based on how they're delivered.

00:05:43.580 And so, I don't know, as someone who loves communication, as someone who is not called

00:05:49.040 to be a pastor, I do, I do just, sometimes I'm like, I really wish though that some pastors

00:05:58.460 that they would just focus more on their communication skills and the formation of their sermon.

00:06:05.020 I think it would be better to reach out to someone who is really good at that kind of thing

00:06:09.320 rather than AI seems like a better resource there, a better connection to make, and then

00:06:15.620 you can actually get godly wisdom from someone who is perhaps more experienced or more skilled

00:06:20.040 than you.

00:06:21.180 AI can't offer those things.

00:06:23.180 And then also like AI, it's run by people who probably are ideologically, religiously,

00:06:29.740 theologically opposed to you.

00:06:31.260 So how much can you really trust artificial intelligence to give you a solid interpretation of scripture?

00:06:39.320 Anyway, long-winded answer to that question, but it's an interesting one.

00:06:55.140 How has this pregnancy compared to your previous pregnancy?

00:06:58.440 So by the time this comes out, I probably already had the baby.

00:07:01.720 But this pregnancy has been, I don't know, in some ways easier, in some ways harder.

00:07:06.640 It definitely went by a lot faster than my previous pregnancies.

00:07:10.000 That's just what happens because the more kids you have, the busier you are, and so things

00:07:14.040 go by more quickly.

00:07:15.640 I mean, as I'm recording this right now, I'm a little over 30 weeks, and it's hard for me

00:07:19.700 to believe.

00:07:20.320 It's so hard for me to believe that I'm this far along.

00:07:23.260 We've got some things coming up, and then after that's done, it's like, oh my gosh, the

00:07:26.620 baby's almost here.

00:07:27.600 So in that sense, it's easier.

00:07:30.340 I was more nauseous the first trimester than the first two, and as of now, I don't know

00:07:36.600 the gender of this baby.

00:07:37.920 We are keeping it a surprise, and so of course, I'm analyzing all my different symptoms, wondering

00:07:42.280 if it means it's one way or the other.

00:07:44.820 Aches and pains come a little bit sooner, I would say, in subsequent pregnancies, but

00:07:50.620 I've actually been okay.

00:07:53.660 This is the first pregnancy that I've worked out, past pregnancies, I just didn't, and I'm

00:08:00.300 not doing CrossFit or anything.

00:08:02.100 I'm doing lower intensity, like bar Pilates type workouts, but I still think it helps,

00:08:10.340 and I try to walk as much as possible.

00:08:13.940 Being in your third trimester in the dead heat of the summer is not the easiest thing

00:08:18.480 in the world, but it's also nice because you can wear loose clothing, and you don't have

00:08:22.600 to worry about bundling up and all of that.

00:08:24.760 So yeah, I'm super excited.

00:08:27.400 At this point, I'm super excited to nest and to be in that stage of pregnancy and to get

00:08:35.960 things ready.

00:08:37.020 It's so crazy, the nesting instinct that happens, especially towards the end of your pregnancy.

00:08:42.280 I actually felt it at the beginning, but I'm feeling it now towards the end too, that I

00:08:47.260 just want to clean everything out of my cabinets and my closets and just make everything nice

00:08:51.340 and clean.

00:08:51.780 It really is like an instinct that God gives you while you're pregnant to do things that

00:08:56.360 you could have done for the past however many years when you weren't pregnant, but for some

00:09:00.480 reason, growing a human inside you makes you want to clean your house and get things ready.

00:09:06.060 We don't, as of right now, we don't have even a tiny part of the room ready for the baby.

00:09:13.860 Honestly, haven't even considered that.

00:09:15.480 But then you also realize the more pregnancies you have, how little you need those first few

00:09:20.760 weeks, you really don't, if you want to, great, not shaming that, but you really don't have

00:09:25.460 to have a whole nursery ready.

00:09:27.120 Like you don't have to have all the decor set up.

00:09:29.360 You don't have to buy everything.

00:09:31.100 People with this being a surprise gender, they're like, how do you know what you need? 1.00

00:09:34.760 Like, aren't you going to have to go out and buy all of this stuff if, you know, depending

00:09:39.480 on what the gender is?

00:09:40.400 I mean, no.

00:09:41.580 And the first few weeks, they're wearing a gray or white onesie.

