Relatable with Allie Beth Stuckey - Ep 919 ｜ No Good Surrogacies： A Surrogacy Baby Speaks Out ｜ Guest： Olivia Maurel

00:00:00.320 Olivia Morrell was born via surrogate, and she has spent years of her life feeling abandoned

00:00:06.620 like she didn't belong. And now she is speaking out about the surrogacy industry and the dangers

00:00:13.760 of child and female exploitation that are inherent in the practice and the industry.

00:00:20.400 Her testimony is so powerful. Before we get into it, we will talk a little bit about the

00:00:26.360 Republican presidential debate last night. Also, before we get into that, I do want to remind you

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00:01:16.740 Hey guys, welcome to Relatable. Happy Thursday. Hope everyone is having a wonderful week so far.

00:01:32.240 I am so excited for you to listen to the interview that we've got for you today with the woman who was

00:01:41.300 born of surrogacy. Her story is really, really powerful. I will say, so she's French, and so

00:01:49.560 you'll hear some differences in the words she chooses to use for different things. So if there

00:01:55.860 are some things that she says that you're like, wait, I didn't quite understand the word that she

00:02:00.960 chose, it is because she is a French speaker. But her English is perfect. There are just some 1.00

00:02:06.500 differences there. So I wanted to give you a heads up about that. But gosh, share this interview far

00:02:11.860 and wide. For anyone who is on the fence about surrogacy or hasn't been thoroughly convinced that

00:02:17.620 it is a corrupt industry and a corrupt practice, they've got to listen to her testimony that she 1.00

00:02:24.180 is giving us today. But before we get into that, I did want to say a couple things about the fourth

00:02:29.960 Republican debate last night. And you might be thinking, there's been four debates? What? I haven't

00:02:36.040 been paying attention to them at all. Now is the time to probably start paying attention. Believe

00:02:41.280 it or not, next year is election year. I cannot believe that it is already here. I can't believe

00:02:46.620 it is already here. But starting at the beginning of the year, we're really going to be gearing up and

00:02:51.700 looking at this primary, this Republican primary. And there have already been, as I said, several

00:02:58.120 debates. Trump has not been present at the debate. So that's probably why you haven't been hearing quite

00:03:03.680 as much about them. But I tuned in last night. I haven't tuned into all of the debates. I'll just

00:03:08.680 be honest about that. But I did tune in last night, mostly because my girl, Megyn Kelly,

00:03:13.700 was the moderator, one of three moderators, and she did a great job. All of the moderators did a 0.98

00:03:19.220 great job. This was a News Nation debate. The Fox News debate that we saw a couple weeks ago,

00:03:25.540 I heard some of those questions. I thought the questions were ridiculous, 0.95

00:03:28.700 just completely superfluous in some cases. And in other cases, couched in like the liberal 0.95

00:03:34.280 assumption of something like how they would ask a question would be like giving credit to the liberal

00:03:41.140 position on, say, abortion or immigration. That was not the case last night. There were very hard

00:03:46.800 hitting questions. So right out the gate, you had Megyn Kelly, always with amazing questions,

00:03:53.400 taking no prisoners. She asked Ron DeSantis, basically, look, you won in Florida, you did a

00:04:01.020 good job, but you are not even close to Trump in the polls right now. And so do you think the voters

00:04:07.500 are saying not no, but not now? And here is a part of his answer to that question. I am sick of

00:04:17.920 Republicans who are not willing to stand up and fight back against what the left is doing to this

00:04:23.200 country. You've got to be willing to stand strong and you've got to be willing to beat these people.

00:04:28.020 I'm the only one running for president that has beaten these people on issue after issue.

00:04:32.960 We beat the teachers unions when we did school choice. We beat Fauci on COVID. We beat George Soros

00:04:39.180 when we removed two of his radical district attorneys. We beat the Democrats on election

00:04:44.120 integrity. I have delivered results. That's what we need for this country.

00:04:48.120 So we didn't play you the whole answer, but right out the gate, I thought it was really,

00:04:53.580 really strong. He said, you know what? I'm not looking at the polls. We did amazing in Florida.

00:04:58.100 Here's who we beat. We beat Fauci. We beat the teachers unions. We beat the Democratic Party there.

00:05:03.320 And we can do that on a national scale. Now, I believe that. But Megyn Kelly is right. He is way

00:05:10.100 behind Donald Trump. Here are the polls, at least according to FiveThirtyEight. You've got Trump at

00:05:17.360 59.6%. Wow. DeSantis at 12.7%. Haley at 10.6%. And Ramaswamy at 4.9%. And then we've got Chris

00:05:28.860 Christie, who was also on the debate stage, who is not even like a part of these polls. No one actually

00:05:33.100 thinks that he is going to win the nomination, but he's hanging in there. He's hanging in there. So

00:05:37.940 Trump, who has not been a part of any of these debates, is taking the lead, the strong lead. And

00:05:43.320 Nikki Haley is coming up close to Ron DeSantis, which is exactly why Ron DeSantis went after Nikki

00:05:50.800 Haley in his question. And I appreciate that he did that because Nikki Haley, I mean, there are

00:05:57.660 plenty of things about Nikki Haley that I think are very commendable that I like. If she somehow

00:06:03.080 ended up being the nominee, of course, I would vote for her versus Joe Biden. That's not even

00:06:07.920 a question. But she said some things recently that I really didn't like. She is a little too soft on

00:06:15.820 abortion. She tries to be too nuanced, walk the line too much when it comes to Roe v. Wade and what 1.00

00:06:22.420 laws should be on the books about abortion. She made a comment that we talked about on here 0.95

00:06:27.340 a few months ago where she criticized Ron DeSantis for his war on Disney and then invited, of course,

00:06:33.600 I'm sure in a tongue in cheek way, invited Disney to South Carolina, invited Disney to South Carolina.

00:06:40.880 Now, does South Carolinians, the conservative South Carolinians, do you really want a company

00:06:46.340 like Walt Disney to be infiltrating your school districts, to be influencing what curriculum your

00:06:54.360 children are learning so that your children learn in kindergarten that they can switch genders?

