Lily Collins' husband Charlie McDowell has shut down 'hurtful' comments being spread on social media after the famous couple shared online that they had welcomed their first child into the world via surrogate.
Actress Lily posted their excitement about their new baby, lovingly named Tove Jane, on social media on Friday, January 31. The 35-year-old captioned the picture of the beautiful baby girl, writing: "Welcome to the center of our world Tove Jane McDowell. Words will never express our endless gratitude for our incredible surrogate and everyone who helped us along the way. We love you to the moon and back again…"
While many shared their joy and well-wishes for the couple in the comment section, some followers instead took the chance to leave hurtful comments under the post about Lily and Charlie's pregnancy route, reports the Mirror. One wrote: "Surrogacy harms impoverished women. People unable to conceive have the option of adopting millions of children that don’t have homes. Renting the uteruses of women is immoral and should not be legal."
Lily, who is the daughter of Genesis frontman Phil Collins, and her hubby were also struck with comments such as: "You're not a Mother, you're a buyer!" A third person added: "Motherhood is not a human right, there are other options to have a child like adoption!! Babies CAN'T be bought!!"
Upon reading these rather hateful comments from some fans, Charlie, who is a screenwriter and director, did not hesitate to step in and defend the decision of himself and his wife to use a surrogate. He hit back: "In regards to the unkind messages about surrogacy and our path to having a baby— it’s ok to not be an expert on surrogacy."
The 41-year-old continued: "It’s ok to not know why someone might need a surrogate to have a child. It’s ok to not know the motivations of a surrogate regardless of what you assume. And it’s ok to spend less time spewing hateful words into the world, especially in regards to a beautiful baby girl who has brought a lot of love into people’s lives. That’s all for now because she just pooped and I need to change her diaper."
In response to his rebuttal, Lily replied with a series of love-heart emojis, while other fans praised his "perfect" response to the "insensitive" comments made by the married couples' critics. While Charlie did not open up about the exact reasoning behind the couple's choice to go with a surrogate, Lily has spoken about how she suffered with an eating disorder in the past.
She admitted that wanting to be a mother had helped motivate her during recovery. It has been found that people with a history of eating disorders have a higher rate of miscarriages or other complications during pregnancy.
In an interview with US Weekly back in 2017, Lily talked about the anxieties she has about starting a family, saying: "Everyone has a different form of recovery. I never had an ‘aha’ moment. My reason to finally start talking about [my eating disorder] was the moment I realised I wanted a family. I wanted kids. I didn’t want this to be something I bring into that."
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