I've had a lot of people asking me recently to update this blog or at least tell them what's new. Unfortunately the answer is pretty boring.........not much new. But here is a little long over due update, Ajasyt had some big stuff come up in her life and is sadly not able to be part of our team. Isis is still putting up with us and all our delays :-) We are looking into a new RE due to travel and such with our former RE, Dr. Zouves. I have a very hard time leaving him as I think the world of him and adore him as a person as well. If anyone has the opportunity to work with Zouves consider yourself blessed!
I spent a bunch of time today reading a long time friends Blog today. She made me laugh and cry...mostly laugh. I wondered why I never write on our Blog. I came up with a lot of reasons.
1. No real progress to speak of.
2. Who wants to hear a broken record?
3. I end up sounding like the broken person I am.
4. I don't like people see me being a cry baby- pee-pee-pants.
5. I don't like being a cry baby pee-pee pants.
6. Recounting my obsessed mission daily/weekly/monthly feeds my obsessed mind.
So my new goal is to try to Blog and not fall to deeply into any of the above mentioned issues.
Where to start?................................
It's been a year....a year since we said goodbye to our babies. To be exact a year tomorrow since we lost baby A and 1 year plus 16 days since we lost baby B. This Fall has been hard............really hard. Picking up our heads and planning for the future....
My new friend Kristen took a giant step forward today and publicly celebrated the fact they too plan to have two surrogates help them! Yup, Jon and I, and Ajasyt and Isis or not the only crazies out there! Yay for us ALL!!
Kristen, I am proud of you for holding your head high and taking pride in your best intentions and joy for the future! Own it sweetie!! May God rain babies on you and fill your home with more love than you know what to do with. ((HUGS))
I'm posting this just to say hi to someone that I know has been reading. She knows who she is. ;)
Now the important part..........
Don't just read, reply too. :) :) :)
I have met more and more couples falling out of the surrogacy world because of IVF costs. I was reading another IM's Blog yesterday and she reports that she has 130k+ and it isn't enough for international surrogacy. At first I thought "she is crazy" and then I sat down and added it all up.....YIKES!
When we first started this I felt really blessed to not be one of those people who does IVF cycle after IVF cycle on themselves before even moving onto surrogacy. I couldn't even imagine the costs of that! Then God taught me that was in fact in store for me as well. I have no uterus and yet we have had three IVF cycles and still no baby!
We have an upcoming RE consult and I should be excited but instead the stats and numbers and future costs are all running through my head. There is this nagging voice that says don't get too excited because you know what happened last year. I'm not a negative person but this is all stats and to pretend "oh of course every dream will come true" is just a bit naive to me. In reality, I could be sitting right where I am today and have spent and other 40k. I know we are in this for the long haul so how can "what if" it does not work, what if my eggs turn to dust? "What if's" can eat me up. I don't want to let my family down again. I don't even want my surros to get excited because I don't want them to have to experience the down sides because of us.
This is my little tiny melt down, stomping my feet asking God to just give me a sign already! If he would just give the date and time I would chill out and go along for the ride......really is that too much to ask? Tell me this works or if we have more disappointments. I can deal with it but I just want to know. I want to be able to prepare the team for the bumps. Come on God...a sign...PLEASE
We seem to be covering a lot of territory in the USA if you look at the map. I even noticed someone was viewing from South Africa. How cool is that?!?! Now if only more of them would reply. (I think I might be starting to sound like a broken record now.)
:)
I hate to see a day go by without a new post so I'll share something that is frustrating me recently. There are so many people I know and have come to care about only because of infertility. Knowing their struggles, it only upsets me more when I hear about yet another teen I know that is pregnant. Not only does this make my heart ache yet again for my friends, it causes another parenting issue for me. I try to teach my children about sex, reproduction, responsibility, etc. However, it seems that this year has been filled with moments in which I'm forced to educate them about certain things earlier than intended or I find myself continually re-educating about things we've already gone over.
