Moving Along

When I got home from my RE appointment, I talked to my IPs and my agency. My agency told me that I didn't have to go with the lawyer that the RE had picked for me, and they gave me some other names. I recognized one as a lady I worked with before and liked, so I picked her. My agency got the retainer, and now she'll work with me for the contract review. I'm happy.

My period started a couple of days ago, and I now have an HSG appointment next Wednesday.

We also contacted the psychologist, and we have our appointments on the 9th. I have to go in for an appointment by myself first. Kate (the psychologist) will talk to me about why I want to do this, how my other surrogacies went, etc. If memory serves, she'll also ask what I plan to do with the money, which I always thought was a rather odd question. Will she say no if I answer incorrectly? "I'd like to start my very own meth business!" or "I need more equipment for my club The Sex Cauldron." Luckily, I won't have to do the MMPI again. That test is strange and extraordinarily long. Some questions are pretty obvious why they're on there, like "When someone does me a wrong I feel I should pay him back if I can, just for the principle of the thing." and "I have never been in trouble because of my sex behavior." But why are there questions like "My hands and feet are usually warm enough" and "I do not read every editorial in the newspaper everyday." I also remember one about whether I would like to be a florist, or something like that.

After my individual appointment, we'll have one with all four of us, to make sure we want the same things out of the journey, and that we agree on the big stuff.

After that, we can start on the contract!

A Quick RE Appointment

Since I have had 3 C-Sections already, I need some testing done to make sure all is well in the uterine department. I went in today for my initial RE appointment. My appointment was for 10:30, but I wanted to allow plenty of time to get there, since it was an hour away, and traffic in the area can be crazy. So, I got into the office at 10:12. I sat down, and they called me back almost immediately. The nurse told me to strip from the waist down and hop on the table. There was a knock on the door before I was even undressed! I have never had a doctor ready to see me before I'm ready to see her.

Anyway, I got on the table and she talked to me. She asked me briefly about my pregnancy and surrogacy history. She asked me if I had done my psych testing and if I had a lawyer yet. I answered no to both. She rather pushed me in to a lawyer she worked with (the lawyer who arranged my first surrogacy. I didn't like her). She did a quick internal exam, said, "Yes, looks good." She told me to get dressed and come out. I did. I met with my surrogate coordinator, who gave me the card for the psychologist the clinic works with and the lawyer. She told me to call when my period started, so we could schedule an HSG (Hysterosalpingogram). I was done.

As I got to the elevators to go down to the lobby, I looked at my clock. It was 10:30.

A Note on Matching

You may wonder what kinds of things are taking into consideration when matching a surrogate and IPs. There are a lot of things, but some are flexible, while others aren't. For example, I said I would prefer a gay couple, since that's who I had wanted to help in the first place, but it wasn't a deal breaker. I also preferred somebody relatively close to me, so they could share the pregnancy more easily. But again, I would have worked with somebody further away.

Some things, though, are absolutely imperative to agree on. The big ones are abortion and selective reduction.

Selective reduction usually happens when you get pregnant with high order multiples. It's more and more common to just transfer one embryo at a time, but that's not always the case, and it definitely wasn't the case when I did my last two surrogacies. We transferred two both times. The first time, I got pregnant with one. The second time, both stuck, and one actually split. So, there were three. We ended up losing the identical twins in the first trimester, but we would have reduced if we hadn't. Every baby over one adds risk to both the woman carrying them and to the babies themselves. Twins are usually fine, but higher gets trickier. Granted, there are many cases where three or more are just fine, but they often have to spend time in the NICU and have lasting problems. Three babies are also a lot more expensive, at a time when the parents may have just spend upwards of $100,000 just getting to that point.

As an addendum to the selective reduction issue, it is important to agree on how many embryos you are willing to transfer. I personally believe you should only transfer as many as you're willing to have. But, it can depends on embryo quality. I know people who have transferred two and ended up with three (me), and I've even heard of a lady who transferred one and ended up with identical triplets! I also know of people who have transferred five and only ended up with one. So, you really have to rely on the RE to be a responsible doctor and give good advice on how many to transfer.

Abortion would generally occur if the life of the surrogate is in danger or if the baby has birth defects of varying severity. The severity is something that needs to be thought out before, or you could have a situation where the parents feel that termination would be the best way, while the surrogate doesn't, as in a recent story. Or, on the other end, if the parents don't believe in abortion and the surrogate does, and the baby dies in utero, the surrogate could be forced to carry a dead baby.