00:09:44.960 Now, some people do want to get super fancy.

00:09:48.040 They want the monograms right away.

00:09:49.940 That's not your girl. 1.00

00:09:51.420 If that's you, that's great.

00:09:53.100 That's not me.

00:09:54.520 So I'm trying to, I have a, you know, it took a lot of work to prepare for what I call maternity

00:10:02.360 leave because I still have to get a certain number of episodes out for the year, which

00:10:06.360 means we prerecorded all these episodes, which was a lot of work.

00:10:10.220 So it was like five days a week of recording and planning and all of that on top of, you

00:10:15.300 know, the other regular stuff.

00:10:18.960 And so, yeah, I forgot what the pregnancy brain, I forgot why I was even saying that.

00:10:26.000 But yeah, so that has made it go by fast.

00:10:29.820 And I guess, oh, what I was trying to say is that I'm trying not to stress myself out

00:10:33.600 about things that don't need to be stressed out about.

00:10:35.400 Like, okay, I've got a lot to do before the baby comes, before I go on maternity leave.

00:10:41.360 And so I'm not going to stress out about onesies.

00:10:43.380 I'm not going to stress out about having it like a perfect nursery.

00:10:47.440 I'm not going to stress out about things that just don't require my energy right now.

00:10:53.220 So yeah, thanks for asking.

00:10:55.560 I'm very, very fortunate.

00:10:58.000 I'm very fortunate.

00:10:58.860 I was thinking about that this morning.

00:11:00.260 And please don't hear this as like, you know, I'm saying this as from a place of gratitude,

00:11:06.080 not from a place of arrogance at all, because it has nothing to do with me.

00:11:09.500 But I'm just, I'm very thankful that I have had, this is my third pregnancy.

00:11:13.900 And I haven't had any kind of complications in my pregnancies.

00:11:17.660 Thankfully, didn't have very many complications.

00:11:20.320 Well, any complications in getting pregnant.

00:11:23.300 And my past two births, the first two births were not great.

00:11:27.560 Things did not go as planned, but I did have healthy babies.

00:11:30.760 I recovered okay.

00:11:32.100 And then we'll see how this birth goes.

00:11:34.460 Lord willing, everything will be okay too.

00:11:37.080 But I know that's not everyone's story.

00:11:39.680 And there are so many difficulties and traumas surrounding getting pregnant, being pregnant,

00:11:44.620 birth and delivery.

00:11:45.480 And I just, I was thinking, I just really am so grateful that thus far I've had three

00:11:49.820 pregnancies that are uneventful, which is what you want when it comes to pregnancy and birth. 0.93

00:11:54.880 So I'm just very grateful for that.

00:11:56.120 So thanks for asking.

00:11:57.560 Thank you.

00:12:09.840 Someone asked, biggest struggle in high school, biggest struggle in high school.

00:12:14.020 Ooh, you know, I was thinking about this the other day, just about, you know, personality

00:12:18.660 development.

00:12:19.340 And earlier this week when we were recording the episodes for the actual week I'm recording

00:12:24.720 in, it's the end of June as I'm recording this, we were talking about, you know, middle

00:12:29.240 school and high school and how we were and all of that.

00:12:32.040 And gosh, those are such awkward years.

00:12:33.540 And I'm just so thankful that I graduated from high school in 2010.

00:12:38.180 So when this was like right before the dawn of social media, I mean, we had Facebook, we had

00:12:43.940 MySpace, we had AIM, which they, you know, were sources of distraction and comparison and

00:12:49.760 insecurity in their own right.

00:12:51.260 But not like what we have today.

00:12:53.200 It wasn't Snapchat, it wasn't Instagram, it certainly wasn't TikTok.

00:12:56.620 And so it was a lot more contained to certain parts of the internet.

00:13:00.420 It wasn't as pervasive in our whole lives.

00:13:02.380 And so we just didn't have all the pressures of social media in addition to the awkwardness

00:13:09.480 and difficulty of adolescence and coming into your own and being secure in your body and

00:13:14.920 being secure in your personality.

00:13:16.540 So I would think that, I think that that would have, I would say that that was my biggest

00:13:20.800 struggle in that I have always been opinionated.

00:13:25.840 I've always been strong-willed.

00:13:27.600 I have always been pretty assertive.

00:13:30.500 I wouldn't say confrontational.

