Surrogacy as it goes.. How it's been..

Hello all!
It's been quite a while since I wrote anything.. and I'm sure what has been happening over the last couple of months most of you already know from following me on Facebook. But I feel that the time has come that I have to write it all down; as a record for posterity, and as an act of respect for the little life that I'm so blessed to be holding.

On October 8th 2011 I drove down to PA for an embryo transfer. The couple that I decided to carry for is an established family with three other children in NY. Their mom carried the older child and then twins, but doctors decided it was unsafe for her to carry again because all of her children were born premature and her pregnancies were very difficult. The couple had two embryo's still frozen, and the thing I remember her saying that made me believe that they were the type of people I could be confident carrying for was when she told me 'they're my babies, I can't just throw them away'.

Two embryo's were transferred.. and then we waited. and waited and waited. Impatient me of course went out and bought a box of 3 home pregnancy tests. The first one (5 days after transfer) was negative. The second (7 days after transfer) was also negative. I became quite discouraged. I had a scheduled blood test on the 9th day post-transfer.. but I also had one home test left. I contemplated not using it and just waiting.. but I really couldn't just let it be. 8 days post transfer I got a very faint positive on the HPT. I was thrilled. My IPs wanted to wait for the official blood work before getting excited, but sure enough the next day it came back positive and they were absolutely thrilled.

The next couple of months were a little rough. I didn't have a lot of morning sickness because of the medications that the clinic had me on to maintain the pregnancy. I had an ultrasound at 8 weeks to measure the baby and make sure everything was growing well. Everything measured perfectly. We worked on getting insurance set up, however because of the regulations with insurance in the state of Connecticut, we were not able to get private insurance, and I was not able to use my state insurance for any of the pregnancy costs. We were stuck.

Luckily we found the wonderful Childbirth Connections Birth Center and midwives in Danbury. My first appointment I was 14 weeks. I lost 4lbs between the initial ultrasound and that date. However shortly afterwards I regained my appetite and I gained 7lbs in the next 4 weeks. Things looked good, baby's heartbeat was strong, and I was starting to feel movement.

We had an anatomy ultrasound scheduled during my 18th week. The tech was not happy about doing the scan at that gestation and wasn't able to clearly see the heart and the head as she wanted to; so I was scheduled to come back in 3 weeks, when I was 21 weeks. We did, however, find out that the baby is a girl!

In for the long-haul!

It's been a little while since I last posted, and I"m sure most of you know about the insanity that has been happening at my house. I am now officially a single parent, and as of a couple days ago, I am once again a contracted surrogate! I am SO excited!

Just one week ago today, I made a crazy journey to PA to meet the doctors that would determine my 'suitability' as a surrogate for this particular NY couple. Needless to say it was a looooong journey, each leg took me over 5 hours, partially in part to the heavy rain on the way up, and my serious miscalculation on the way home that led me directly into New York City. But I digress..

The girls stayed with their father Sunday night, and were to go to their grandparents in the morning. After a very long, rainy, 5 hour drive during which I learned that my daughter was inconsolable and begging for me, I finally arrived at my hotel room. 

 Nice place, quiet, plenty of room. It would have been wonderful; if I hadn't felt so alone! I missed my kids a whole bunch to say the least. So, knowing I would see them soon, I worked on some homework and went to bed. Did I mention I started my Bachelor's program that same week??

Got up in the morning, jumped in the shower, and ready for my appointment. Here I am, don't I look fabulous? lol

 The appointment took forever! Basically it was like a job interview! We went over just about everything in my medical file, which took almost a full hour! Then we did a baseline ultrasound, blood work, and formulated a game-plan that included waiting about a month to get me on birth control, a mock transfer, and then the final transfer sometime around Thanksgiving.

Well, as you can imagine after all that excitement, I felt I deserved to treat myself. So before stopping home, I went to Starbucks and got myself some jet fuel for the way home:

 When in the interview, the doctor mentioned something about being familiar with Connecticut, the general Manchester area, and how high gas prices were there! Gas was at $3.59 at the area in PA where I was, and went up to $3.77 as I got further from Philadelphia on my way home. Imagine my surprise when I crossed over the New Jersey line and found this at a Hess station:

Of course, I filled up!!
$37 for a full tank of gas, now that felt good!

On the way home, I mistakenly took I-87 instead of I-287, sending me directly through New York. Let me just state for the record that I HATE New York traffic. 2 hours to get through Manhattan, almost 6 hours to get home.. I MUST remember next time to take the other route..

To make a very long story at least tolerably short, I got home finally and spoke with my new intended family. There were some concerns over how long the clinic wanted to take to do the transfer, the necessity of the mock transfer, and my personal travel plans to see my mom in St. Louis over Thanksgiving. The family wishes to move things along as soon as possible, and therefore made a request to the clinic to fore-go the month waiting time, and get started right away. So currently I have begun the birth control phase and waiting for the next set of instructions! If all goes well, I shall be pregnant soon!