The reality star welcomed her son, Tatum, via surrogate in 2022.
Khloé Kardashian has elaborated on some of the challenges she encountered during her surrogacy journey with her second child, including experiencing intense feelings of detachment throughout the entire process.
The television personality gave birth to her first child—a daughter named True—in April 2018 before welcoming her son, Tatum, via surrogate in July 2022. The 39-year-old shares both children with her now-ex Tristan Thompson, a professional basketball player.
“It was a long time, and I’m embarrassed to say that,” she told the podcast’s hosts, fashion designer Mary Alice Haney and ob-gyn, Dr. Thaïs Aliabadi, who is Ms. Kardashian’s gynecologist.
Feelings of Denial
The reality star said she felt “really detached” throughout the majority of her son’s pregnancy, which she attributed in large part to her tumultuous relationship with Mr. Thompson. Ms. Kardashian learned just weeks after undergoing the embryo transfer procedure that the 33-year-old had fathered a child with another woman while they were still together.
“The entire pregnancy of my surrogate I admittedly buried my head in the sand,” she said. “I couldn’t really face it. I was, I very much think I was in denial that this is happening, so I didn’t get to … really attach during the pregnancy part.”
When Dr. Aliabadi shared the news that her son was about to be born, the Good American founder said she began to cry hysterically.
“Dr. A called and she said she just had a checkup with my surrogate, and she said, ‘Khloé, we have to deliver within 24 hours,’” she recalled. “The baby wasn’t due for, like, another week or two, and this was my last weekend with my daughter, True. Like, in my head … I just needed the weekend.”
Realizing Ms. Kardashian wasn’t emotionally prepared to welcome her son, Dr. Aliabadi offered to take care of the newborn in the interim instead. “And she goes, ‘You know what, I’ll deliver the baby. I’ll take the baby, and you let me know when you’re ready to pick him up,’” Ms. Kardashian continued.
Struggles During Surrogacy
Ms. Kardashian previously touched upon the difficulties she faced navigating her son’s surrogacy during the season three premiere of Hulu’s reality series “The Kardashians,” which was reportedly filmed in the fall of 2022, just a few months after Tatum was born.
Speaking with her older sister, Kim, and Scott Disick, the father of her sister Kourtney’s eldest three children, the entrepreneur acknowledged that she initially felt less connected to her son than she did with her daughter.
“She had a really hard time accepting the whole process,” Kim Kardashian said. The 43-year-old shares four children with her ex-husband, rap artist Ye, formerly known as Kanye West. She gave birth to her daughter North, 10, and son Saint, 8, naturally, going on to welcome her daughter Chicago, 6, and son Psalm, 5, via surrogates.
“I do think that there is a difference when the baby is in your belly,” she continued. “The baby actually feels your real heart.”
Ms. Kardashian explained in a separate confessional that she “didn’t digest” the fact that she was having a second child until her surrogate was in labor. “I think when I went to the hospital, I really think that was the first time that it really registered,” she noted. “And it has nothing to do with the baby. It’s just, you’re like, ‘Okay, we’re having a baby, and this is my son, and I’m taking him home with me.’”
The reality star recalled being in a state of shock at the time. “I felt really guilty that, like, this woman just had my baby and then I take the baby and then I go to another room and you’re sort of separated,” she shared, adding the entire process felt like a “transactional experience.”
She continued: “Because it’s not about him. I wish someone was honest about surrogacy and the difference of it. But it doesn’t mean it’s bad or good. It’s just different.”