00:13:32.740 I'm not necessarily confrontational, but I'm not afraid to say, well, this is what I think

00:13:37.600 and this is why I think that you're wrong.

00:13:39.300 Literally, since I could talk, I've been that way.

00:13:42.720 And just with my parents getting into debates, getting into discussions, never taking anyone's

00:13:48.000 just authoritative word at face value, always wanting to wonder why, always pushing back

00:13:55.100 against teachers, which is a very difficult way to be.

00:13:58.660 And so I think I struggled with that, especially as a girl, knowing how do I use these strengths

00:14:06.220 in a way that are feminine, that are godly, because we're told in scripture that women 0.84

00:14:11.200 are to have a gentle and quiet spirit.

00:14:14.960 And so what does that look like when God has very clearly given someone the gift of talking

00:14:20.580 and the gift of debating and discussing and argumentation and persuasion, communication,

00:14:27.020 rhetoric, all of these things that I've always loved to do, I've always been passionate about

00:14:30.900 doing. I've always just known deep in my heart that I was supposed to do something with these

00:14:36.520 gifts. When I gave the commencement speech in college, I just remember this moment, this

00:14:43.140 almost like transcendent moment, looking out into the crowd, delivering the speech, saying,

00:14:46.740 this is what I want to do for the rest of my life.

00:14:49.880 I remember that moment so specifically at my college graduation.

00:14:54.360 And so what does it look like to have a gentle and quiet spirit, to be submissive to the Lord,

00:14:59.960 to be a wife that is submissive to my husband, even as he loves me as Christ loves the church?

00:15:06.860 What does that look like? And I struggled, I think, in high school and college,

00:15:11.720 thinking that I needed to just pretend that I wasn't these things, that I didn't have strong

00:15:16.580 opinions, that I didn't like to speak up, that I wasn't strong-willed, that I didn't have a

00:15:22.440 particular perspective that I wanted to be shared. I, even in college, because of a relationship that

00:15:27.240 I was in, tried to pretend that I didn't want to do this, that I didn't want to do any form of

00:15:34.600 communications because I conflated and confused godliness with basically pretending to be something

00:15:43.620 that I'm not. Godliness is harnessing the strengths that God has given you for his glory,

00:15:49.480 putting them in the proper context that he ordained through scripture. And that doesn't

00:15:55.920 mean that all parts of our personalities are great and wonderful and should be flaunted all of the

00:15:59.760 time, but the strengths that God has given us, they can be used for his glory. We don't have to

00:16:04.680 pretend that we don't have them in order to fit our own convoluted idea of what it means to be a godly

00:16:13.240 woman or a godly man. So I think I was just insecure about, I didn't want to be seen as aggressive.

00:16:18.880 I didn't want to be seen as masculine. I didn't want to be seen as a diva or whatever it is that

00:16:26.280 women struggle with when it comes to identity and when you are very outspoken person. And so 0.83

00:16:31.040 I would say that was my struggle. And also, my dad always said that I was born 26. And I think that

00:16:39.480 that's true. And now, I mean, I just still feel, I've always felt old for my age. Someone said,

00:16:47.040 can you believe in nine years, you're going to be 40? To me the other day, I was like,

00:16:50.800 girl, I already feel 40. I don't like that doesn't, I've always felt in some ways, like old. And so that

00:16:58.880 was a struggle also in high school is that I'm, you know, immature still because you're 16 years old,

00:17:05.380 your frontal lobe isn't developed. You don't know anything. You're super, you know, underdeveloped

00:17:11.380 in a lot of ways. And yet I always just, I didn't like adolescence. Like I didn't like everything

00:17:19.340 that came with, you know, being a, being a kid. People, I don't understand when I hear people say

00:17:27.180 like, oh, being an adult is so hard. It's so sad. You have so much more responsibility. I'm like,

00:17:31.700 it is awesome. I love being an adult. So let me just give you an encouragement. If you who asked me

00:17:38.160 this or in high school, it is so much better being an adult than being a kid. So much better.

00:17:45.120 It is so much better being in the real world than it is being in high school or college.

00:17:50.540 Do not believe the lie that those have to be the best years of your life, that you're always going

00:17:55.420 to want to go back to high school or college. If you do, there's a problem. There's a problem there.

