In a way..still waiting.

Last Thursday was my appointment with The Fertility Center. Yes..a bit behind. Alot of things going on with my job, that has led me to be a temporary stay at home mom. I love every minute of it, but I am so much busier now than i was when i worked. How's that happen? My doctor did a brief interview with me and a quick exam. Nothing that actually went in and looked at the almighty "spot". On August 30, i will start my first injection of Lupron for the mock cycle. Sept 9 i go in for my first ultrasound. We leave at that...and wait.

Idah and I have been trying to plan a lunch date. She is a third shifter, so it gets tough.
She called me today to ask me to help her plan a baby shower for her friend who is pregnant with twins. How did she know that I LOVE this stuff! I'm again still on cloud 9 about all of this. Hoping, praying, fingers crossing that this all works out!

Who is up for a little game of....Waiting???

I spoke to the new clinic yesterday. Who actually isn't really new, they are my original clinic. Most likely I will not need any more testing done or updated bloodwork etc because we have just recently done all of that for the past IP's. Hopefully tomorrow Shady Grove (the x-clinic) will be faxing all of my records over to The Fertility Center (new clinic) tomorrow. The DR there said most likely a small spot of fluid will not hold us up, but she will take a look and I will also have an exam on Aug 9.

Spoke to Idah last night. I love her. She loves me. Enough said.

PLEASE let this work out for us!!

A Second Chance???

I'm Back!!! I cannot believe the way that some things are working out right now. I don't want to get too overly excited just yet but here's the scoop...

Idah - who is the intended mom from my first possible surrogacy journey has been in contact with me over the past few weeks. See below if you forget. Due to the starting of a new journey, I really just had to put her in the back of my mind. Even though deep down I really wanted to be her surrogate, the new family was great and we had already begun the process. So when it didn't work out (with 2nd family) and then at the same time, Idah had been reaching out to me - it was so weird. I do always believe that things happen for a reason, but this to me was and still is just so weird.

I talked to Idah yesterday and told her i want to move forward with her. This has been such a roller coaster but here we go again. I will have an exam at her clinic, but we are hoping, praying, fingers & toes crossing that this is going to all work out and the enfamous spot is gone or not an issue.
I truly cannot believe that this has circled around like this.

Today at lunch, Idah called me. She is so happy right now and she is just such a sweet sweet woman! She is African and has a deep deep accent. I love our conversations. This just feels so right. Ok anyhow..when she called me I couldnt believe what she asked me.
Idah and her husband will be using an egg donor AND a sperm donor. I'm not sure how out of the norm this is, but i think at first the clinic was not going to allow it to happen - which is part of the reason this journey ended the first time. Supposedly, they are allowing it and hence the reason we're here now.
She asked me to go to this website she was given and help them find the perfect sperm donor! What an experience. We had a lot of fun and even think we found one. She has to call her clinic tomorrow and we will see if she can use him. She already has her egg donor picked so they have to have matching or able to paired up blood types and i'm sure there is more to it than that. She then called me and left me a voicemail later in the day that she is overjoyed and so anxious. Well Idah..so is this chic!!!

Soooo...Don't stop reading now - we are starting another journey!!

The End.

Last week as i anxiously awaited my period to begin - my 2 year journey to be a surrogate mother became no longer a reality.

The Doctor from our clinic decided that the very "scant" spot of fluid that is hanging around on my uterus is too much of a risk for surrogacy. At least through them. This whole thing has been very odd to me. From previous post that I have written - We have been given the green light at my last appointment to start getting my cycle lined up with the egg donor.
Last Monday though - i got an email from the IF (intended father). Not a phone call from my nurse or from my doctor, an EMAIL from pretty much someone i barely knew. The email stated that the Doctor had a meeting with them today and recommended that they do not use me as a carrier. And of course they were going to go with his recommendation and find a new carrier. They stated that this was very upsetting to them because they really liked and trusted Tim and I, but felt they had to do whats best. Of course. If i was in their shoes, I would feel the same way.

However, this email came to me at 6pm on a Monday night. By this time I had no one to call to get information as to what the hell was going on and why no one professional had talked to me first? I pretty much assumed it was this fluid spot but I had to go all night worrying, wondering, and just sad that something I have been working towards for so long has just come to an end, that quick. Again at that.

