13 week scan

Baby's parents flew down yesterday so we could all attend the 13wk scan. Our egg donor came as well - so it was a full room for the scan! The technician managed to capture some very clear pictures of bub - including this crazy 3D one.

It really does blow my mind each time I see the baby again as to how human it is already. We think about these things in terms of something not-quite-formed yet. But we could see details like finger bones and kidneys and even the hemispheres of the brain!

Even though this is my third time going in for a 13wk scan, the magic never dulls. This is truely a miracle.

The Transfer

When I first started this journey the eventual embryo transfer seemed like a mythical process that would happen at some undefined time in the future. I actually didn't think too much about it.

There was so much to get done first - the creating of the embryo's to begin with (which is a whole other story that deserves it's own post. Donor eggs were needed as the Intended Mum's ovaries had been removed along with her uterus to save her life - leading her to this position. The IPs, myself and the donor all met up and it was amazing to have three families coming together to create this muchly longed for baby), along with blood tests and fertility appointments and hours of counselling, visits to lawyers, more appointments, matching our schedule with that of the Intended Parents, signing the final legal documents and trying to get everything posted back to the clinic in a timely manner. This whole process took from February when we first met and had our initial appointment at the clinic until the end of June.

And cost the IPs a small fortune!

Then we were given the green light to start my cycle. Things were about to happen.

I was put on some estrogen tablets, slowly increasing the amount over the first few days following my period. Then I went into the clinic for a scan on day 12, and everything was looking good. I took home some CRAZY expensive progesterone gell dispensers that needed to be squirted up there twice a day, morning and night. At a cost of approx $230 a week. If the pregnancy took, these would need to be continued until 9 weeks along!

Day 17 was embryo transfer day. The IM flew down so she could be there with me. We sat in the waiting room, chatting constantly, just waiting for whatever needed to happen next. We had a scheduled time that came and went. We were told the Dr was running a bit behind. But the IM had a plane to catch back, and we were getting closer and closer to peak hour traffic! Finally a lab tech came to talk to us. She had photos of the embryo at first defrost, then a few hours later. You could actually see how it had changed and expanded. We were both mesmerised! Would this be the first baby photo!?

We were then ushered back into the waiting room - when I suddenly remembered that I was supposed to be drinking water so I had a full bladder. I sculled a 600ml bottle of water in about 5mins. And went back to waiting. We were called in not long after that. I was convinced my bladder wouldn't be full enough - but I need not have worried!

They got me up on the very immodest chair/bed thing specifically designed for this kind of thing, with my pants off and my legs spread I had the Dr elbow deep with one probe inside and one on my belly, a nurse hovering around behind him, the IM to the side  - all four of us having a chat about something innane.

We hovered like this for a while as the Dr had a look at my uterus. He likes to give 'pop quiz's' in the middle of appointments, and this was no different. He brings up the image of my uterus with a dark area in the centre of it and proceeds to ask us all what the dark spot means. I suggest fluid of some kind. He agreed, but wanted to know what kind of fluid. The nurse tentatively suggests blood? The Dr looks at me and asks if I've had any bleeding. I reassure him that I hadn't. By this stage I can feel the tension from the IM, which only worsens when he makes the comment that embryo transfers have been cancelled after discovering uterus's like this. I don't think the IM or myself breathe for a few seconds.

Then he proceeds to explain quite mater-of-factly that the fluid is just mucus. Which is actually really good. And gives us the garden analogy - 'you can't expect a garden to grow without moisture, it's the same for embryos'. We all start to breathe again. Including the nurse who is obvioulsy used to the Dr's quirky bedside manner, but still wasn't sure where he was going with this.

We're still in this position for a while longer. The Dr asks the IM to take over the belly ultrasound probe at one point. I'm not even sure why!? All of this awkwardness is starting to get uncomfortable. That bladder that wasn't full before is now full to the brim. I decide to ask if we can expect something to happen soon. The Dr laughs and explains that we're just waiting for the lab techs to bring in the embryo.

Finally the magical tube with the embryo nestled safely inside it arrives. It's inserted and we watch as the white substance is expelled into my uterus on the ultrasound screen. Two little white splotches. But we're reassured that there was only one embryo transferred.

Then it's all over and done with. As soon as that the probes are removed, I'm told I can stand up and go to the toilet (and again reassured that doing a wee won't knock the embryo out!). We go over what happens after this - I get given two blood test forms. One for day 28 to determine if there is any HCG floating around in my blood. And the second to re-test 3 days later to make sure the numbers are increasing appropriately (they like them to double). They explain that if the first result is negative, they'll book us another appointment to come back in and discuss the next cycle.

My IM and I take the elevator back to ground level, say a quick goodbye (as the taxi's are there waiting for us), then head off in our respective directions - me home to my family, and her off to the airport to make the much longer journey home to her family.

The whole afternoon is quite surreal. The taxi driver and I talk about the state of the city now and how there's just not the work for taxis any more. I want to grab him and say 'I've just been impregnanted with another persons baby'. But I sit there. And listen to him talk about his retirement and how he doesn't work the dreaded night-hours anymore.