00:18:00.500 Like we should be excited. And every different stage is difficult. Of course, it comes with different

00:18:05.620 struggles and different difficulties, but gosh, there's so much more freedom as an adult that

00:18:09.920 you didn't have growing up. And yeah, there's a lot more responsibility. There's always more

00:18:15.040 responsibility and more wisdom required of you and more sacrifice and discomfort required of you when

00:18:20.060 there is more freedom. But I wouldn't trade that for the world. Like I wouldn't trade the hardships

00:18:25.280 and the responsibilities that come with the freedom of adulthood for the lack of responsibility

00:18:30.580 and the lack of sacrifice that came with adolescence and childhood. I would never do it for anything.

00:18:38.400 I would never do it. So if you're in high school, it's awkward. It's supposed to be. It's difficult.

00:18:44.200 You're supposed to feel too big and too big for school and too small for the world. Like it's supposed

00:18:50.680 to be a transitional period. It's okay if you don't have your best friends in the world. It's okay if this

00:18:55.680 is not the greatest time in your life. It's okay if you don't love all of your classes. It's okay if you

00:18:59.880 don't know what you want to do. It's okay if you're figuring out your personality. It's okay if you

00:19:03.700 don't really like your body. It's okay if you used box dye on your hair and it ended up looking terrible.

00:19:09.060 Only saying that from experience. And it's okay in college too. It's okay in college if you don't

00:19:14.280 get in the sorority that you want to. Or if you do, that doesn't make your life. And if you don't,

00:19:21.940 it's not going to break your life. It's okay if you don't find your spouse in college or immediately

00:19:26.240 after college. It's okay if you go through college not knowing what you want to do for the next 25

00:19:30.740 years. It's okay if you get out of college and you don't find your dream job right away. And that's

00:19:35.740 making $100,000 a year and uses all the talents that God has given you. I certainly didn't. That's

00:19:40.500 okay. It's okay. The only thing you can do is the next right thing. Don't think that your identity and

00:19:46.880 your worth and the rest of your future rises and falls on what happens to you, what grades you get,

00:19:52.820 what friends you have, what even some of what choices you make. Of course, some choices last

00:19:58.300 forever. But a lot of the choices that you make in high school and college will be ultimately

00:20:03.220 inconsequential. There is a God that is much bigger than you. His plan, his purpose, his providence is

00:20:09.340 much bigger than you. You making a bad grade, not getting in the sorority you want, not being accepted

00:20:14.360 by who you want to be accepted by, not being asked to homecoming, none of those things are big enough

00:20:19.460 to thwart his plan and purpose for you. Do the next right thing. Cultivate wisdom. Try to cultivate

00:20:25.300 deep, lasting friendships if you can, rather than focusing on temporary romantic relationships.

00:20:31.880 That's my advice. Try to own the strengths that God has given you and use them for his glory rather

00:20:37.660 than trying to be, you know, personality-wise, strengths-wise, something that you're not. Also,

00:20:44.440 I know your teachers are trying to convince you that you're going to use physics and math one day.

00:20:48.060 You're probably not. So, um, just, it's, it's okay if you don't do well in those, in those classes.

00:21:07.260 Let's see. Someone says, why do we question dinosaurs? Well, there's a lot to question when

00:21:13.120 it comes to dinosaurs. That's all I'll say. I don't know if at this point we've played the Kim Ham 0.99

00:21:18.660 episode. Um, if so, you'll see why I have some questions about dinosaurs. If you have no idea

00:21:25.320 what I'm talking about, uh, it's because I think, well, it's because we've never found a full dinosaur

00:21:32.800 skeleton that we've been able to put all together. We definitely don't know the scales that they have.

00:21:38.860 We definitely don't know that they had spikes or how long all of their tails were. We don't know

00:21:44.440 what they sounded like. Apparently we don't even know how they made it. Like if you look at the,

00:21:49.500 like anatomy, the drawings of, uh, some dinosaurs, you're like, how did you procreate? How exactly

00:21:57.480 did that go down? Um, I think that there's a lot of questions about dinosaurs. I'm not saying that

00:22:02.740 dinosaur-like creatures never existed. Uh, I'm just saying that I think that we have a lot of

00:22:09.360 reason to be skeptical about the depictions that we've been given by so-called science,

00:22:13.780 uh, scientists today that we just don't actually have evidence for a lot of what we hear dinosaurs

00:22:20.780 were like and looked like. Now, some people think that they were completely and totally a myth in order

