Pocket Bebe

In the winter of 2001 I bought a book for $1.99 at the Beall’s Outlet store, the cover of the book had the promising bubble gum appearance of a good chick-lit novel.  Thus, I settled in to read the adventures of a girl from Texas who was approached by her boss (with whom she had previously had an affair) to carry a baby for him and his wife.  The story got more and more complicated, per the rules of writing a sellable piece of fiction, and as a result ended with the heroine learning more than her fair share of lessons.

I was 23 and our oldest daughter was only two-years-old.  It was the first time in my life that it occurred to me that some people who want to have children may have a very difficult time conceiving them.  I also thought about how easy the whole pregnancy process had been for me.  I realized that I’d been blessed.  I finished the book feeling compassion for those struggling with infertility and fancied that maybe someday I could carry a baby for someone else.

Fast forward life almost seven years…I now had three beautiful children to call my own.  The Husband and I agreed, as far as our own desires went, that we were content with our family of five.  A friend of mine was in the process of a gestational surrogacy and I had been able to take a peek inside this very amazing aspect of her life.  She and I had many long conversations about her experiences and her journey.  I was reminded of my thoughts after reading the $1.99 novel and then evaluated my feelings toward what my friend was doing, and finally prayed about the stirrings in my heart.

Eventually, I approached The Husband about potentially doing a surrogacy.  We had many discussions and decided some of the pertinent questions I needed to find answers to were:

1. What does God think about this?
2. What is my motivation?
3. What am I willing and not willing to expose myself to?  Can I do a surrogacy without going against any part of my value system?
4. What risks to myself and to my family am I taking if I do a surrogacy?
5. Was I emotionally ready?  Was I ready to purposefully change my life for better or worse with this experience?
6. How would I handle criticism?

In order to answer many of these questions I had to research, seek advice, and pray.  This part of the process consumed all of me as I grappled for answers.  Trying to verbalize my heart’s desire to other people, while being open to hear valid input, concerns, and godly advice led me to become very emotional at times.  It wasn’t easy answering the challenging questions.   I’ve never had to deal with the trauma of having a miscarriage, was I willing to expose myself to the possibility for someone else? Yes.  Would I be willing to use my own genetic material? No.  I’ve never had surgery before; was I willing to expose myself to a potential c-section for someone else? Yes.  Was I willing to experience abortion for someone else? No.  Would I care about and bond with someone else’s baby that was growing inside of me? Yes.  Would I love this baby? Yes.  Would it be hard that the baby wasn’t mine? No.  Would I feel sad at the end of the journey? Maybe.  Medically speaking the risk to my health and life was low but, did I realize I could potentially die? Yes.  Whatever the outcome, would it all be worth it? Depends upon whose perspective this answer would be based.  My family would base ours on our faith, God is in control.  Would this be easy? No.  Would this be exciting? Yes.  Was I, would I, could I….the list goes on and on and those are only the questions I could answer or for which I could speculate.  I know there will be things unique to the journey that I never even thought about or things I thought I’d feel a certain way about and then didn’t.  I can’t say that I know what the end result will be, but I do know that God does.  We hope for many things, but we rest in knowing HIS will is what will be done.

I feel I’ve been given the gift of growing and delivering life.  That doesn’t mean that everything about pregnancy is super awesome and easy; I mean who loves stretch marks, constipation, or not sleeping at night?  Not too many people I’d assume.  There are just some specially designed people who love it more than most and I am blessed to be one of those people.  It was at this point The Husband and I decided I would pursue being a gestational surrogate. 

Coming Up Next: Needles, Speculum, Psychologists, Oh My!