I get home and my 4yr old hugs me and asks if I have a baby in my tummy now? (We've been very open and honest with her throughout this whole process, and my husband had told her I was seeing the Dr so he could put our friend's baby in my tummy). I had to laugh, and explain that he had, but that it wasn't a baby yet, it was just very very small. And we had to wait to see if it would decide to stay around and grow into a baby. I lay on the couch with her for a while and was reminded again of how blessed we'd been with our kids. Nothing like a surrogacy process to remind you of that!

Obviously we did get our positive HCG result. 360 for the one done at 28days, and nearly 2000 for the one done 3 days later. (But I cheated, and did a little home pregnancy test before hand!)

And so began the journey that is this surrogate pregnancy.

Why choose altruistic surrogacy?

Hi.

Welcome to this brand new, squeaky clean blog.

I've been blogging for some years now, mostly to do with my pet-keeping hobby and craft business, though I did flirt with the idea of a 'chronicles of motherhood' blog when my children were very young and my sanity levels were questionable. I didn't have a lot of positive things to write back then though, so I decided against it. Though I've always kind of wished I'd had the guts to stick to it, to write how I was feeling and document those painfully slow days with a new baby and an toddler barely out of babyhood herself.

But I didn't. I self-censored myself. Things did get better. We all got used to our new lives, the baby grew up into a nearly-toilet-trained handsome little boy and the toddler is now a very well spoken pre-schooler. And I love them with every fibre of my being.

My husband and I were told early in our marriage that we'd have a lot of trouble concieving a baby naturally thanks to some rather serious health complications we'd both faced in our teens. We tried for a long time, then resigned ourselves to the assisted fertility process. We purchased health insurance to help us pay for the priviledge of becoming parents, then discovered that we were pregnant with our daughter within a fortnight! And 18months after her arrival to the world, we were welcoming her little brother.

Our family was complete.

It was late last year, around the time when families are gathering together to celebrate christmas and people are making their new years resolutions, when a passing comment between my hubby and I led to the idea of looking into surrogacy. I had managed two successful pregnancies, not without minor complications, but at the end of the day both babies had arrived safely and very well cooked (9lb and 10lbs!). We knew our family was complete, but there was that little part of me that wanted to experience pregnancy one last time. But without the newborn at the end!

I also wanted to give back in 2013. I wanted to do something to help change someone's life for the better. Our business was working well, but selling craft kits and handmade plushies wasn't exactly making a meaningful difference to anyone. Surrogacy would. Being able to grow a baby for a family who otherwise would have no other means to bring their child into the world was such an incredible concept.

I started an extensive google search. And I learnt a LOT! It was actually really overwhelming in those first few weeks of learning. And quite a few times I questioned whether or not I could actually do this.

In Australia surrogacy is only legal if done altruistically. That means no payment for the actual process of carrying the baby. You do need to be reinbursed for any medical costs, transport to appointments, parking costs, loss of income from attending appointments, medications required, therapies used etc etc. But no 'wage' for being a surrogate. You do that just because you want to.

Once the embryo is transferred to your uterus (in the case of gestational surrogacy, when you're not genetically related to the baby), it actually becomes YOUR baby legally. This means you, as the surrogate have the legal rights to decisions around what happens with the pregnancy/fetus. So you would really need to trust your surrogate! Also, once the baby is born, it is still legally the surrogate mother and her partner's child. Even though they both have no genetic contribution! A parentage order is made through the courts after the baby has been in the care of the actual parents for 28 days, and the legal guardianship is transferred to them.

The reverse of this is also true though: if the intending parents decide at any point during the pregnancy or following the birth (before the parentage order has gone through) that they don't want the baby - then legally the surrogate and her partner are 'stuck with it'. In the eyes of the law it's their child. Obviously they could choose to terminate (if early enough into the pregnancy) or adopt the baby out following birth. But both options would be horrendous emotional minefields.

There's a process of counselling and personality testing for all parties involved, as well as separate lawyers for both the surrogate and partner, and the Intended Parents so a 'surrogacy agreement' can be drawn up. This is a ridiculously expensive piece of paper that outlines what will happen over the embryo transfer, pregnancy and birth, but isn't worth the paper it's printed on, because it all comes back to the fact that the surrogate has the legal rights. Again, you would REALLY want to trust your surrogate here in Australia.

So after coming to terms with all that a surrogate journey in my country would entail, and deciding that it was still something that I felt compelled to do, I set about familiarising myself with the world of families seeking surrogates. Surprisingly there didn't appear to be a great many of them (which I think comes back to the fact that it's illegal to advertise that you need a surrogate, or would like to be a surrogate! They do like to make a complicated process just that little bit worse). But I did stumble across a family who's story struck a cord with me. They were the same age as my hubby and I, and had experienced a similar background with some serious health complications that had led them to this situation. We started emailing and over a matter of months came to know each other quite well!

Obviously there is a lot more of the story to fill in between then and now, but I'm chuffed to say that we are currently 10wks pregnant with a very precious surrogate baby. I have been writing a pregnancy diary for the baby, and for his/her mum, and will share some of those extracts, and this unique journey as it unfolds over the next few months. But I think for now I've probably prattled on enough :)