00:06:59.960 Is that the kind of influence, the kind of corporate influence that South Carolinians want?

00:07:05.940 But apparently, Nikki Haley thinks so. And then, of course, she made the comment just this week,

00:07:11.380 I think we did talk about it on yesterday's show, that the law has no place when it comes to

00:07:17.040 the genital mutilation of children. It has no place when it comes to these, quote unquote,

00:07:24.820 gender affirming surgeries on minors, the double mastectomies for teen girls, the chemical castration

00:07:31.360 of preteen boys. She said in the interview, the law does not have a place. What in the Asa Hutchinson?

00:07:37.720 Yes, we did talk about that yesterday because I think I said the same thing.

00:07:41.780 So she is like running to the left of Ron DeSantis. Ron DeSantis called her out because he is,

00:07:48.880 she is catching up to him. And then Ramaswamy also called her out really for being kind of a hawk.

00:07:55.600 He's much more isolationist, or at least he says he does. And he says he's anti-corporation,

00:08:00.280 whereas she has a lot of corporations backing her. As she said last night, Wall Street is backing her. 0.81

00:08:05.660 She just had a meeting with BlackRock and Vanguard, these companies who are funding the moral rot

00:08:11.500 at an institutional level in our country. So she addressed those things. Ron DeSantis obviously

00:08:18.400 going after her. And then I've got a couple more things to say about Ron DeSantis and a little bit

00:08:24.200 more of a superficial analysis. And then that'll conclude this segment of our podcast and everything

00:08:30.960 that I have to say about the debate.

00:08:41.500 Okay, so I just wanted to play one more thing that people are talking about. It's Vivek versus

00:08:50.720 Nikki Haley. He called her on something because he is criticizing her and other Republicans for

00:08:56.640 wanting to fund this war in Ukraine, which he doesn't believe that America should be involved,

00:09:03.600 involved in that. I'm obviously sympathetic to that position, although it's probably

00:09:10.640 a little more complicated than these formats of debates allowed. But I do think he's like

00:09:16.960 very clear and consistent, at least on this issue. And he says he calls Nikki Haley out and was like,

00:09:22.860 you can't even name three provinces in Ukraine. And that was that was a bet. He wasn't sure

00:09:28.680 if he was right about that. But it turns out he was. So here's that.

00:09:33.180 Foreign policy experience is not the same as foreign policy wisdom. I want everybody at home to know

00:09:39.980 that I was the first person to say we need a reasonable peace deal in Ukraine. Now a lot of

00:09:44.680 the neocons are quietly coming along to that position with the exceptions of Nikki Haley and 0.71

00:09:49.260 Joe Biden, who still support this, what I believe is pointless war in Ukraine. And I think those with

00:09:54.740 foreign policy experience, one thing that Joe Biden and Nikki Haley have in common is that neither of

00:09:59.560 them could even state for you three provinces in eastern Ukraine that they want to send our troops to

00:10:05.300 actually fight for. Look at that. This is what I want people to understand. These people have

00:10:10.300 I mean, she has no idea what the hell the names of those provinces are, but she wants to send

00:10:14.040 our sons and daughters and our troops and our military equipment to go fight it. So reject this

00:10:19.040 myth that they've been selling you that somebody had a cup of coffee stint at the UN and then makes

00:10:22.740 eight million bucks after has real foreign policy experience. It takes an outsider to see this

00:10:27.140 through. Look at the blank expression. She doesn't know the names of the provinces that she wants to 0.54

00:10:31.920 actually fight for. And there's a puppet makers right there, the donors, the donors right there that

00:10:37.320 are playing her like the puppet makers. Okay, hold on, hold on. Woo! Woo! I mean, he made a bet that she would

00:10:42.840 not be able to name the three provinces. But I do want to say, because people are saying, oh, she didn't

00:10:47.060 even know three provinces. He specifically said the three provinces that she wants to send troops to. 0.92

00:10:53.620 So just to hedge a little bit to give her maybe the BOD, maybe that's why she didn't want to answer

00:11:00.220 that question. But of course, this turned into the viral moment. So Vivek wins the Twitter debate.

00:11:08.900 That's what happens is that I don't think he won the actual debate. I think Ron DeSantis was the

00:11:15.060 strongest in his responses, but he is always going to win among the people on Twitter who did not watch

00:11:21.620 the debate because he is so rhetorically sharp and rhetorically talented. And like he's, I would say,

00:11:28.620 the like most online candidate. So he says what the Twitter conservatives want to hear, and he's going

00:11:34.500 to go viral that way, which is a strategy. Like it might be an effective strategy because I don't think

00:11:39.760 most people are watching the debates. They're just catching the highlights after. And he's probably the

00:11:43.740 best at packaging the highlights for social media. So that's a strategy. Okay, let me give you my like

00:11:48.900 hard hitting analysis that this is really just about their appearance. Okay, so I was telling my husband

00:11:55.680 this actually earlier, and he was like, you know, you need to say that because that's interesting. One thing

00:12:00.660 that I will give Nikki Haley, even though I disagree with some things that she has said some like really

00:12:05.500 important things. She has dressed really well. She dresses really well as a female politician. And you know how I 0.99

00:12:15.620 know that she is doing a good job when it comes to her hair and her makeup and her appearance. And I

00:12:19.440 know, I know you're not supposed to talk about this. You're not supposed to talk about this for a woman 1.00

00:12:22.800 because no one has talked about it. No one has talked about her clothing choice. No one has talked

00:12:28.800 about her hair. No one has talked about her makeup. And you know, if no one is talking about a woman's

00:12:35.420 appearance, then she is doing a good job of dressing herself. Because as a woman in politics, it's not fair, 1.00

00:12:41.400 but this is how it is. You can't look like you're trying too hard. And you can't look like you're not

00:12:46.100 trying enough. If you're trying too hard, then you're a pick me. If you're not trying enough,

00:12:49.940 then you're slovenly. She doesn't look homely, but she doesn't look like she is trying to draw 1.00

00:12:54.600 attention to her appearance. Everything is well tailored. Everything is nice and simple. So good job, 0.52

