The Surrogacy Process in a Nutshell
“Try every avenue; try anything you can do. You’ll end up with a family and it’s so worth it. It’s the most ‘worth it’ thing.”
It's been a hot minute since my last blog post. And honestly it's because Brian and I are still trying to wrap our heads around the whole surrogacy thing. We have accepted it. We are excited about it. And we are overwhelmed by it. Every time I have sat at my computer to write about the process, I go blank. I don't know how to put it all into words. And then the negative self talk starts. Did I fail? Have we given up? No and no. Even though I know the answers to those questions, the thoughts of failure still linger.
After we got our bad news, I spent two weeks unemotional. I couldn't cry and that is not normal. I'm usually a blubbering mess after a failed IVF transfer. I spent those two weeks wondering if I was in shock or if I just felt peace in my heart with the decision to do something different. As the process of finding an agency started to pick up speed and we were beginning to see profiles, I totally lost my shit. And not in a bad way. I just cried. It felt good and I recognize now how important it was to have that release. I think as we hit milestones in the process I will continue to grieve more and more. It's necessary to move forward.
Everything has really started to fall into place. I am thankful for that. It has been a lot, but I'm hoping once we choose an agency and get matched with a surrogate, we will catch our breath a little bit.
I want to share this process with everyone. One of my intentions when I started this blog was to bring awareness to infertility and this is a whole new side of it that I know nothing about. I am a pro with all things IVF, but this is foreign to me. Hopefully as our story unfolds, I will be able to shed light on this journey and help couples who are going through it or considering it as an option.
For this post, I really just want to get down to the nitty gritty of what this process looks like. In a nutshell, gestational surrogacy is when a woman carries another couple’s biological child. So, in our case, my fertility doctor would transfer OUR embryo into our surrogates womb. Technically Brian and I are the "donors" and it's basically our bun in her oven. In traditional surrogacy back in the day, the surrogates eggs were used. That is not the case for us. This is our BIOLOGICAL child.
There are lots of terms in the surrogacy world…
Brian and I are called the Intended Parents or IPs. Brian is the Intended Father/IF and I am the Intended Mother/IM
The surrogate has a few names that are used interchangeably - surrogate, gestational carrier/GC, surrogate mom, gestational surrogate
Getting started is overwhelming and slightly scary, so if you are on this journey I hope this helps a bit. Here are the typical steps, with our personal experiences up to this point:
First, consult with your reproductive endocrinologist. After three egg retrievals and six failed transfers, we knew my body and our hearts needed to heal. It was time to start considering other options. We are thankful that we came to the decision to use a surrogate before our doctor recommended it. And when he recommended it we felt reassured in our decision. Our doctor gave us a list of recommended agencies and we knew that was the next step. Side note: you will need to have embryos to go through this process. If you don't have any, you will need to go through an IVF cycle.
Determine if you want to use an agency or go the independent route. Has a family member or friend offered to be your surrogate? Do you want to use someone you don’t know? All things to think about. We decided that an agency was the best option for us. We also decided that we did not want to put a friend or family member in that situation. While we both think it could be a beautiful experience, we don’t want to put any stress on relationships we love. And if you have offered to carry our child, just know we are forever thankful that you would do something so wonderful for us.
If you go the agency route, call multiple agencies. At this point, we have had phone consultations with three Texas agencies and we have loved all of them. Take your time reviewing these agencies. What are their agency fees? What are their surrogate fees? What type of payments do you have to make…one lump sum or deposits over a period of time? When do you have to make your first payment? Do they have any surrogates available or is there a waitlist of IPs? Tip: join some Facebook groups…they have a plethora of information on the process (here are a few: Surrogacy Group for Intended Parents Only, Intended Mothers Through Surrogacy, Texas Surrogacy, Surrogacy Agency Reviews - US Only).
You will fill out applications for the agencies you liked, typically before the consultations so they can get to know a bit about you. Once you have your phone consultations and have filled out the necessary paperwork, they will start to send you profiles. This is of course dependent on if they have any surrogates available. From my experience so far, there is typically a wait list of intended parents and not enough surrogates, however, surrogates are applying every day. By this point you will have determined what preferences are important to you. You have to be totally aligned with your partner, which thankfully Brian and I have been. For us, it is important to have an experienced surrogate (someone that has been a surrogate before). It is important to us that she has surrogacy friendly insurance because it can add an additional $15,000+ to the cost if she doesn't. It is important to us that we can get to her easily, whether a two hour drive or two hour flight. It is important to us that she be open to sharing our journey. It is important to us to have a relationship with her and close communication. We want to go to appointments. We want to see bump pics. We want her to Facetime us if the baby starts kicking. We want to be in the delivery room for the birth so she can hand us our baby. We want to experience all of this pregnancy because it may be the only one we ever have. Outside of that, we just want someone that we click with. Someone that feels familiar and comforting.