00:22:26.160 to affirm, uh, Darwinianism, the idea that animals existed for thousands, millions of years before

00:22:34.700 humans did. I don't, I don't know. Kim, Kim Ham, who, whom I trust when it comes to these issues,

00:22:40.440 he doesn't believe that that's, uh, a conflict, uh, and he does believe that there were dinosaur-like

00:22:45.880 creatures. And so, I don't know. My, my faith doesn't rise or fall, uh, on that, but I think that

00:22:52.660 we should approach paleontology or we should just approach, like, dinosaur discoveries and dinosaur

00:22:59.340 depictions with a healthy dose of skepticism. That's all I'm saying. People get so mad when I

00:23:06.220 say that as it, like, okay, if your identity is wrapped up in, like, uh, stethosaurus, that's your

00:23:13.880 problem, not mine. Um, okay. Let's see. A lot of people asking me to have, uh, certain people on.

00:23:25.480 I always try to get the most, uh, interesting people. So, I get this question a lot, though.

00:23:30.220 Uh, have you talked about how people freeze embryos and then don't end up using them? Yes,

00:23:34.160 we've talked about that several times. We've talked about that with Jennifer Law. We've probably talked

00:23:37.580 about that with Katie Faust. We've probably talked about it with Libby Emmons. Probably talked about it

00:23:41.040 myself. The first time I talked about IVF and the ethical issues with, you know, uh, freezing your

00:23:47.940 embryos and egg selling and sperm selling and surrogacy was all the way back in 2020 and birth 0.68

00:23:54.180 control too, all the way back in 2020. And so you can go listen to those episodes, although I've learned

00:23:59.900 a lot since then. So you might listen to them and be like, oh, this is kind of incomplete. I've learned

00:24:04.040 a lot from Jennifer Law and, uh, Katie Faust and a lot of people who have been talking about the

00:24:08.800 reproductive industry for a long time. Um, so obviously I'm against people freezing. I'm

00:24:16.340 against people freezing embryos, period. I mean, these are, if we believe, especially as Christian 0.97

00:24:21.820 pro-lifers, a lot of Christian pro-lifers have frozen embryos and maybe you froze your embryos 0.56

00:24:26.900 before you thought about the, uh, ethical quandary that it creates, that now there's a human being

00:24:32.500 made in the image of God and it's embryonic stage on ice. And, um, I don't know, is that like, is that

00:24:40.780 a perpetual state that we should keep human beings in because we didn't want to implant them or we

00:24:48.340 couldn't implant them? There are a lot of questions about that. Now, some people implant all of the

00:24:53.420 embryos that they fertilize. I still think that there are ethical questions, always going to be

00:24:59.220 ethical questions when you separate sex and conception. There just are. What do we always say

00:25:04.160 when technology takes us from what's natural to what's possible? There are always questions that

00:25:08.280 we should ask about if it's moral or ethical. And so, and there are also complications and a lot of

00:25:14.740 health risks, uh, that can come with IVF. There's also like a very high attrition rate and that it is,

00:25:21.600 um, it is very likely that not all of the eggs that are fertilized will, will one, that they're

00:25:29.600 implanted, but also that they survive. And so you go into it knowing the, how high the risk is,

00:25:36.600 not just for the mother and some of the health complications there, but also for the little

00:25:40.140 lives that you're creating. So, and I know that's a very sensitive topic and I get that. I totally

00:25:45.340 understand that's a sensitive topic. Please don't hear me coming from a place of hatred or condemnation

00:25:50.240 of you. Um, I think a lot of us were never told to think through these issues. We were never told

00:25:55.400 that there are any questions about them. We're told over and over again, that the only thing that

00:25:59.220 matters is that you want to be a parent. You want to be a mom. And we're even told that that desire

00:26:04.140 is indicative of God's will. Our desires are not indicative of God's will for our lives. We have to

00:26:09.400 think a little bit more critically than that. But of course, if your babies were born out of IVF,

00:26:13.940 they have just as much worth or just as much made in the image of God. And I know you love your

00:26:19.420 kids so much. So I'm not questioning your quality of motherhood because of those things. I am

00:26:24.100 questioning the ethics of IVF and just reproductive technology in general. Um, IUI, a little bit of a

00:26:31.280 different story, but, um, there's still, I mean, still questions when you, anytime you separate sex,

00:26:37.280 just like when you separate sex from marriage, there are ethical questions about that ethical issues