00:13:00.360 Nikki Haley and her glam squad. It is really difficult, I think, as a woman in politics to strike that 0.69

00:13:06.480 balance. But she's doing a really good job. Now, I will say Ron DeSantis, as someone who is a Ron

00:13:13.280 DeSantis stan, I really like Ron DeSantis and everything that he's done. I just want to say

00:13:18.040 this from love. He needs someone to tailor his suits. He needs someone to tailor his suits. He's

00:13:24.520 lost weight. That's a great thing. But his suits need to be better fitting. Does that matter

00:13:30.540 long term in either of these cases, Nikki Haley or Ron DeSantis? It doesn't. Of course not. It

00:13:36.840 doesn't affect how you can lead. But look, people are superficial. We have cared about the aesthetics

00:13:41.520 of our presidential candidate going all the way back to Nixon v. Kennedy. And so I think that this

00:13:47.340 is a very simple fix that whether it's fair or not can communicate something to voters. How someone

00:13:54.000 looks and their ability to fill out a suit, it communicates something to voters. I'm not saying it's

00:13:59.480 right. I'm not saying it's fair. It's just the way it is. And you don't want people talking about your

00:14:04.480 appearance. But people are talking about Ron DeSantis' suits. And you don't want people noticing. You

00:14:10.640 probably don't even remember what Vivek was wearing. That's because he had probably a well-tailored suit

00:14:15.600 on. You don't want people to notice. If people are talking about it, then you're doing something wrong.

00:14:20.060 So better tailored suits.

00:14:29.480 Olivia, thanks so much for taking the time to come on. Could you just tell us a little bit about

00:14:38.580 who you are and what you do?

00:14:41.160 So I'm Olivia. I'm 31 years old. I'm about to turn 32, actually. I'm a mother of three. I live in the

00:14:48.040 south of France. And I am married to a wonderful man. Today, I am fighting against surrogacy. I'm using 1.00

00:14:57.260 my story to fight against surrogacy and try to, you know, speak my word and take my word out there.

00:15:08.780 We have a lot in common. I am also 31, almost 32, and a mother of three. Yeah. So I first,

00:15:17.400 I saw your testimony on Twitter a couple weeks ago. And I was like, gosh, I've got to get her on my show.

00:15:25.560 It was the International Conference on Surrogacy. It was held at the Parliament of the Czech Republic.

00:15:31.460 This was on November 21st, and it's been going around on Twitter. Back us up. Tell us why you're

00:15:39.380 speaking out about this, why you're opposing surrogacy.

00:15:42.800 I was born from surrogacy. So 30, almost 32 years ago, through traditional surrogacy in Kentucky. And I have

00:15:54.720 suffered a lot from the trauma of what surrogacy has caused me. And I really wanted to make sure that

00:16:04.400 people knew that surrogacy wasn't this beautiful kind of magical thing that we like to portray it on

00:16:13.560 media. So yeah, I really wanted to show people that the negative aspects of surrogacy, that surrogacy

00:16:20.560 isn't what it looks like in the media. It's dark. It's full of negative things. It's using women as 1.00

00:16:29.680 incubators. It's selling and buying children. And it's also causing a lot of harm on children.

00:16:37.680 I'm 32. I'm almost 32 years old, but I'm going to say I'm 32 years old. It took me 31 years of time

00:16:46.400 to speak out. All these children that are starting, I mean, that are being born now,

00:16:52.080 now. They can't speak up yet. We'll see in the future generations what it's going to cause. But I

00:16:59.280 do thoroughly believe that we are going to see a generation of children that are going to be very

00:17:08.960 hurt by surrogacy, because they were born that way. 0.99

00:17:14.080 And you said that you were born via traditional surrogacy. I actually hadn't heard this term,

00:17:19.680 but this means that the surrogate was also the egg donor, which from my understanding,

00:17:24.800 that is now not only uncommon, but also illegal in most cases that the egg donor, the egg seller has

00:17:33.440 to be separate from the gestational carrier. But your biological mother was also your gestational

00:17:39.760 carrier, correct? Exactly. That's how it is. But it does still happen. And you can see it on

00:17:46.640 internet, actually. A lot of centers still sell traditional surrogacy.

00:17:52.560 Okay. And when did you find out that you were conceived in this way?

00:17:58.240 That's a good question. I always kind of knew. I mean, I always felt like I didn't fit in.

00:18:05.120 My entire life was kind of awkward with my parents. Up until I was about 16 to 17 years old,

00:18:12.960 where I started getting more and more questions just popping up in my head

00:18:18.640 concerning my birth, and I had to get answers. So I just went to Google. I Googled Louisville,

00:18:24.400 Kentucky, and I started getting all these internet websites concerning surrogacy. And that's when

00:18:34.960 it kind of all clicked into place. So as of then, I started saying to everyone that I was born by a

00:18:43.760 surrogacy.

00:18:45.360 And this was before...

00:18:47.520 Okay, so...

00:18:49.040 Yeah, that's when I was 16, 17 years old.

00:18:51.280 That's when you were 16. And what... I know that you said that things were kind of like awkward with

00:18:55.520 your parents, but were there any specific clues that made you think this? Because,

00:18:59.760 like I'm thinking, I don't think I would have ever even known what that was or even

00:19:05.760 tried to deduce that as a teenager. So how did you know to even search for something like that?

00:19:12.240 I don't know. It was kind of like it was in me. My mother... I mean, we always had really weird,

00:19:21.760 like not a very good connection with my mother. I love her, but we don't have like that mother-daughter

00:19:27.920 kind of interaction thing going on. Yeah, exactly, bond. And she doesn't really look like me. 0.80

00:19:35.120 We don't have the same passions. I really don't share much with this person, except that she...

00:19:42.800 I know she... Of course, she offered me an education and whatever, but she... I don't share much with

00:19:48.720 that person. And I knew something was off. So I knew it was either adoption or something else.

00:19:57.840 And that's when I started just looking up maybe things that were happening with

00:20:03.040 with surrogacy in Louisville, Kentucky at that point in time. So when I was 16, 17 years old.

00:20:12.160 Okay. And where were you raised?