Another note - the surrogate's body is her own. Nobody can force her to have an abortion or reduction, even if she has signed a contract that says that she will. She can also go have an abortion on her own if she decides to. I do not condone either of these actions, but they have been known to happen. That's why it is so very important to really agree on these things, and not just to sign the paper thinking "that will never happen to me." It does happen, and it could very well be to you. Think long and hard. The triplet thing was one of the most difficult things I've ever gone through. I am wholeheartedly pro-choice, but when it came to actually having a reduction, I had a breakdown. I believed it was a choice for other people, but I never wanted to be the one that had to go through it.

You can believe that my application was very detailed on those issues.

Starting Again

When we got back to MD, I filled out my application for Miranda and Elizabeth and got my OB approval to be pregnant again. I did ask if they had any gay couples on the books, and they said that they were interviewing one right then, and that it looked like we would probably be a good match. But, they couldn't say for sure just yet.

So, I'll get technical for a moment, for those of who who are perhaps thinking of being a surrogate, or who are just wondering what it all entails. Though, really, it's probably just me reading this. I'll use it as a reference when somebody asks me about surrogacy.

So, if you're going with an agency, there are lots of things you'll need to fill out. Huge applications including information that you never thought anybody else would ever want to know. Consents to release medical information, consents for background checks, privacy forms (hence the changed names), etc, etc. You'll also need to get them copies of any medical records related to pregnancy, and you'll have to make sure you can get them a copy of up-to-date pap results. You basically need to open up your whole life to be judged worthy of carrying somebody's baby. Which I understand. If I were trusting somebody with my unborn child, I would want to know that they are healthy and safe. Especially if I were spending craptons of money to even bring that child into existence. Surrogacy is not a cheap endeavor.

Once I was officially accepted back into the agency, they took my application and used it to make a profile that they could share with potential IPs (Intended Parents). They matched the things that I had written with the people they had looking for a surrogate, and I was, indeed, a good match with the gay couple that they had. So, we arranged a conference call, so we could see if we matched well that way, too. We did. :) It's still good to meet in person, if possible, so that you can make sure you get along in real life, and not just on the major points. After all, you're going to be working together for at least a year, on one of the most important parts of their lives. It's important that you at least like each other.

We met at a zoo, since they have a toddler who likes the zoo, and I have an animal crazy teen who would happily spend the rest of her life there. It was a beautiful (if a bit cold) day, and we all got along great.

So, we're matched. I now have to be approved by their RE (Reproductive Endocrinologist, AKA fertility doctor), and then we can move forward with contracts. After contracts, we can start the cycling to get pregnant!

Intro

Hello, my name is Karen, and this is my third surrogacy. The first was in 2006, and the second was in 2008, but I didn't do much documenting of either of those. I wasn't a blogger, and I didn't have Facebook yet. Now, I have a few blogs and I'm on FB all the time, so I wanted to keep track of this one.

I first looked into surrogacy way back when my now-teenage daughter was a baby. But, I was nursing and so couldn't. Then, we were military, which made the whole thing difficult. Surrogacy can take a long time, and moving in the middle isn't so great, if you end up moving a long way away. And since we were stationed in Hawaii at the time, anywhere we moved would be a long way away. Plus, I really wanted to carry for a gay couple (because they have fewer options to have children), and military hospitals were not exactly gay-friendly back then. I am a Gestational Surrogate (GS), which means that I am merely a babysitter. I have no genetic connection at all to the babies I carry.

So, when we moved to our new forever home in Maryland, I immediately contacted a lawyer who arranges surrogacies, and was rewarded with a lovely match. They were a straight couple, which I knew right off, but I didn't know they had a child already until I met them. But, by the time I found out (they hadn't been keeping a it a secret, but the lawyer hadn't told me as she should have), I had already decided that I wanted to help them. We got along really well, and the surrogacy went great. A year and two months after we met, we had a bouncing baby boy named Caleb.

About 6 months later, I decided I wanted to to another one. I hadn't liked the lawyer I was with the first time, so I found an agency that was run by a former IM (Intended Mother, a woman who needs a surrogate), Miranda, and her former GS, Helen. (In case you haven't guessed, mine will be the only real name in this blog). I had met Miranda before and liked her, so I went with their agency. I was soon matched with another straight couple (the agency didn't have any gay couples looking right then.) who I liked a lot. They didn't have any other kids yet. We again had a good journey, and two years minus one day from when Caleb was born, I had Elizabeth.

We ended up moving away not long after that, but just for three years. It wasn't feasible to do another surrogacy while we were gone. But, I kept in touch with Miranda and Helen, and when we had an idea of when we'd be back, I asked them if they thought I could do another. I had 3 C-sections under my belt (tee hee), so I wasn't sure if they'd be able to find me a match. I know some surrogates who have had a lot more than that, but not all infertility clinics will accept women with multiple C-sections. They said that I should be fine, pending OB approval, so I sat happy until we got back to MD.