Surrogate: APPROVED

At the end of August Bill and I received an email from Rotunda titled "Surrogate Profile" and I took a moment to pause and reflect on this journey we've been on since January.  I thought about how long we’ve waited for these milestones to arrive -- having my niece agree to be our egg donor, determining viability for both Kelsey and Bill, and such crazy things as regulating a period, for goodness sake! As I paused I recognized that bringing everyone to the table has been a long process for all three of us, one that I would easily do over again, but long and involved nonetheless. In a way, the arrival of this email was another baby “stake” to place in the sand and say, "we made it this far" and then keep moving forward.  I remember reading through the one-page document that included a photo, age, number of children, marital status and other health information and thinking that I had to share this with Bill and Kelsey...since this was the woman that in just a few weeks time would be attempting to get pregnant with KK's egg fertilized by Bill's sperm.  Gotta love science.

As some background to the whole surrogate selection thing, I had heard from a few other IPs that Indian women on average are petite, and that getting a bigger surrogate was sometimes difficult. One couple had chosen a surro and then at the last minute had to go with another because of a complication. The new one was under 90 lbs so that made me kinda nervous, mostly because we have a chance of twins (and my mother was an identical twin) AND my family and Bill's are both big and tall. I asked Dr. Kadam at Rotunda if we could ask for a surro that was over 100 lbs and she said that she would be able to accommodate that request -- good news.

So after a few questions and discussion, Bill and I decided we would go with the surrogate selected by Rotunda.   She is 5'3" and 150 lbs (which is great since I had been hearing so much about petite women).  She's married, 23 years old and has had two children. From the photo we received she looks like a nice woman, and while I understand that IPs don't usually get to have a relationship with their surrogate, Bill and I want to bring her something as our token of thanks. But then again, what do you give someone who is giving you the opportunity of a child? -- it's just crazy to think about what gift could possibly thank this person – I doubt a box of chocolates is going to suffice.

So as we made the decision to go with our surrogate and this milestone was becoming a thing of the past, I get an email from Goral Gandhi who is the embryologist at Rotunda:  “So we are all set!"...and then she said something that made me chuckle and twitch nervously at the same time: "let's hope Kelsey makes lots of eggs!" She even put a smiley face next to her statement.  

Time to start that fertility dance :-)