00:20:15.200 I was raised between Florida and the South of France.

00:20:19.440 Okay. And you searched Louisville, Kentucky because you knew that you had been born there?

00:20:25.520 Yeah, exactly. On my birth certificate, that's where I was born, on my passport, whatever.

00:20:29.520 Okay. So you're 16, 17 then. And did you go to your parents at that point,

00:20:36.400 the people who raised you, and say, hey, is this true?

00:20:42.080 No, never. I would never have gotten to them. I felt like I had kind of this...

00:20:48.000 I mean, I couldn't. It was impossible. I couldn't go up to them and be like, okay,

00:20:51.440 hey, I know that this is... I was born through surrogacy. Tell me the truth. No, that just

00:20:56.960 wouldn't happen. I was too scared of how they would react, what they would say. I was still living

00:21:03.760 under their roof, so I couldn't go against them and the way I was born. It was impossible. And so I

00:21:10.000 kind of just kept that inside of me. But I was telling the whole world, apart from them, that I was

00:21:17.520 born by a surrogacy. That's what was insane. So I was telling the doctors, I was telling my friends.

00:21:24.000 I met my husband at the age of 21. I was telling him, I told my mother-in-law. And because I told

00:21:32.880 my mother-in-law, so my husband's mother, and she just knew and she saw me suffer. She just saw me

00:21:39.200 suffer all these years. And so at the age of 30, she offered me a DNA test. And that's when I had

00:21:45.680 the physical proof. Okay. So you just knew, intuitively, when you searched for surrogacy

00:21:54.480 in Louisville, Kentucky, what exactly did you find that confirmed your intuitive feeling that

00:22:02.320 this was how you were conceived and carried? Websites concerning surrogacy centers.

00:22:09.040 Okay. Gotcha. And so you did not go to your parents at this time. And when you say that your

00:22:14.400 mother-in-law saw you suffer, talk a little bit more about your suffering. Like, I know that you said it

00:22:20.960 was awkward growing up. I imagine that that in itself is traumatic, not feeling like you have a real bond

00:22:26.560 with your mom. That's such an important bond to have. But when you say that even in your adult life,

00:22:31.860 you were suffering from this, what do you mean by that?

00:22:37.640 Well, I had difficulties with addictions, such as drugs, alcohol. I suffered with a lot of things.

00:22:46.400 I always felt the trauma of abandonment. So I was always in this position where I was scared that

00:22:55.040 people would leave me. I have difficult, I have, I still have difficult, I have difficulty, sorry,

00:23:05.360 having friendships because I suffocate people. And I tend to like, you know, suffocate them and

00:23:11.940 then they just leave me because they're, they're, they get annoyed by me, basically. But I'm so scared

00:23:17.460 that they, that they'll leave that I suffocate them. So kind of, kind of annoying. And yeah, I, I'm,

00:23:27.200 I still have that void. I mean, my mother, biological mother and surrogate mother,

00:23:31.780 she left me at my birth. She left me, she exchanged me for a check. She, I mean, I don't,

00:23:42.320 I don't blame her because she, she did it because she probably needed the money, but, uh, it's the

00:23:48.960 truth. She did abandon me at one point in my life where I needed her the most. And that left a void

00:23:54.720 void. And that void, I tried to fill it up my entire life. So I tried filling it up with alcohol,

00:24:02.140 drugs, friendships. And, uh, also I had weird relationships with older women. So like, um, 0.97

00:24:10.000 I would try to find the mother figure in every older woman that would come about in my life. 0.99

00:24:15.540 But of course I could never fill that void.

00:24:20.900 Right. Right. And so your parents sought out this woman and it, so your dad is your biological dad.

00:24:29.460 They sought out this woman and she went through, I guess the IVF process in order to conceive you, 0.99

00:24:36.240 right? Yes, she did. Yeah. So I imagine even though there is a wound and a separation that happens

00:24:43.900 with adoption too, this probably feels different though, because it was more transactional.

00:24:51.000 She needed money. And so she conceived you purposely with the intention of abandonment,

00:24:58.020 right? Which is a little different than if you find yourself with a surprise pregnancy and you can't

00:25:02.560 take care of your child and you give your child to a loving family. This was much more transactional.

00:25:08.160 I just imagine that that probably compounds the feelings of loss that you have.

00:25:14.820 Yeah, I, I agree. Um, that's how I describe the difference between adoption and, uh, surrogacy.

00:25:23.180 And that's because people always compare surrogacy with adoption. I don't know why, but it's two

00:25:28.920 completely different things in surrogacy. We are prescribing the abandonment. That's what

00:25:34.560 René Friedman, who's a very well-known gynecologist. That's how he calls it. Um, the prescribed

00:25:41.000 abandonment. I just love that term because it's exactly what it is. We are, um, intentionally

00:25:47.360 programming, um, the abandonment of children by their birth mother, which is horrible. And we are

00:25:56.020 intentionally going to create that primal wound that adoptees talk a lot about. Um, and yeah,

00:26:04.000 at one point in my life, I was a trend, I was part of a transaction. I actually have a price tag on my

00:26:11.100 head, which is sometimes difficult to carry and is also why I had a hard time speaking up because as

00:26:19.540 a surrogate born child, we have a price tag, we are worth a lot of money. And, um, so because of

00:26:25.880 that, we are not allowed to talk. We have to be grateful. We have to be grateful towards our intended

00:26:30.720 parents. Um, so yeah, that's, it's not the adoption and surrogacy are complete, two completely different

00:26:38.540 things and we must keep them different. Yeah. I like to say that adoption in general redeems a

00:26:45.840 broken situation where a surrogacy creates one. It's a life that's already been created. And the 0.84

00:26:52.260 next best option, if the biological parents can't raise that child is adoption by loving parents.

