08/16/2026
❤️👶🏼 Pray for this sweet baby’s heart to heal 🍼🙏🏽
I have been following the story of surrogate McKenna West and baby Gabriel, and I cannot stop thinking about it.
At 20 weeks, the baby she was carrying was diagnosed with hypoplastic left heart syndrome, a severe congenital heart defect. According to McKenna and court filings, the biological parents wanted the pregnancy terminated. McKenna refused.
And what followed has turned into a legal battle spanning multiple states over surrogacy contracts, parental rights, bodily autonomy, medical decisions and now, ultimately, the life of a newborn baby.
Gabriel was born yesterday in Texas.
And right now, doctors are fighting for him.
I know people are going to come at this story from every possible political angle. Abortion. Surrogacy. Contracts. Parental rights. Texas. California.
But I keep coming back to the human beings in the middle of all of it.
A woman carried this baby inside of her, felt him move, watched him grow and was faced with being told that because something was terribly wrong with his heart, the pregnancy should end.
And she said no.
Whatever anyone thinks about surrogacy or abortion, I cannot imagine believing that signing a contract means a woman signs away the right to say no to a medical procedure being performed on her own body.
And now there is an actual little boy here.
Not a hypothetical.
Not a clause in a contract.
Not a political talking point.
A newborn baby with a very sick heart who needs incredibly complex medical care, and doctors are giving him that chance.
That is the part that gets me.
Because a diagnosis tells us what a child is facing. It can tell us the odds. It can prepare families for devastating possibilities.
But a diagnosis does not tell us the value of a life.
I also think there is an uncomfortable conversation here about surrogacy that deserves to happen. What happens when the person carrying the pregnancy and the intended parents profoundly disagree about what should happen to that pregnancy? Who gets to decide? What can a contract ethically require of another person's body? And once that baby is born, whose wishes matter when we're talking about potentially lifesaving treatment?
Those aren't easy questions, and this case is nowhere near finished.
But today, Gabriel is here.
He made it to birth.
He is receiving care.
And whatever eventually happens in those courtrooms, I hope that somewhere underneath all of the attorneys, contracts, politics and arguments, we remember there is a tiny human being at the center of this who didn't ask to become the subject of a national legal battle.
He just got here.
And I'm rooting like hell for his little heart. ❤️
