What the Kyla Simpson case reveals about the physical, emotional, and financial stakes of surrogacy for a Black woman
TheGrio...
We unpack the Kyla Simpson as she continues to fight the rare post-surrogacy debacle she’s been embroiled in for nearly two years.
A woman in Florida is fighting to gain custody of the children she delivered via surrogacy after their intended father failed to travel to the United States from China to pick them up.
Kyla Simpson, a Black woman from St. Augustine, Florida, has been embroiled in a custody battle since giving birth to triplet boys on Nov. 4, 2024, for Ted Zhou, a single father living in China, First Coast News reported. In the more than year and a half since, there have been complex visa issues on Zhou’s end, one of the children has died, and allegations of abandonment and trafficking on both sides.
The bizarre case has shocked the nation for its rarity — one judge recently called it a “unicorn” — but it has also pulled the curtain back on the physical, financial, and emotional stakes of surrogacy, particularly for Black women who already enter pregnancy facing some of the worst maternal health outcomes in the country.
Neither attorney for Simpson or Zhou immediately returned theGrio’s request for comment.
Simpson was 24 and raising a young daughter with her husband, Lincoln Simpson, when she connected with Zhou through California-based Angels Creation Reproductive Center. Two embryos were transferred, with one ultimately splitting, leaving Simpson pregnant with triplets. The original plan was for Zhou to take custody after their birth, but he did not have the necessary visa to enter the country, leaving Simpson to temporarily care for the babies while he worked to get them home, according to the Wall Street Journal.
However, before any of the ensuing legal drama kicked off, Simpson had already taken on an enormous physical risk. Five and a half months into the pregnancy, doctors discovered that one of the fetuses had severe growth restriction that could eventually endanger all three babies. Simpson was hospitalized at 31 weeks and ultimately underwent a C-section, delivering the boys two months before her original due date. All three required extensive NICU care, with complications that included heart defects, breathing problems, and anemia.
Carrying triplets is inherently high-risk, increasing the likelihood of complications including preterm delivery, preeclampsia, and gestational diabetes. For Simpson, those risks came layered within the Black maternal health crisis. Black women are roughly three to four times more likely than white women to die from pregnancy-related causes in the United States, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and disparities persist across income and education levels. Meanwhile, research suggests gestational carriers may face heightened risks of their own.
A 2024 study published by the National Library of Medicine examining more than 800,000 pregnancies found gestational carriers experienced severe maternal morbidity at higher rates than women who conceived without assistance or through IVF, including higher rates of postpartum hemorrhage and hypertensive disorders.
Race can also factor into who is even considered desirable for the job. According to The Cut, some Chinese intended parents working with the agency that matched Simpson and Zhou refused Black gestational carriers because of the false belief that a Black woman could somehow affect the race of their genetically unrelated child. Zhou reportedly did not share that belief, though he did subscribe to false claims that Black women were more fertile.
The physical risks also came with a significant financial incentive, however. At the time Simpson began pursuing surrogacy, she was working multiple jobs to support herself and her daughter alongside her husband. Zhou spent over $300,000 on the surrogacy process, including a total of $130,000 to Simpson, according to court filings reviewed by First Coast News.
While she has told the outlet and others that the figure worked out differently, what she was receiving was already making a difference in her life. She quit one of her jobs, moved into a larger apartment, put money down on an SUV, and hoped to eventually buy a home with a yard.
Then the babies arrived, along with an entirely different financial burden. With Zhou unable to enter the country, Simpson became responsible for three premature infants who required significant medical care. She sought to have herself and her husband listed on the babies’ birth certificates in part so they could qualify for Medicaid rather than leave Zhou facing potentially millions of dollars in NICU bills. Once the boys came home, Simpson asked Zhou for $2,500 a month to help cover her rent and car payment while she cared for them and could not work normally.
The temporary arrangement stretched from weeks to months as Zhou struggled to secure a visa and navigate the paperwork required to bring his sons to China. Payments became inconsistent, and the money she had earned through the pregnancy eventually disappeared into caring for the children.
“Financially, I lost everything,” she told The Cut.
The stakes only grew after one of the boys, Christopher, stopped breathing in August 2025. Simpson performed CPR before he was rushed to a hospital, where he later died. An autopsy determined that a parainfluenza infection had inflamed his airway before oxygen deprivation stopped his heart. By then, what had begun as a financial and contractual arrangement had become deeply emotional. Simpson had spent months becoming their primary caregiver. She pumped breast milk, traveled to visit them during their NICU stays, brought them home, took them to doctors, and raised them alongside her daughter, who came to see the boys as her brothers.
At the same time, she became increasingly wary of what would happen if she surrendered them. Zhou remained in China and began relying on intermediaries to retrieve the children, including men Simpson did not know who showed up at her home seeking to take the babies on his behalf. Zhou maintains he never abandoned his sons and was desperately trying to get them through visa issues, with a network of people who, according to reporting, may have been scamming him. From Simpson’s end, however, the situation had grown so strange and confusing. She eventually sought to terminate Zhou’s parental rights and adopt the boys herself.
“I birthed them,” Simpson told The Cut. “I’m the only mom they’ve ever known.”
The two surviving boys have since been removed from Simpson’s care and taken to California as the legal battle continues. A guardian ad litem is expected to represent the children’s interests as courts sort through competing claims over their custody and parentage.
For all the money, medical complications, international legal wrangling, and grief that have followed, Simpson has said her reason for becoming a surrogate in the first place was rather noble.
“I made up my mind that I wanted to bless someone with a child,” she told First Coast News.