00:26:58.840 Surrogacy, you're purposely creating motherless and fatherless children, or at least you are creating 0.93

00:27:05.360 them to be separated from the woman that carried them. Um, and then excelling and sperm selling, 0.97

00:27:11.360 it's the same kind of thing. Um, one thing that we've also talked about is like the loss of

00:27:16.780 medical information that a child has when they are unknowingly, but intentionally separated from

00:27:25.060 their biological family. Half your DNA is from this woman, um, that you were not raised by. And 0.98

00:27:31.560 that has presented obstacles for you, right? Like you have only later found out some of the mental

00:27:37.820 health struggles that she had. Exactly. I had no idea, no clue. And I was struggling with mental

00:27:44.640 health issues throughout my entire life. And I had no idea why. And I just recently found out that

00:27:50.940 she struggles, of course, with these mental issues and that, of course, their head, I mean, 0.68

00:27:56.600 it comes from her. Yeah. So yeah, I mean, that, that's, um, that was a big issue for me because

00:28:02.340 when I got pregnant from my first daughter, Eleanor, um, I kind of was just like, okay, I'm having this

00:28:09.980 baby and I have no clue what I'm going to give to her. Like what kind of diseases am I going to give 1.00

00:28:17.760 her? Am I, is she going to have a breast cancer maybe later on? Or is she going to have a mental 1.00

00:28:23.680 health issues? Is there were so many questions that I was asking myself and I didn't have answers

00:28:29.680 to, but yeah, that's 25% of the DNA of my children that I didn't know, um, which is incredible to me

00:28:37.500 and it should not be allowed. It shouldn't be allowed.

00:28:47.760 So your birth certificate had already been altered, right? To remove your biological mother's name.

00:28:59.460 So she was supposed to like, we were supposed to just like erase her from your history without a 0.86

00:29:05.500 trace. Exactly. So what happens is that I was born, um, my parents had a house in Florida. So we moved

00:29:14.260 to Florida, uh, like right after my birth. Uh, but it took like three to four days to have a new birth

00:29:20.620 certificate delivered so that my birth mother, my surrogate mother was completely erased and it was

00:29:27.100 replaced by my intended mother. So on my birth certificate says that my intended mother is my birth mother

00:29:34.440 and that's false. Right. And it's kind of dangerous as well because I mean, it's right. It's, it's, it's,

00:29:47.120 it's not true. Yeah. It's lying. It's lying. And we're supposed to, these certificates are supposed

00:29:53.680 to be true and they're not. And, uh, it should have at least mentioned that I was born via surrogacy or at

00:30:00.520 least adopted or at least something. Right. But no, it says that my, uh, intended mother is my,

00:30:05.880 is my biological mother, which is not true. Yeah. And that's a piece of your identity that,

00:30:11.280 like you said, they are lying about it. It's an important piece of your identity.

00:30:15.880 Wiped away from my, it's just wiped away. Yeah. Don't consider it. Yeah. But it,

00:30:23.000 which is interesting is that they tried to erase it. But early on when I was,

00:30:30.020 when I was younger, um, I was like, I remember I was like eight or seven and I, you know,

00:30:35.620 we all have those little journals where we write, uh, our lover, like who we like and who we love and

00:30:41.260 who's our best friend whatsoever. And in my journal, I wasn't writing this stuff. I was writing,

00:30:45.920 I was in France at the time and I was writing, oh, I need to go back to America. I love America.

00:30:52.160 I am American. Um, um, I need to go back to America. Like it was just this one idea that I

00:30:59.900 had and I was, that I was writing down in my journal. And so you see the genes were calling,

00:31:05.560 like saying, okay, you are American. You need to go back to your country. So the papers lie,

00:31:13.300 but the genes, they don't lie. And at one point they come back and, you know, it was kind of like

00:31:19.380 America was calling me, you know? Yeah. Right. And the birth certificate thing in all of this that

00:31:26.720 you're talking about, I mean, they do that for the parents. They do that for the parents to give

00:31:30.980 the parents or, you know, the, uh, the people who raised you, your dad and the mother who raised you,

00:31:38.200 it's for them. It's to give them a sense of legitimacy so they can look at the piece of paper

00:31:43.300 and say, no, this is my real child. The transaction checked out. Like this is, you know, the, the check

00:31:51.000 cashed. This is my receipt basically, um, of that. And in all of this, it is because, I mean,

00:31:58.860 this is the pushback that I get when I talk about surrogacy. I'm sure you do too. But what about the

00:32:04.520 people who really want a child? What about the people who really want to be parents? What about

00:32:09.120 the people who have X, Y, Z health issue and they have to use a surrogate? They have to use an egg or

00:32:15.200 sperm donor. It's like, people can't get out of their minds that the primary, like the primary

00:32:22.380 thing cannot be what adults want. It can't be that adults want it. So anything goes right.

00:32:29.420 Exactly. There is no right to have a child. That's what I say. Every time people tell me these things,

00:32:36.000 there is no right to have a child. I mean, that has to just get into people's minds,

00:32:41.060 but children have rights and we have the right to know where we come from. We, we have the right

00:32:48.080 to not be separated from our mothers at birth. Uh, we have the rights to be raised by our mother,

00:32:54.180 our mothers. And those are just such primal and important rights that we step on and we just spit 1.00

00:33:02.960 on with surrogacy. Um, but people can't understand that they don't, they, they, they just can't.

00:33:10.400 Yeah. It seems, it seems like they, they really can't. And, um, you've met, well, okay, actually,

00:33:16.300 before I ask that, let me ask you about the moment that, so your mother-in-law, she helped

00:33:21.900 you get this DNA test that confirmed what your suspicion had always be, which is again, I just

00:33:26.640 think, I just think it's so wild and really cool that your intuition just knew it just knew. So this

00:33:34.700 DNA test just confirmed what you already knew about who you are and what your, uh, ancestry is. So tell

00:33:43.340 me about that moment. What was it like when you had that confirmation?

00:33:48.960 Oh, it was, um, it was surreal. I, I remember it precisely. It was on January 11th, uh, 2023. So

00:33:59.280 it's actually really recent. Yeah. Really recent. Yeah. Really recent. But she was, um, I, this,

00:34:07.120 I'm actually going to write in a book because I have to write a book about this. It's so important

00:34:11.140 to me. Um, but like when I opened the test, the first thing that you see is like your ethnical 1.00

00:34:18.760 background. And, and I mean, I had no French blood in my ethnic background, like nothing,

00:34:25.880 nothing came out. So at first I was like, okay, wow. That's, that's, I feel better because

00:34:32.480 that just, I mean, I had the answer to my questions. Um, and then I scrolled down. My dad is not French.