00:26:42.040 that come with that. And then when you separate conception from sex, there are also going to be

00:26:47.540 ethical questions to ask about that. So the question then that follows is, okay, well, what about all

00:26:54.120 these embryos that are frozen? What do we do with them? Should we adopt them? And I don't, I,

00:27:01.180 I don't think it's wrong to adopt a frozen embryo. That is for sure. I do not think it is wrong. I don't

00:27:07.640 think it's unethical to adopt a frozen embryo. I think it can be very redemptive and very good. And I do

00:27:13.040 believe that those are human beings that have value. And there are more than a million souls

00:27:17.820 on ice right now because of this reproductive industry. And it's such a cash cow for the 1.00

00:27:23.900 reproductive industry. I mean, people, because they don't know what to do, they, they also know that

00:27:28.540 these are their children. They don't want to abandon them. Well, they don't want to, uh, allow

00:27:35.580 them to be killed. They are in a sense, just kind of abandoned because they're in a freezer, but

00:27:40.060 they, they don't want to trash them. They're scared to put them up for adoption. They don't

00:27:45.180 know what to do. And they're now dealing with the ethical quandary of this. And I don't wish that on

00:27:49.100 anyone either. That's part of the issue is that some people don't think about the problems with

00:27:53.720 IVF until after they've done it. And now they don't know what to do with these little souls that

00:27:57.640 they've created on ice. Um, so over a million in the country, just making so much money for some

00:28:03.760 people. And it's very sad. And so of course the question of, should we adopt them again? You can,

00:28:12.020 there are also children who have a very low likelihood of ever being adopted, who have already gone

00:28:20.760 through the pain of rejection, who have already experienced the trauma of separation, who are

00:28:26.200 already going through the difficulty of foster care, um, that need your love. Again, I'm not saying

00:28:33.860 that you shouldn't adopt an embryo, but I also don't think that we should avoid, if you are called

00:28:40.500 to adopt, avoid adopting the five-year-old, the 10-year-old just because, oh, you don't get to

00:28:47.840 experience pregnancy. I think there, we should look at our heart behind that. Like, do you just want

00:28:52.780 to adopt an embryo because you feel like, um, it's easier that way or because you really want to

00:28:59.300 experience pregnancy and that's why? So there are some questions about that. Again, our desires are

00:29:04.940 not necessarily indicative of God's will. So I think we need to assess that. And now this person does

00:29:11.180 say, gosh, don't freeze embryos, freeze your eggs. Well, yes, in the sense that eggs are not human

00:29:18.040 beings. They have human DNA, but they're not fertilized. And so they're not human beings, but

00:29:23.080 I still like, except in some cases, like I understand there are cancer cases. There are

00:29:29.000 very sad cases in which women, they have to freeze their eggs if they want to have like any hope one 1.00

00:29:34.440 day of having a child. Again, there's still ethical questions with that, but I understand that

00:29:40.320 more than someone just freezing their eggs or selling their eggs because of career, because they

00:29:44.920 want to there, but there are questions about that. Like there are moral questions about when you take

00:29:50.320 your eggs out and then you freeze them. And then the process that you have to go through to then

00:29:54.820 fertilize them and implant them perhaps with a surrogate. There are questions about that. There

00:29:59.880 are questions about the risks to the embryo, about the risks to the woman or the women involved. Um,

00:30:06.800 and so I wouldn't say that that's just the easy alternative. Freezing eggs, sure,

00:30:11.420 better than freezing embryos, but still has the potential for some, uh, complications.

00:30:31.360 I'll end on this one, which is fun. Favorite thing about my wedding day. Ooh, I loved our wedding.

00:30:38.520 I loved our wedding and it was, let's see how many years ago was it now? Eight years ago.