After speaking to the nurse the next day she confirmed it was the spot and supposedly it was never to work out that the family told me before them. At this point anything else coming out of this nurses mouth sounded like Snoopy. Wah Wha Wah. I was just irritated, exhausted, frustrated. She then told me that the Dr would call me back on my lunch hour at work that day..did he, nope. He called back at 5:00 while i was still at work and of course when i went to call him back he was gone for the day. I'm not even bothering with him at this point. The nurse did call me back to check in if i had a chance to talk to the dr, i just told her no and at this point i will followup with my personal gynocologist.

The weird thing is - today I got a voicemail from the IM from my first failed attempt journey asking me to give her a call. If you recall a recent post stating that she had reached out to me a few weeks ago about moving forward and then i never heard back. I did call her back today but was unsuccessful in reaching her.

I really did feel like I found a calling for myself. I was certain i was gonna be the best surrogate for that special family. This was something that made my heart flutter each and every step and every time I would think about delivery day. But for now I must put it in the past. For the past 2 years I have focused on and used alot of my personal vacation time to get to appointments. I'm not ready to make it 3 years and not have a light at the end of the tunnel. I thank everyone for following my blog and of course thank you, THANK YOU to all of my friends and family members that have supported my decision and were there to help with my babies when we needed it! A bigger thank you to Tim. You were amazing in supporting me and my decisions for these past 2 years. I couldn't ask for a better person to be by side every day <3

Trial Run = Over

So July 6th has come...and gone. So glad that wait is OVER! Mom is back to work, Jae had to work, so this meant Tim had to leave work a little early to be home for me to leave for Bel Air Wednesday morning at 6am. I really do not remember much of the ride there because thoughts were just parusing my mind the whole time. Even the elevator ride up to the clinic - don't remember that either. I went in, had my bloodwork and then she came in to do my ultrasound. The next words I remember quite well - "Miranda, everything is great!" She i'm sure thought I was a bit odd when i sat up as quick as I could and loudly said "Really, no fluid spots on my uterus?" I was quite a happy camper leaving the office. I just wanted to call Susan (the IM..intended mom, remember?) but our relationship level is not at that yet. So i called Tim and Mom and Jaelyn and emailed Becky...HA!!
I still had to wait almost all day to hear from my nurse as to what I do next. And actually my normal nurse was on vaca..so it was even longer than the norm. She told me that I need to take 5 days of Provera (a pill i take before i go to bed) and this is to bring on my period within a few days of the last dose. Tonight is my day 5. On day one of my period I am to notify my nurse. I think that this then starts the REAL cycle. However, I still have not heard from my nurse since she has been back from vacation so i really am not sure as to what will happen after day one. I'm sure I will hear from her tomorrow. It really isn't like her. She was on vaca for a few days so she could just be running a bit behind. In the meantime...We are starting to take care of contracts and getting them signed.
Wanna see the hottest doctor in town...? I love his faces ")

                               

Moving On

Monday morning I woke up at the butt crack for my drive to Bel Air, MD for my ultrasound & bloodwork. Much thanks to mom for sleeping over sunday night to be here with the kids until Tim got home.
The drive is just about an hour and the appointments usually are not even 10 minutes.
She did my ultrasound which showed that everything looked fine but my uterine lining was still a little thick which was from my previous mock cycle. When i leave there, I still really have no idea what this means or what is going on. Since the person performing the US (ultrasound) is not my doctor, she cannot really discuss anything with me. So i leave and wait. and wait. and wait. Finally around 2:00 my nurse called me. Of course i can't answer because I'm at work so i wait. and wait. and wait some more.
My nurse says that the doctor thinks i just need a little progesterone to get me to ovulate and get my period. I had to pick up the script monday night and take one pill for 5 days. Tuesday morning I took my pill right after I got to work which was around 8:30. Literally at like 9:30 - i got my period. Coincidence? Not sure. Happy? Absolutely! I excitely emailed my nurse who called me back and told me it was time to start the mock cycle. I am over the moon! So starting today i have 2 different meds to take. The first is called Estrace. This is a small blue tablet that weirdly enough actually is a vaginal pill that I enter 2 times a day and the other is Del Estrogen which is in the form of an injection right in the upper area of my butt cheek, that I get once every 3 days. I posted pics of this one in an earlier post.
I will go july 6th for the followup on this and we go from there.