00:34:41.260 My dad is Swiss. Okay. So, but my DNA test identified that I was Swiss. So everything was covered. Um,

00:34:50.620 and then what was interesting is that this, I mean, we knew that it was going to help me

00:34:58.760 find my DNA. Um, I mean, my ethnic background, but we didn't know that it was going to help me

00:35:06.680 find my half siblings because I did find my half siblings via this test. Um, so I scroll down,

00:35:15.300 I find my, uh, cousin because, you know, the DNA kind of matches with all the other DNA

00:35:20.700 in the, um, in the, uh, whatchamacallit, the, um, like the, the, the, the DNA pond that the, um,

00:35:31.580 the system has. And I was matched with my cousin. And so I write to my cousin and I'm like, okay,

00:35:38.660 well, uh, I am this person. Um, I think I was born by a surrogacy. Maybe, you know,

00:35:45.280 someone in your family that you surrogacy and you can help me out and help me find my biological

00:35:50.920 mother. And she actually responded. And she says that she said that she does know someone

00:35:55.900 and she put me in contact with my half brother. And then my half brother put me in contact with my

00:36:01.960 half sisters. And then I got in contact with my biological mother. And that day I was, I felt

00:36:10.700 so much better, so much better because I just had 30, like 31 years of questions in my head. I was,

00:36:19.720 I just felt relieved, honestly relieved that, uh, I finally had the answers to my questions,

00:36:26.140 but now I have other questions. Like how could she have sold me? How could at one point I,

00:36:33.820 how could she have sold me? How could she have given one of her children and kept the rest? 0.99

00:36:42.120 How could I have been a product at one point in my life? You know, there's so many other questions

00:36:45.940 that pop up, um, and that are very emotional to me still. Yeah. And you know, some people might be

00:36:54.180 listening to this is, as you know, this is like a very hot topic that even, you know, I'm a

00:36:59.300 conservative Christian and the conservatives listening to this, you would think would be on

00:37:04.240 our same page, but not all of them are. Um, and so some of them might be saying, well, this is just

00:37:09.500 her. This is just one person. She happens to have these feelings that doesn't, that doesn't speak for

00:37:15.660 everyone born via surrogacy. And while that may be true, I have heard what you told me about how you

00:37:22.560 felt from every person that I know born via sperm or egg donation or surrogacy, they struggle their

00:37:32.040 whole lives with feelings of abandonment, feelings that their mom had been picked out of the catalog

00:37:39.020 or their dad had been picked out of the catalog feeling, as you said, you said it so profoundly that

00:37:44.700 like there was a price tag on your head and that, that is what we are for. That is the burden that we

00:37:51.100 are forcing tiny humans, babies to carry when we say my desire to be a parent is more important than

00:37:59.980 the wellbeing and the rights of this child. Exactly. And I just want to say that it's not because some

00:38:08.360 people live. I mean, it's not because some children born via surrogacy live well, that we have to

00:38:19.740 legitimate surrogacy that, that it doesn't make it legitimate. At least. Um, I had this, uh, this

00:38:28.940 lady talked to me the other day. She was like, well, it's not because I mean, you, you cut your arm off

00:38:33.960 and you have a prosthetic arm and then you live. Okay. I mean, you live well with your prosthetic arm,

00:38:38.300 um, that it makes cutting arms. Okay. It's kind of like, um, it doesn't, it's,

00:38:45.340 I mean, I've talked to egg and sperm, um, donor conceived children as well, and they all feel

00:38:52.260 the same way. Like I do, um, adoptees feel the same way that I do. I unfortunately don't speak

00:38:59.360 to people that have been born via surrogacy. I have a hard time finding people that are born 0.99

00:39:04.560 by a surrogacy. Um, probably because we, people are too afraid to speak out. Like I said, uh, we have a

00:39:10.840 very big price tag on our heads and it's kind of like, if we go against where our parents, we are

00:39:16.380 alienated and that's what it costs me at least. I've been alienated. Yeah. Yeah. Hmm. So your

00:39:26.680 parents, after you started talking about this, they won't talk to you anymore? No, no, no, no. We're,

00:39:32.760 we're on very, we're not on good terms. Unfortunately, I, I have nothing against them. I don't,

00:39:39.860 I don't blame them for using the system of surrogacy because it was just out there. Like I said,

00:39:45.020 uh, handed out on a silver platter and they just took it. But, um, they are, yeah, they're bothered

00:39:53.840 by the fact that I'm talking, that I'm saying out loud that this is, this is bad, but I feel like I

00:40:00.240 have every right to say it's bad. I mean, I have lived through with these traumas. It doesn't make

00:40:04.880 them bad parents. It just means that I lived traumas and traumatic, like I live with a trauma

00:40:11.380 of abandonment all my life because of the way I was born. It's just the way it is. Do you know

00:40:17.940 why they decided to seek out a surrogate? Yeah, I do. They, um, my parents, they, they had a very,

00:40:27.520 very successful business. They worked very long hours, whenever they, they worked very, um,

00:40:35.040 they worked a lot and they didn't start. I mean, they, they just kept working and I think they

00:40:40.400 prioritized their, um, business rather than building a family. So, um, when it was time for

00:40:48.920 them to build a family and that my father was like, okay to build a family, it was a little too late.

00:40:55.880 And, um, and my mother had had problems, health issues, so she couldn't conceive a child. And, uh,

00:41:04.340 and so they seeked out surrogacy. My mother was 48 when they started seeking out surrogacy.

00:41:11.120 Wow. Wow. Okay. Yeah. Um, and what do you say to people who say, well, you only feel that way

00:41:18.000 because you're the gestational carrier for you was also your biological mother. But in a lot of cases of

00:41:24.220 surrogacy that we see, it is the biological child of the couple that's renting the womb of the 0.99

00:41:31.720 surrogate. So it's the biological egg, it's the biological sperm. They are just implanting

00:41:37.560 this embryo into the surrogate. What do you say to that? Is that still a form of surrogacy that you

00:41:44.400 oppose? Of course, every surrogacy is a bad surrogacy to me. This child that's in the womb,

00:41:51.540 that's connecting with its mother because she will be the birth mother in every single case.

