Friday, January 25, 2013

Am I that adventurous.....

In the last week 3 friends of mine have sent me this article, A scientist has said it would be possible to clone a Neanderthal baby from ancient DNA if he could find a woman willing to act as a surrogate.  
Now, I am all for the advancement of science and technology but this is taking it bit far. They are actually searching for a willing surrogate?!?! For those of you who don't know me personally may not know that I am the adventurous type. I'm not much for sky diving but I have a wild, spontaneous and an up for anything personality which makes me think at least one of those three friends were serious when they sent the link to me. I actually considered it.... for a second. Then I remembered that a child would be the end result. A child with no parents or siblings or family except the scientist in the lab they are confined to for life. What kind of life or childhood for that matter is that? From what I've read clones don't live long anyways. As much as I am pro-science certain things shouldn't be done and this is one of them. IVF is as close to "playing G_D" as I am willing to go. Cloning a human is a whole new level of wrong and I agree with it being illegal in most countries.

I hope no one steps up to do that. Some things should not be messed with and this is one of them. Next they will be attempting to clone dead historical figures or celebrities and THAT my friends is how a zombie takeover will happen. 

Wednesday, January 9, 2013

ugh... I hate insurance companies

One thing on my agenda for the last few weeks was to find out if my health insurance had a surrogacy exclusion on it. Meaning they wouldn't cover anything related to the pregnancy unless it was my own baby. Sure enough that was the case. I had been dreading calling them  because our policy was about to change at the end of 2012. We've had fairly good insurance with this same company for the last 10 years with no issues but this year the company decided to turn all their plans for my husbands company into HSA's which is a complete 180 from what we had previously. Even if my insurance company did cover it they would still have had to pay my LARGE deductible before the insurance would start paying anything.

The only silver lining here is that since I'm planning an out of hospital birth with a midwife the out of pocket costs are the same as my deductible. Now the labs and ultrasounds are a different story.

With that behind me I figured the next step was to hit the sale racks at Target for maternity clothes, seems rational right? At best I'll be implanting in 6 months, I see no reason to to get a few good deals now.

Wednesday, January 2, 2013

met with a potential couple

Just a few days after I made my announcement my agent called me (Lauren over at http://www.surrogatesolutions.net/ ) and said there is a couple who will be in my area for the weekend and asked if I was ready to start my search for the perfect couple? I was surprised it was going a bit fast but I'm not sure why I expected this process not to. I asked Laurent to "warn" couple about my crunchy side before they met me so we didn't waste each others time if they weren't willing.

I met with them at their hotel down at Disney and my awesome agent Lauren joined us for coffee. It was great having her there with us to be an ice breaker and to help guide the conversation where it needed to go as far as what we were both looking for in the "ideal surrogate/intended parents" because lets he honest, I have a list of things I wanted from my couple. I want them to be involved with the pregnancy and at the birth, updates after the baby is born,  providing breast milk after is very important to me and I want an out of hospital birth. I also wanted to really love my couple since I was going to be going through something so intimate and personal. I also really wanted a Gay Jewish couple who were home birth friendly but I think I will be searching for years if I get that picky but I did put it out there.

 I was certain this search would take years to find just the right couple so I wasn't optimistic when meeting with my first couple but kept an open mind. When having my first meeting with my agency  I told Lauren that I was doing this because I wanted another pregnancy and the birth I never got to have with my kids, my home birth but birth center was just as good too. She told me that I should hold out for a couple who were open and willing to go along with my plan but I should stay flexible in case I end up with twins or a complication during pregnancy which I was.

The meeting went great although I freaked them out a bit at the end when I asked how they felt about me nursing the baby at birth. I was just seeing what they were comfortable with and where we make boundaries. They were OK with everything else but I told them since we were just having a meet and greet that nothing had to be decided then and there. The IP-intended parents were sweet and seemed like awesome parents to the 20 month old they already had naturally. I expected a couple with no kids so that information surprised me a bit but after hearing their story about an emergency hysterectomy and her almost dieing after birth due to what seems like another unnecessary medical intervention gone horribly wrong but I wasn't there or know enough about it so I'm not going to assume. Anyway, getting off my doula soap box now. There story broke my heart but they are so in love with their adorable daughter so much so that the dad got a bit giddy, pulled out his phone and started showing me photos of her and telling me about her.

 One of my expectations when meeting THE couple for me was to fall in love with them immediately and leave knowing they were the ones for me. I didn't feel that way with them although looking back at that now maybe it was because they were OK borderline unsure of the birth center birth and breast milk but needed to think about it. Lauren and I spoke about my feelings as we walked back to our cars and I asked her to keep looking but felt that this couple was my best option because they wanted to put only 1 egg in at a time to avoid multiples. The best way for me to get my out of hospital birth was to make sure I had a singleton.I do like these IP's. I only met them once though so I can't say I love them yet.

Christmas was very soon so I was not expecting to hear anything from my agency for a while and wasn't sure they even wanted me, I may be willing to do this but lets face it, I am an acquired tase personality wise. You either like me for who I am or you don't so I wasn't expecting them to just fall in love with me either just because i have a womb for rent. I did hear back from my agent a few days ago and they did actually like me and were fine with my "demands". I haven't made any decisions and still want to meet with other couples but we'll see what the future holds....