Next is the match! How do you match? Once you get sent a profile you are interested in, you let the agency know ASAP. If the surrogate is interested too, then the agency will set up a call with the IPs, the surrogate and her husband and your contact at the agency. Think Tinder or Bumble, except instead of going on a date to see if you want to pursue a relationship, you are on a blind date phone call to determine if you want that woman to carry your baby. Yep. Another side note: the agency is doing a lot of screening for the potential surrogates that come through…background checks, medical records, home studies, etc. to make sure that by the time a profile gets to the IP, it is someone that has been thoroughly checked out.
After that first match call, the IPs and the surrogate let the agency know if they want to move forward in the process. If the answer is yes, you have some short period of time (typically a week) where the surrogate will be put on hold and you continue conversations. Once you officially choose each other (the surrogate has to choose you too!), then you will sign an agreement with an agency and pay your first agency fee installment. Outside of agency fees, the other expenses are funded out of an escrow account. Our first escrow payment will be due at this time too for things like monthly allowance, travel expenses, medications, etc.
Once an agreement has been signed and you are matched, the surrogate will go through a psych evaluation. Lots of questions are asked in this evaluation and you just have to trust that if something doesn’t seem right, it will be flagged in this process.
If she passes psych then she will start the medical screening process. Depending on what our doctor thinks is necessary, he can request that our surrogate do a number of things…bloodwork, sonohysterogram, hysteroscopy (if something comes back from the sono), an ERA test to determine the best timeframe for transfer, etc. Once she passes the medical screening, the second agency payment is due. Let's just say she doesn't pass her medical evaluation. We would be out for whatever we paid for pysch and medical, but we would be rematched for no additional agency fee.
Next up is legal. You both hire lawyers that have to be specialized in reproductive law…i.e., Brian can't just write up our contract. The IPs attorney will draw a contract that includes all of the things that have been agreed upon by the IPs and the surrogate…examples of this are financial terms, parental rights, conduct of surrogate, her responsibilities for communication to you and yours to her, ownership of embryos, timing of cycle, prenatal testing, reduction, termination, and birth. The surrogates attorney reviews the contract and if it's all good then we both sign and we are bound by that contract. At this point in time our second escrow payment is due. This is one of the bigger deposits…typically $30,000+.
Transfer time. The contract is signed, the surrogate has passed the psych evaluation and she has been given the thumbs up by our doctor to get started. Once her cycle starts, they will prep her for transfer, which will take place at our IVF clinic in Houston. She will take the progesterone shots just like any normal IVF warrior. She will go through all the hormonal craziness to give us the greatest gift anyone could ever give.
We're pregnant! At least that is the hope. Once there is a heartbeat confirmation, our third and final agency fee is due. At this time, our third escrow deposit is also due, which is $20,000+. We will fly/drive to the city our surrogate is in for doctor’s appointments and keep in close communication over the nine month period. The fourth escrow deposit is due anytime the escrow account drops below a certain amount, which typically happens in the third trimester. Note: agencies differ on these deposits (how much they are and when payment is due) so not everyone's experience may be like this.
Baby is born! We get to be in the delivery room and watch our baby come into this world. Thinking about it makes me want to cry happy tears. How will we ever repay this woman who has made all of our dreams come true? This is how I'm envisioning it anyways.
Based on the fee breakdown, you could potentially spend anywhere from $70,000 to $180,000 during this process. Seeing this made my jaw drop. Of course, I knew this was going to be outrageously expensive, but seeing it on paper was eye opening. The agency fees are around $20,000. The surrogate is paid between $30,000-$55,000. If they don’t have surrogacy friendly health insurance that could be another $15,000+. And then there are things like travel expenses, maternity clothes, breast milk pumping fees, housekeeping allowance, lost wages if bed rest needs to happen…the list goes on and on. We've already spent $60,000 on our family without success, so the thought of failure always seems to be a dark cloud hovering over us. Someone said to me the other day that there is a fine line in being obsessed with the money and throwing your arms up and saying just give me my freaking baby and you can have my life savings. It could not be more true. We stress and stress about the financial aspect of this and yet I would spend every penny I had and sell all my belongings if it meant I could finally hold our baby in my arms.
No matter what, we are so thankful for this option. My therapist told me the other day that at some point we just have to take a leap of faith and trust the process. And so that is what we are going to do. God is writing this story for us and we are choosing to see the beauty in it. We can't wait to share it with y'all.