Jamie Chung used a surrogate because being pregnant might hurt her career

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Chances are, her husband wanted kids badly and she was ambivalent. This was the compromise they reached. Good for them.

Or she's too damn old and couldn't have kids and didn't even have viable eggs. Wasted 20 years of her life to be a reality TV has-been and D list actress instead of having babies naturally, at an age her body could have easily bounced back from.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:So back to Chung’s actual statement - ‘pregnancy puts your life on hold for two years’. Agree or disagree?

For a working woman whose career is dependent on her physical appearance and literal ability to be active and present on set - I totally agree. I’d say the same if she was a neurosurgeon trying to get ahead or a trial lawyer.

For one, she's not curing cancer, she has no career of note. Two, no. Three, she's 40 years old and should have thought about having kids when she was pissing her fertility away on MTV 20 years ago.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:So back to Chung’s actual statement - ‘pregnancy puts your life on hold for two years’. Agree or disagree?

For a working woman whose career is dependent on her physical appearance and literal ability to be active and present on set - I totally agree. I’d say the same if she was a neurosurgeon trying to get ahead or a trial lawyer.

I have zero issue with surrogacy and don't judge how other people choose to have kids, but I disagree.

For me one of the best things about pregnancy and childbirth was that it introduced me to some different metrics for evaluating my life. Like it really upended my previous ideas of what it meant to be productive, or to be successful. I still work and have a career and still very much care about my career. In some ways more because now I'm setting an example for my kid and I want her to see me working and being respected and accomplishing professional goals.

But I know have the whole other metric by which I evaluate where I'm at in life that has nothing to do with financial gain, being respected by colleagues, etc. Like I can spend a couple hours with my daughter where we just tell jokes and spend some time in nature and she tells me about some friend drama at school. And I feel fulfilled and happy and full in a way that I literally never feel satisfied by work. And that started for me with pregnancy, with realizing that I could do something worthwhile by simply eating well and getting enough sleep while my body made a human. Breastfeeding made me realize that simply feeding a child could be this deeply satisfying, rewarding activity. The whole experience made me more patient, more grateful, more willing to accept a slower pace and simple satisfactions.

I don't feel that pregnancy put my life on hold. It introduced me to another way of living and thinking about life. This will sound dramatic, but pregnancy made me feel like I'd gained actual wisdom, not just knowledge, for the first time in my life.

(This is not a knock on people who become parents without being pregnant, at all -- I know for a fact that the process of adoption, for instance, can be similarly transformative in different ways and my DH found a way to parenthood without being pregnant. Not knocking how other people arrive at this point, just explaining that for me, pregnancy was instrumental in changing how I thought about my life and the world and I would never say that process was "putting my life on hold." It was instead a critical and meaningful time in my life.)

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:There are thousands of unwanted babies right now. I would love to see test tube, IVF, and surrogacy outlawed in this country. Some people were not meant to be parents. Just because you can doesn’t at all mean you should. Flame me all you want, but this is how I feel.

No one gives a $hit about how you feel.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Please explain how she has postpartum depression having used a surrogate.

Ask the people who have post-adoption depression.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Looking at IMDB, she's done a few random guest spots and some voiceover work, so the whole "career" angle seems like BS.

You must be looking at the wrong IMDB page.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Chances are, her husband wanted kids badly and she was ambivalent. This was the compromise they reached. Good for them.

Or she's too damn old and couldn't have kids and didn't even have viable eggs. Wasted 20 years of her life to be a reality TV has-been and D list actress instead of having babies naturally, at an age her body could have easily bounced back from.

I usually think that’s harsh but Chung is 39 and Asians have documented studies showing it’s harder for them to conceive as their fertile eggs are in shorter supply.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Chances are, her husband wanted kids badly and she was ambivalent. This was the compromise they reached. Good for them.

Or she's too damn old and couldn't have kids and didn't even have viable eggs. Wasted 20 years of her life to be a reality TV has-been and D list actress instead of having babies naturally, at an age her body could have easily bounced back from.

She’s worth $5 million. How much were you worth at 39?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It is absolutely wrong and vulgar to rent the womb of a poor woman to carry a baby for you. The fact that so many women are ok with women being treated like livestock by rich women and gay men is astounding.

Talk to a surrogate. The ones I've known were not poor. They were middle class, like being pregnant (most surrogates have already had children of their own), like the idea of helping other people create a family, and use the compensation from surrogacy to send their own kids to college, buy a house, or prepare for retirement.

I'm sure there are surrogates who get exploited but my impression of the surrogacy practice in the US right now is that the surrogates are generally very willing participants who have an asset (fertility, relative comfort with pregnancy, usually a history of uncomplicated and easy pregnancies) and want to leverage it for financial gain. All the surrogates I've met (three) were married and had young kids and I can't say any of them were exploited. One had done it twice, for the same couple.

If you're renting your body out for 9 months with the possibility of severe health complications from the process - you're poor.

I know you’d like to believe that, but sadly for you, your ignorant generalization is not true.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Please explain how she has postpartum depression having used a surrogate.

This is how I feel when men talk about their postpartum depression.

Men who've recently become fathers absolutely can become depressed. Becoming a parent is a major life event, which drastically changes your life and comes with an overwhelming amount of responsibility and financial cost. Not to mention the huge commitment and duty to keep the child alive and healthy.

P-O-S-T-P-A-R-T-U-M. Reading comprehension lack much?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I don't have a problem with a woman using a surrogate because she's unable to carry her own baby for health-related reasons. But I find it distasteful for a woman to use a surrogate for vanity or career reasons. It just reeks of selfishness and narcissism.

Nooooobody cares what you think. It’s irrelevant.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:So back to Chung’s actual statement - ‘pregnancy puts your life on hold for two years’. Agree or disagree?

For a working woman whose career is dependent on her physical appearance and literal ability to be active and present on set - I totally agree. I’d say the same if she was a neurosurgeon trying to get ahead or a trial lawyer.

For one, she's not curing cancer, she has no career of note. Two, no. Three, she's 40 years old and should have thought about having kids when she was pissing her fertility away on MTV 20 years ago.

Angry Brunch Granny, is that you? LOL!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Chances are, her husband wanted kids badly and she was ambivalent. This was the compromise they reached. Good for them.

Or she's too damn old and couldn't have kids and didn't even have viable eggs. Wasted 20 years of her life to be a reality TV has-been and D list actress instead of having babies naturally, at an age her body could have easily bounced back from.

I usually think that’s harsh but Chung is 39 and Asians have documented studies showing it’s harder for them to conceive as their fertile eggs are in shorter supply.

All of my Korean friends who had babies in their 20s bounced back immediately and are still skinny and adorable and still get carded for wine.

[Anonymous]

It’s wild that people on this board are saying she should have had babies in her 20s…before she had a partner and a career. Her children, however they were conceived, will have much better lives being born to healthy, functional, and financial stable parents.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Chances are, her husband wanted kids badly and she was ambivalent. This was the compromise they reached. Good for them.

Or she's too damn old and couldn't have kids and didn't even have viable eggs. Wasted 20 years of her life to be a reality TV has-been and D list actress instead of having babies naturally, at an age her body could have easily bounced back from.

She’s worth $5 million. How much were you worth at 39?

At 39 I was married, with 3 children (conceived naturally), and we had a pre-inheritance net worth of I guess $1-2 million plus two pensions.