00:41:58.500 This baby is connecting with his mother for nine months. He's eating what she's eating. He's feeling

00:42:04.880 what she's feeling. He's just living every single day with her and he's hers and she's his. So

00:42:15.340 when he's going to come out of that womb, he's going to be looking for her. And if she's not

00:42:21.660 there, that trauma of abandonment will still be there. So in 100% of cases, you will cause the

00:42:28.780 trauma of abandonment. That's what it is. I mean, the baby is not going to be like, okay, she's not

00:42:34.780 my biological mother. Wait, hold on. Let me go and check if she's my mother. No, the newborn doesn't

00:42:40.660 care. He's going to search for the one that he listened to for nine months. That's what it is.

00:42:50.020 But I mean, even if it doesn't matter if they're biologically related or not. Yeah. Has no

00:42:56.000 difference. It's just crazy how we understand this when it comes to kittens and puppies and not babies.

00:43:01.740 Exactly. Like we have, we force people to keep kittens and puppies with their mothers for two 0.58

00:43:10.380 months or three months after they are born. But with surrogacy, we don't even leave little baby

00:43:16.860 humans with their mothers for two to three months after they're born. No, we just rip them away from 1.00

00:43:21.720 their mothers at birth. How is this even, how is this imaginable? I'm still, I'm still wrapping my

00:43:29.520 head around how people find this normal just to have children. Yeah. Yeah. It's, it's, I just feel

00:43:38.180 like it's not human at least. Yeah. We just had, um, you know, the conservative like commentator class,

00:43:48.420 uh, on Twitter was having a big debate about this because there is a conservative commentator. He and

00:43:54.500 his, uh, you know, male, male partner just, uh, you know, welcomed their baby via egg selling and

00:44:02.480 surrogacy. And you have all of these people who are applauding this. They're excited about it because

00:44:08.540 really most people have not thought about surrogacy. They haven't thought about reproductive technology.

00:44:14.220 They haven't thought about the ethics of the reproductive industry. They've not thought beyond

00:44:19.080 yay babies because it's really uncomfortable as you know, and unpopular to think beyond that and

00:44:25.700 especially to speak beyond that. And so people like me, and I'm sure people like you too, we're called

00:44:32.240 bigots. We're called hateful. We're called cruel when really it's the opposite. Like we have the common

00:44:39.160 sense, the logical and the humane position that children are not to be bought and that wombs are not 1.00

00:44:45.700 to be rented and that eggs are not to be sold. Like to me, like these are so obvious and like

00:44:51.440 fundamental positions. And yet, I mean, I'm, I'm routinely called radical and extreme and I'm sure

00:44:57.780 you are too. I am. I'm all the time, every day on TikTok, on social media. It's, but I, I don't,

00:45:06.260 I don't really care because I think we have to educate people to what surrogacy is. Uh, people have

00:45:14.940 no, no, no knowledge on what surrogacy really is. And that is what you are saying, buying children,

00:45:21.980 selling children, renting rooms. We're like human trafficking and everyone's like, yay,

00:45:26.720 human trafficking. It makes no sense to me either.

00:45:30.940 Surrogacy is just separating a child from its mother at birth, uh, whether or not they're

00:45:48.540 biological, biologically linked or not. It doesn't make a difference because the fetus will link with 0.65

00:45:55.580 its mother, um, at, from four or nine months. Uh, we deprive these children from knowing their

00:46:02.140 parentage. Um, so in all cases, they're going to lose the woman, their mother that built them at 0.73

00:46:08.560 that end that birthed them. Um, so that's going to harm all of these children and traumatize all of

00:46:14.820 these children. And surrogacy is also paying a woman to use her womb as an incubator for a certain 1.00

00:46:20.780 amount of time. And yeah, we're, we're, this is, this is ridiculous. How is this, how is this normal 0.97

00:46:27.980 for people? Um, and yeah, I keep saying this on, on Tik TOK, on my Tik TOK, um, in France, but, uh,

00:46:35.760 but I keep getting these messages like, Oh wait, what, what about homosexual parents? Well, no,

00:46:40.280 I'm against surrogacy for everyone, not just for homosexual parents or heterosexual parents. 0.78

00:46:45.220 I'm just against the whole entire ordeal for everyone, everyone. Yeah, me too. Um,

00:46:53.520 what are the surrogacy laws in France? Uh, it's, it's, we're not allowed, you're not allowed to

00:46:59.520 do surrogacy, but I mean, they always find ways to go around laws here in France. Yeah. There are ways

00:47:08.320 to go around the laws, but it's not allowed in Italy. They're going to penalize it actually.

00:47:14.420 Yeah. Which I love. Um, and you know, what's so funny, I find this also with a lot of different

00:47:21.540 policies in America that, um, you know, the progressives here who are pro surrogacy and

00:47:26.860 things like that, they will point to people like us, like, you know, conservatives like me and say,

00:47:32.200 Oh my gosh, you're so extreme. You're like the, the Taliban. That's so crazy. And they view America

00:47:37.920 as so insanely conservative when really, like, if you look at Europe, surrogacy and the reproductive

00:47:43.340 industry is a lot more regulated there. I mean, we're like the wild, wild West over here when it

00:47:48.900 comes to embryos on ice and reproductive technology. That's why so many people either go through like

00:47:55.060 the third world countries where these poor women are trying to make money as surrogates, which, 1.00

00:47:59.460 oh my gosh, yes, human trafficking, but also they go through America, I guess like your family did

00:48:04.580 because it is so liberal and so unregulated here. Like it's really, that's the, if you want to call

00:48:12.460 something extreme, America is extreme when it comes to this. Yeah, I do find so. And I've did some

00:48:19.520 research. Apparently you don't have, like, there's no regulations apart from New York. Apparently

00:48:25.260 anyone can open an agency here in the United States to like a surrogate agency. I think that that's what it,

00:48:33.940 I mean, I made some research about it and apparently, yeah, anyone can open a surrogate

00:48:37.540 agency in the United States, which I found crazy because they're dealing with humans. They're

00:48:44.720 trafficking humans and anyone can open, like I can open an agency if I want to in, I don't know,

00:48:49.180 in Florida, which is crazy, crazy to me. Crazy. Yep. Yep. It really is. Oh, go ahead. Go ahead.

