The Surrogates

In this episode, we meet Caitlin and her boss Kate. Caitlin is 26, a single mum, and in a new relationship with her boyfriend Jordan. Kate and her partner Matt have lost three pregnancies, including one at 32 weeks. Kate has been told that medically she could carry her own baby, but after such difficult experiences, she doesn’t feel able to. After talking about surrogacy in the office, Caitlin offered to help Kate and Matt have a baby. Kate and Caitlin live in Alderney, in the Channel Islands, and in this programme they fly to Southampton to have Kate and Matt’s embryo transferred to Caitlin’s womb, in the hope it will work and Caitlin will get pregnant. Meanwhile, 23-year-old Emma is pregnant with the baby of a gay couple she met on a fertility matching app just a few months earlier. As the biological mother, it begs the question: will she become more attached as her bump grows? And will letting go of the baby be more difficult than she thought at first it would? We also meet David, 40, who is a single gay man hoping to have a child through surrogacy. David has made embryos using anonymous donor eggs and joins a surrogacy organisation in the hopes of meeting a woman who will carry his child. But in most surrogacy agencies, intended parents aren’t allowed to ask a woman to be their surrogate, and so David has to go to events and wait to be picked by someone. How will he navigate this, and will he successfully attract the right woman?

Caitlin is now pregnant with her boss Kate’s baby, and they try to navigate the complex relationship between a surrogate and an intended parent while working together every day. Caitlin’s boyfriend, Jordan, tries to get used to his girlfriend being pregnant with someone else’s child, and when cracks show in the relationship, Kate worries for the health of the baby. Single man David and his surrogate Lauren end their relationship. He then meets first-time surrogate Faye and her husband Lee. Lee was astounded when he first heard that his wife wanted to be a surrogate, but will David’s determination and charm help ease Lee’s fears? Faye needs to have a check up to see if she can carry a child, and she takes an awkward and anxious David with her into the examination room. We also meet Maddie, a 29-year-old single mum of two, who connected with married gay couple Alex and Richard at a surrogacy event. Unlike Caitlin, Maddie is a straight surrogate, meaning she is trying to get pregnant through home inseminations with Rich’s sperm. As the trio only met a few months ago, navigating this extremely intimate process could turn out to be physically and socially awkward.

Maddie, Alex, and Rich agree to give themselves six months to try to get pregnant. As the deadline approaches, Maddie feels low, and the trio begin to have doubts about their future together as a surrogacy team. Will Maddie ever get pregnant and realise her dream of being that special person who helps her new friends start a family? Meanwhile, single man David has his embryo transferred into his new surrogate, Faye. We watch as they both navigate the emotional complexities within their relationship, whereby the intended parent has to completely trust the surrogate to safely carry their child and then hand the baby over at the end. In Birmingham, we meet Jemma, 33, the mother of three children with her partner Steven. When Jemma gives birth to her first surrogate baby, she says she is 'officially addicted to surrogacy' and immediately begins the search to find a new couple to carry a child for.