Just. Not. Sure

Been waiting for my period to begin - which at the latest should have been yesterday. Of course the first thing we did was a pregnancy test (actually two just to really be sure). Both were negative, so ok - what the heck is going on with my body. I have NEVER missed my period unless i was pregnant. Even during our last surrogate cycle for the original couple.

I wrote it in a previous blog when i wrote about the fluid in my uterus and i still stick to it. When i had that HSG done - something didnt go right. The pain was terrible and the cramping/discharge/spotting (a tad gross but ur only reading this if i truly know you, so suck it up) that came for weeks after it just didn't seem right. Other than that there has been nothing different between this cycle and the cycle I did the first time.
Last night I emailed my nurse who emailed the DR today who wants me to come in Monday morning for an ultrasound and bloodwork. I'm sure the bloodwork is just to be sure the pregnancy test isn't lying to me. However - these constant trips to the clinic are wearing me out. I've had a little break from them but I'm sure they are about to start up again. With these trips - i normally have to take an hour of my vacation time so that I am not late for work. Meaning i'm running out of hours that I can use for my own personal needs. None of this stuff mattered to me in the beginning. It just feels like everything is draaaggging right now though. I'm not seeing the light at the end of the tunnel like i used to. I'm not as excited as I used to be. Just get me over this hump PLEASE!

On top of all of this -
The mom from my first time around trying to be a surrogate called me out of the blue on Wednesday. A quick history on them because im not sure i talked much about them before. Mom's body won't get pregnant and i'm not quite sure if i even remember why she can't use her own eggs. They had been trying to have a baby for 11 years! Any procedure that could be done, was tried. They then turned to surrogacy. Then found yours truly! Their plan was to get an egg donor and use dads sperm. We didnt really talk to them much up front - we were just going with the flow of all the testing, injections, pills etc.. At some point during meds, i got a call to stop the process. Huh? Was it me? What happened? Nobody was telling me why or what. Finally one day mom called me and asked me to come meet her at her house. Very nervous and a little scared, I went. From the moment her and i met - we had a bond. I loved her and her husband. I couldnt wait for them to meet Tim and the kids, i had so many visuals. Including the best one - me handing them their new precious baby. We talked and they even fed me. They fed me Goat! She made me try it. It wasnt that bad but the sauce she had on it was so spicy i just couldn't take more than 3 bites. I was waiting and waiting for her to open up to me about what was going on. Are we or aren't we doing this. We aren't, was the outcome. There was some mixup betweem them and the fertility clinic that made dad so exhausted since he was the main one doing the testing, appts, etc. He just completely shut the process down. I can imagine as a woman wanting a child so bad that this just was not going to be acceptable. But i hardly knew them to judge or try to counsel her on what I think. So i shook my head ok and we watched American Idol. HA!
After that mom and i met up a few times for lunch. The last time at lunch was emotional. She really let out about how upset she was with dad and how bad, oh so bad that she wants to be a mom. That she was going to do anything. At this point we had already started working on some testing for the new family. I really didnt bring it up much to her because i didnt want to be put in that position at that moment. At the time of this luncheon though it had been months since her and I had talked. I suggested why not use and egg and a sperm donor. She said because you are not able to do that - at least thats what the clinic originally told her. That it had to be a biological part of someone who would be in the childs life i guess is a good way to put it. So this was all probably in november of last year. I had not spoken to her since until she sent me this text the other day. She told me that the clinic is willing to allow her to use the egg donor AND a sperm donor. She wants to move forward...with me. Soo bad i want to be her surrogate. So really bad. But now I have been going through this whole process with the new family. Contracts haven't been signed but the last thing I want to do is hurt anyone. My heart is being pulled in two different directions. With original mom though..who knows what will really come out of it. For now I do believe i will continue with my current IF and if original mom is interested still after (hopefully) i have their little miracle - maybe we could do it again? Who knows. Time will tell.