00:48:56.220 Yeah. But I don't think you're, I don't think it's a political thing. You know, we're talking humans.

00:49:01.820 We're talking babies. We're talking women. We're talking, it's not, it, this shouldn't be a 1.00

00:49:06.580 political thing. It shouldn't be a conservative thing or a progressive thing. It just should be

00:49:10.740 normal. It just should be in people's minds that we don't buy children. Yeah. Dot. We do not use

00:49:19.440 women as incubators. Dot. Yeah. There's no political aspect to this, at least to me. Yeah. It shouldn't be. 0.63

00:49:29.420 I mean, as you probably know, in the United States, um, we're not only extremely political,

00:49:34.460 but like our differing political factions have very fundamental moral differences. So how we view

00:49:43.560 human beings is really different. Now that's not to say all Republicans think one way and all

00:49:47.840 Democrats think one way. I'm not saying that at all. Um, but you will find more on the progressive

00:49:52.960 side, kind of pushing this idea of the family diversity theory that no matter how a child is

00:49:58.900 conceived or created or raised, as long as they have someone in their life who loves them,

00:50:02.800 and that's totally fine. It's the nature versus nurture debate. Whereas we over here who believe

00:50:08.700 in natural law and believe that we're made in the image of God, we believe there is a purpose and

00:50:13.400 an intention behind how we are made, how we are created, how we're raised, that all of that is really

00:50:18.620 important. Um, and so there are some fundamental differences that do unfortunately manifest

00:50:24.560 themselves in, uh, political differences in the United States. So I agree with you. It shouldn't

00:50:30.480 be political, but because of where we are politically in the United States, it has become so.

00:50:36.100 But look at me. I just, let's take me as an example. I was born by surrogacy, whatever,

00:50:41.800 32 years ago. I now have like, I kind of lived 32 years. So I can give you my perspective of how I

00:50:49.980 lived my life. My parents loved me. They did what they could. Yeah. Um, they educated me. They offered

00:50:57.880 me an extremely good education, extreme. I mean, I had everything I wanted. I, I had, my parents had

00:51:05.660 money. I, uh, I, I mean, I lived a good life, um, financially speaking. However, there was not that

00:51:13.400 bond. And even though they loved me, that love was not enough. It wasn't enough because I still

00:51:20.500 developed, uh, tendencies to drugs, to alcohol. I had, I mean, I, I, it's, it's just how it is.

00:51:29.440 Yeah. So love doesn't suffice. Love isn't enough. That's, it's, um, you, I mean, it, it's ridiculous

00:51:38.740 to think that way. Yeah. Yeah. Um, well, I know that we have to let you go. There are so many other

00:51:44.400 questions that I, that I wanted to ask you. The, the, the last thing that I want to ask is I'm,

00:51:48.780 I'm just curious, do you have, like, do you consider yourself a Christian? Do you have a faith?

00:51:54.140 No, I don't actually. I have no faith. I have faith in humanity. That's what I, I, I always say.

00:52:01.480 I have faith in humanity. I think that we can abolish surrogacy worldwide. I will be fighting 1.00

00:52:07.740 this cause for as long as I am here on earth. So no, I don't have faith, but, um, but I mean,

00:52:13.400 I respect anyone who does. Yeah. And, um, and, but no, no, I'm not, I do not, uh, I'm not a

00:52:21.200 Christian. I'm, I'm just, I'm actually atheist. Atheist. Well, I just, I mean, um, and you can,

00:52:29.040 you can react to this how you will, cause I know we have to close out, but as I'm listening to your

00:52:34.160 story and the feelings of abandonment that a lot of people have had, but specifically people who have

00:52:39.260 been abandoned by parents, like, I just wanted you to know that I believe that you are made by a God

00:52:45.240 who cares for you and loves you and made your DNA with purpose and that you have incredible value,

00:52:54.080 not just because you're a human, but also because you have a soul that is going to live forever.

00:53:00.880 And I just, I, when I hear you talk, I'm like, gosh, she needs to know that there is a God who

00:53:06.280 created her and who loves her and who sent Jesus to die for her. And that is the only place I believe

00:53:13.780 that we find purpose and belonging ultimately. So I'm so thankful though, whether you believe in

00:53:20.700 him or not, I think that he is using you and using your courage and using your voice and using

00:53:27.320 your suffering for something really redemptive and good. And that's what God does. He takes

00:53:32.440 broken things and he redeems them for a greater purpose. And whether you believe that you're being

00:53:39.740 used by him, that's, that's what I see. So I just want to tell you that, but I also wanted to thank

00:53:44.360 you for being courageous because you didn't have to take this stand yet you are, and you're speaking

00:53:48.900 up for the most vulnerable. And so thank you so much. I will be absolutely cheering you on.

00:53:54.880 And thank you. And I just want to, I mean, I just want to finish with this sentence just for the

00:54:00.740 people that are listening to me. And I want to, I want this message to be clear and clear as possible.

00:54:09.440 There is no such thing as a good surrogacy. No surrogacy is good. There is no justification for

00:54:17.200 forcing a child to be born in order to be separated from its biological mother or non-biological mother. 0.64

00:54:23.940 And there is no justification for using a woman as an incubator. And that is my message that I want 1.00

00:54:31.220 to spread. And I hope it'll be listened to. Amen. Amen. Thank you so much. We're going to share

00:54:37.300 this far and wide. Yes. Thank you. Have a great day. Thank you. Bye.

Relatable with Allie Beth Stuckey - December 07, 2023

Ep 919 ｜ No Good Surrogacies： A Surrogacy Baby Speaks Out ｜ Guest： Olivia Maurel

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