Now on to the recent problem. My daughter is in 6th grade at our middle school now. I found out there is an 8th grader that is pregnant. The father is also an 8th grader. These kids are 13 years old and will be 14yo when they become parents. I don't know if they plan to keep the baby but it doesn't matter. The point is that their own parents probably didn't educate them. If they did, there was too much opportunity for unsupervised boy-girl activity and private time. (Before you think I'm being too judgemental, I know a little about the parents and that's what I'm basing some of my opinions on.) I should add that this boy is a kid I know because he used to spend time with my son and nephew. My nephew told us that this kid was bragging about having had sex. He even went so far as to say he could have as much sex as he wanted because he couldn't get anyone pregnant. I wish my nephew had asked him why he thought this. It might have been enlightening.
It's my personal opinion that it doesn't matter if there is any kind of sex-ed in your school system. You should teach or reinforce these things at home too.
I have a family member that recently became a grandfather. His 16yo daughter became pregnant. He told her she couldn't give up the baby. He was complaing to his SIL the other day about how his daughter isn't very good at taking care of the baby and how she was complaining about the responsibility. His SIL told him too bad and he had no right to complain. He's the one that wouldn't let her give it up. It made me angry because we all basically thought this was how it would end up going. Don't get me wrong, this girl loves her baby but she could have made another couple happy parents. I believe she would have been OK with that decision if she'd had the support to do it. That's not what she got. She got to be a mom when she wasn't ready because her daddy said she had too. Was that for her sake or his?
Sorry about this rant instead of my usual weird humor self but it's been a rough few days struggling to find the words to talk to my 11yo daughter about someone so young having a baby. It's not easy talking to my son about it either. I seem to find myself doing it alot these last few months, and days, though.
Just being me...I will offend some and be loved by others. I tend to be loved or hated and I don't see myself here any differently.
I feel like this time we have two surrogates who also chose to be my friend before offering to carry for us so I doubt they will be offended by me being me. I am fee to be crazy me!!!
My madness.......
1. Pray like mad.....never stop. I figure God is in charge so it is best to go directly to who is in charge of the show and make sure I take the time to ask him for what I want.
That seems pretty sane right? Well, I don't stop there......nope not me. My brain starts going and the craziness just comes pouring out.
Naming of Our Embryos. - Yes, they need potential names every single one of them. If we are transferring 2 embryo's we need FOUR names. Two girls and two boys. This isn't so hard but when we transfered 3 frozen embryo's I needed three boys names and three girls names. Then when we transfered four frozen embryo's I needed four of each. The biggest problem came in when Jon could not cooperate with me and help. So then I am frustrated with Jon because he veto's all my additional boy choices. Doesn't he understand that our children will not stick if they think we have not even cared enough to consider what their name can be? This seems so logical to me, how can Jon not understand my insanity?
The naming doesn't stop there, if/when they stick they need nick names because I need my friends to cheer them on without me revealing their potential names. When we had twins we were calling them Tigger and Roo because one of the embryos looked like "baby Tigger" (like you see in a cloud). Susan called them "George and Martha" because on the small picture I put up "Baby Tigger" looked just like a nickel. The doctors called them baby A and Baby B. Crazy enough as long as they have names it brings me comfort. It makes them more real.
I talk to them - Yep, I like to go all out on "crazy" and take their little pictures with me every where and tell them I miss them and how much I love them and want them to grow.
Funny thing is I don't get the idea other IM's do this or if so not to the same degree as I do. The great part is IM's have a bit of a reputation for being crazy people by surrogates who misunderstand us and make assumptions because we are not big shares of our real feelings. I think I might be the craziest of the bunch but I am also the one willing to tell surrogates who call us crazy to sit down because they are off base. Ahh.......if only they knew haha
My question to other IM's is what do you do or have you done that is a bit nutty?