00:30:45.120 And I still think that it was a beautiful wedding. It was very, very classic. That's,

00:30:51.500 that's when it pays to be like a simple gal who is not super trendy. Um, everything was like very

00:30:59.180 timeless. Our dress, our flowers, our decor, it was outdoors, which I don't necessarily recommend

00:31:05.320 on Labor Day weekend, but it was in the evening and it was in the shade. And so it was okay. And it was

00:31:11.520 like, it was very beautiful. Gosh, it was a really fun day. My friend did my makeup and she did a great

00:31:18.320 job. I still think about what a great job Ansley did on my makeup. Um, but honestly, it was probably

00:31:25.700 after the ceremony, I did not cry walking down the aisle. I was very emotional, but you know,

00:31:31.540 sometimes the adrenaline is high that stops you from crying. My husband was crying a lot,

00:31:36.520 which was really sweet. Um, honestly, our ceremony was amazing because the person who married us

00:31:44.680 was, did probably, I could actually tear up now thinking about it, the best delivery of the gospel,

00:31:52.780 um, that I've ever heard at a wedding. Oh, maybe also at the pulpit from a pulpit. But every, that's

00:32:01.600 what everyone said after that. I've never heard the gospel explained to like that. I've never heard

00:32:06.340 the gospel explained so clearly. And like praise, there's still people who will tell us, oh my gosh,

00:32:11.980 I remember your wedding. And the guy who did your wedding, who married y'all, I still think about

00:32:17.420 what he said. And I'm like, that's, that's praise God. If everything else had gone wrong that day,

00:32:23.180 that would have been enough. So I'm so thankful for that. That was really, really important to us.

00:32:29.620 Um, also gosh, the guy who sang during our ceremony acoustic on the guitar was so good.

00:32:39.500 Um, but okay, probably my favorite part. Like one of the most fun parts was after the ceremony,

00:32:47.300 before the reception. So we did all of the pictures. I, the first time he saw me, we didn't do a first

00:32:53.220 look. We just did a, we, he saw me for the first time coming down the aisle, which I would not change

00:32:59.340 for the world because his reaction was absolutely, it was just priceless. And so, but we did all of

00:33:05.900 the like bridesmaids and groomsmen pictures, all of those pictures before the ceremony. And then

00:33:14.000 after the ceremony, but before the reception, he and I did our pictures, but we made sure that

00:33:20.920 everyone had a place to sit at the reception, that everyone had shade, that everyone had food,

00:33:25.880 that everyone had drinks, because it is the worst when you have to stand around in your high heels

00:33:30.420 and you have to wait for food and drink for like an hour. So the wedding party and everyone

00:33:35.080 could do their, could do their picture. So that was very important to me. Um, so we did that.

00:33:42.260 And then I would say the moment that was like super fun was right after we came into the reception

00:33:48.120 and everyone ate dinner, we went into a room with our dinner, like with full plates of dinner,

00:33:55.600 like by ourselves in the house where we were, we got married in Athens, Georgia.

00:34:00.720 And we ate, like, we got to actually eat. We ate our dinner like in private by ourselves and just

00:34:07.240 got to be like, Oh my gosh, we're married. And then, then we went to the reception and then we

00:34:12.740 sat with everyone and we had a band and it was really fun. Um, it's a great wedding, a great

00:34:19.580 wedding. And then we went to Cancun the next day and that was really fun. And we still want to go back

00:34:26.160 to the same place that we went and we just haven't, um, every year we're like, let's go back to the place

00:34:33.980 where we stayed. And we still haven't one day. Stop having them kids. We'll be able to go.

00:34:41.040 We'll go back to our honeymoon place. So yeah, I hope that answers your question. Uh, make sure you

00:34:48.740 take lots of mental pictures the day of don't separate from your spouse at the reception.

00:34:54.460 Don't go talk to people independently, stay together because then you could get separated

00:34:59.200 forever and have lots of moments where it's just y'all too. Cause that's what it's really about.

00:35:03.580 I really don't remember everyone that I saw or everyone I talked to at my reception,

00:35:06.920 but I remember being with him the whole time. And that's really what matters. Uh, all right. Okay.

00:35:12.900 That's all we got time for today. We will be back here soon. Hey, Related Bells and Related Bros.

00:35:18.620 If you could please leave us a five-star review, wherever you listen to Relatable,

00:35:23.180 that would mean so much to us. And it really does help the show. Also, if you haven't subscribed

00:35:28.540 to our YouTube channel, please do. Thanks.

Relatable with Allie Beth Stuckey - October 10, 2023

Ep 887 ｜ What Do We Do with Frozen Embryos？｜ Q&A

Episode Stats

Summary

Transcript

Relatable with Allie Beth Stuckey - October 10, 2023

Ep 887 ｜ What Do We Do with Frozen Embryos？ ｜ Q&A

Episode Stats

Summary

Transcript

Ep 887 ｜ What Do We Do with Frozen Embryos？｜ Q&A