A very close friend of mine had a baby yesterday. By "had" I mean her surrogate gave birth to her her beautiful daughter. What an incredible day. She sent me a picture shortly after Bailey's birth and I cried and cried and cried. A few months ago, I did the same thing at the birth of my other dear friends son's birth. Today I saw a video of Brendan....again more tears. My tears over these children is a flood of hope through my heart. These are children who arrived after years of infertility and parents who would not give up even when everything in the world tells you it won't happen. Through the battle their parents were willing to fight and the hearts of the surrogates who gave of themselves in ways I cannot ever fully understand these babies are here. They have healed deep wounds. As Wendy (AKA Baileys mom) said to me yesterday "you forget it all when you look at her face".
Welcome to the World Bailey and Brendan thank you for the smiles, you both make this ache I carry a little lighter today. To their mommies.....I love you both with all my heart.
This post is inspired by a couple years of personal turmoil over a silly topic to be debated. My new hero Jaymee brings up the subject in her Blog and my comment back to her was so long I just made it my own post here. Here is Jaymee's Blog (I swear this girl is in my head)
A BIG hot topic in Surrogacy is breastfeeding/pumping and the insecurities/jealousy issues IM's must have if they do not allow their surrogate to nurse to do not want to use breast milk.
My initial plan was to induce using Ask Elenore protocol with Domperidone and BCP's. I have a close friend who used and I saw it work wonderfully.
THEN came the pressure from the surrogacy world to be okay with a surro breastfeed in the hospital. I thought heck no! I will feed my baby thank you very much. It is the first thing I CAN do as a parent and I am going to do it. Plus to be really honest, I find it a little creepy.
This is where to much time to think got to me.......I started asking myself what was wrong with me that I didn't want my surro to nurse my child? I need to suck it up and get over myself. So THEN I decided I could do it and it's not such a big deal.
BUT of course I couldn't just stop there, in the end I wind back up with were I started. It's OKAY for me to want to feed my own child. People who do not have a surrogate do not have anyone pressuring them to have a friend nurse their child. At some point, we get to be a family like everyone else and make parental choices for our children without a HIPPA release and PBO in place. It doesn't mean I am ungrateful or bailing on my friend or surro who carried our child it just means she helped create a REAL family, one in which the parents are allowed to meet the child's' basic needs as they see fit.
I am so incredibly grateful we have two friends who will not only carry our children but respect our need to be a real family too.
*As a side note-I am not in favor of our surrogates eating the placentas either.......again, the creepy issue plus it's just gross......BLECH Now that I have completely offended the very crunchy parents and surro's I am done for now.
I read other blogs and am struggling to find my voice here. The "who I am" and "how I got here" explanations make me sound like a big cry baby (which I am not or at least not MOST of the time and then only Jon gets blessed with it). How do I wear a hat here that is honest without destroying myself or worse making others pity me. I have shared a lot online over the past few years in hopes of letting surrogates know what it is to be an intended mother and letting other IM's know they are not alone. I REALLY don't want pity I just want to open some eyes because I see so many misconceptions as to what we go through. So in my sharing I need the readers to know that the perception IM's are just broken and crazy is not altogether true. I say "altogether" because 1. Clearly we are broken in body and 2. If we were not just a bit crazy we wouldn't be fighting so damn hard to create our families BUT what truly defines us and sets us apart is our incredible strength and sheer determination to over come and conquer mountains most people have never even seen. There are days the mountain beats me up but in the end you must know I will WIN. I hope my voice will be seen as a post card from the mountain.
We know the odds now, (way to well) so how do we use them to our advantage? Let's double our odds by doubling our surrogates. The math seems really simple.
Sure having all of the people involved can make things complicated, but Mr. Excited just wants to hear about the results - not the complications.
We have One goal. One Mission. AND One Obsession.
So with our eyes firmly on the prize we are moving forward with a new Adventure of a Lifetime. We have built a new team to join us and are ready and excited about moving forward again.
We have named our surrogates Ajysyt and Isis. To give them their privacy on the web. Also, it just seemed like a lot of fun to keep people guessing.
Our goal is to share this story with everyone. To accomplish this we have started a new blog so that you can meet all of the players.:
A Tale of Two Surro's
Surrogacy itself can lead to confrontation whether face-to-face, on the phone, or online. It's tendency for controversy comes from people having such passionate feelings about it. Surrogacy in which more than one surro is being used tends to be an even more touchy subject. My thoughts on dealing with confrontation are (I think) rather simple. You need to love, care, and be passionate about what you are doing more than you fear confrontation. Add to that doing what you know is right and having your heart and mind in the right place, then thats the armor you need to get you through whatever lies ahead.
Isis and I were talking on the phone a while back and she started to wonder how big Jon was at birth. Jon is a big guy. He's a big basketball-playing athlete of a guy. Isis and I are both, umm, short. She has the distinction of having carried big babies though, I've only been tested with small and average babies. So Isis decided to tell Christy that we would transfer the big Jon embryos to her and the small Christy ones to me. The problem with that plan? Christy was the bigger baby at birth! ROFL She was a nice average baby, but Jon was a tiny little guy.
So, Christy and Jon, thank you for having small baby genes.
And Isis, thank you for a great laugh as always. I hope you don't mind I shared! heehee
At one point I wasn't even sure if I would be a surrogate again. Honestly, I was feeling sad about my "journey" even though I tried as hard as I could to be completely positive about it.
When I met Christy I met a real and honest woman who so badly wanted to have a baby. A woman who despite everything she was facing was still able to laugh and be open. When I met her I immediately felt like she was just who I would hope for as an IM. I even told her so! Of course she was matched and I was... busy. I was fortunate instead be able to become friends with her. I moved on and followed my heart, which lied to me mercilessly! When I came to my senses there was my friend, in need of a surrogate (or 2). Wow, how lucky am I to get to help my friend have a baby (or 4)?
I haven't met Isis yet, but I can't wait. My home is open to her anytime, and my heart is open to the great friendship that I know will develop. I feel like I know her already! :D
Oh, and Jon, he's okay too. Hahahahahahaha! :P
Scroll down to the first few posts and you will see Jon's "interesting" attempts at making an announcement. Not sure if we ever got it right so we just decided to share this with our close friends in surrogacy today! MUA .....Christy
please post comments.
Please!
Pretty please with sugar on top!!!!!!!
I can see the ticker that shows us people are visiting. If you don't post comments it's like we're talking to ourselves. I do that enough at home. If I start doing it online too people might think I'm crazy. ;)
My observation............
When talking to other people in the surrogacy world the topic of having two surrogates help one set of IP's at the same time causes a bit of a stir. A number of people in the surrogacy world become quite judgmental. The odd part to me is these are the same people who have the world at large questioning what they are doing being a surrogate at all.
Just interesting that those that are fastest to judge something out of the "norm" are the same people who have been judged by others for doing something out of the "norm".
Welcome to my world of infertility, "norms" have no place here :-) But for everyone else there are reclining seats with a popcorn holder.
Murgdan has a funny comic strip following the Indiana Jones theme today.
It's called spermiana bones and uterus of doom.
It's worth the time to take a look. There is a war going on in the uterus. Survival is at stake.
You will laugh.
Our Quote's
"Caveo of quisquam ut has iustus unus redimio."
Translation:
Beware of anyone that has just one surro
And From Ecclesiastes 4:9-10:
"Two are better than one because they have a good return for their labor.
For if either of them falls, the one will lift up his companion. But woe to the one who falls when there is not another to lift him up."
A Tale of Two Surros
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This is a blog built by Intended Parents for Intended Parents. Having been through the process ourselves we understand better than anyone else the road that lies ahead when building a family through IVF and Surrogacy.