Surrogacy Agency Problems

Even though I searched what seemed like non-stop for a good agency to handle our surrogacy issues, we ended up with SurroGenesis, which seemed like a good idea at the time. SurroGenesis was run by former surrogates who seemingly knew how to run a surrogate agency.

We contacted Ann Robinson and she seemed to really care about us. We got the ball rolling, spoke on the phone with first Carrie, our egg donor, and then Julie, our gestational surrogate. In most cases, the egg donor is kept private but Carrie wanted to know us and we wanted to know her. We are so glad that we got to meet and will always be a part of each other's families.

Everything went as planned until Ann mentioned that we had to put money into a trust account through Michael Charles Holding Company which, as we assumed, was a bank that would write checks to whomever needed payment for whatever needed payment for. We were against this and wanted to handle the money part ourselves. No go. Put money with Michael Charles or no baby. Kind of harsh when the end product is something you have wanted and have not been able to achieve yourselves.

Ann and SurroGenesis were very attentive to our needs through most of the pregnancy. Then in January we didn't get as many update calls but we were so wrapped up in the pregnancy we didn't really seem to mind or care. Then Julie mentioned she had not gotten paid. Then, at the hospital right after Emily's birth, the hospital billing department called and told Julie that her insurance had been cancelled. We just wrote this up to another SurroGenesis problem; Julie called her representative and insurance was reinstated.

Now we find out SurroGenesis was kind of a Ponzi scam and Tonya Collins and Ann Robinson were in this together and stole all of the money. According to the Los Angeles Times:

http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-surrogate-agency21-2009mar21,0,3918452.story

Very disturbing.

Hopefully everything will resolve itself - with the intervention of lawyers - and our money will be returned.

All we can say is Thank God we have Emily!

Why We Love Our Daycare Provider

1. Can't beat the great price!

2. Jen is a great person with a great way with the children.

3. Good family values.

4. Wants to adopt a greyhound (YEA!)

5. Takes great pictures with her cell phone:

Now we finally have a picture of Emily smiling. Thanks Jen, you're great!

How Cancer Led to Surrogacy

As most of you know, Emily is the product of a gestational surrogacy. In 2006, I was diagnosed with cervical cancer. This type of cancer had a terrific survival rate, but I was still scared. The cancer was in a place where surgery was not an option. I was ready to have everything removed in order to stop the cancer. However, in November 2006, I started a regimen of weekly chemotherapy and daily radiation therapy. It was certainly a life changing event. When my chemo and radiation finished in January 2007 just before my birthday, I was sad to find out that basically my eggs were scrambled from the radiation and I would no longer be able to produce eggs. The positive note was that I would no longer be having a period even though I still have all of the parts. Unfortunately, I would be going through an early menopause and would not be able to take hormones as they could stir up the cancer again. Devastated that I would never be able to carry a child, we decided to look at other options.

Our friends, Danette and Mark, have two adorable daughters who were born in China and later adopted by Danette and Mark. We decided to look into international adoption. Rules have gotten stricted since Danette and Mark adopted their daughters and one of the worse rules was that I would have to be cancer free for five years and then there was no guarantee that we would be able to adopt. So we scrapped that and looked into domestic adoption. Even harder. We would have to be picked by a birth mother and the hoops to jump through would be difficult. Kevin and I have both worked with developmentally disabled children before and knew that we would not be good candidates for adopting a child with a developmental disability. If God gave us a child with disabilities, we would work through it. I'm sure we could handle it, but I longed to have a biological child. This may seem selfish to some, but this was how we were going to become a family.

We turned to surrogacy. Though a very expensive process, we knew this was for us. We chose an egg donor (Chickie Mama Carrie), since my eggs are scrambled, and a gestational surrogate (Baby Mama Julie). Kevin is the biological father. In fact, on Father's Day 2008, he became the father of 22 zygotes, 8 of which became embryos. A few days later, Julie was implanted with two of the embryos and became pregnant with Emily. Such an exciting, emotional journey that ended with a beautiful baby daughter and new friends Carrie and Julie and their families.

Photography Help Please!

OK, so I had Shannon's floppy duck and was trying to do some cute pictures with Emily. Obviously I'm no Betsy Milder. See for yourself the natural progresion of the pictures.

And, naturally, don't try taking pictures of the baby when she is hungry and tired. They most likely won't turn out very well.

Emily's first professional pictures

When we brought Emily home from the hospital, she was a little jaundiced so we didn't have her pictures done right away which was good. We were put in contact with Betsy Milder by our friend Shannon and Betsy came to our house (!), did the pictures, was excellent with Emily, and made a CD with all of the pictures on it. AND it was a great price.

Here's a sample of the excellent pictures Betsy did. If you want to see her website, check out my main page for more info.

Emily's First Easter, part 2

This is the second part of Emily's First Easter. We went to Grandma & Grandpa's house for Easter Dinner. Emily got a doll from the Easter Bunny since she's too little for candy.

Emily also got a cute bib that says "Baby's First Easter" on it from Uncle Andy, Aunt Jenn, and cousins Taylor and Jessica. She also got two very cute onesies that she will probably fit in very soon. I suspect Aunt Jenn was the one responsible for getting Emily all of the goodies so we'll have to make sure to send a thank you note.

After dinner, grandma announced that they had bought dessert and showed Emily this cake. For only being 5-5/7 weeks old, Emily's eyes got huge when she saw this cake. Then she spit up and started to cry. I guess if I saw this thing I would probably cry also. I hope we didn't scar her for life. Grandma saved to plastic easter bunny parts to use next year. We'll see what happens.

And finally, the family picture with the scary Easter Bunny cake.

Emily's First Easter, part 1

Emily's baby mama, Julie, and her family gave her this basket full of goodies for Easter. She said that since she couldn't give her candy quite yet, she gave her rice cereal, spoons that tell you if the food is too hot (Julie said "Where were these when my kids were little??) and a bunch of baby foods. Julie's favorite color is orange so she HAD to get the orange onesie (even if it had a seahorse on it) and orange bath toys. The pink just sort of came along with the package.

Of course, we couldn't forget the dogs and here's Daisy the miniature pinscher, eating her Easter treat.

Molly, the lab/pointer mix, gobbled her's down almost quicker than I could take the picture. This is difficult to do because you give a treat to one dog and the others hover around and try to steal it.

Killannie (pronounced Kalani), the greyhound, was polite and ate hers a little slower so I could get a good picture. Had to distract the other dogs with something else of course.

Grandma Verna's 91st Birthday

It was my Grandma Verna's 91st birthday this weekend, so we packed everything up and went to Wisconsin to visit. We left Friday, got a late start because of you-know-who, took a wrong turn, saw the ENTIRE Clayton County, and finally got to Grandma's at about 9:15 pm. This was certainly past Grandma's bedtime and our bedtime. Emily was quite awake.

That night we stayed in a dinky little stinky motel and my parents decided they wanted to take Emily for the night. THANK YOU! We finally got some sleep....well Kevin slept a bit on the way up in the car, but I was exhausted.

The next morning we went to Grandma's for some more pictures and a birthday party. Here are some of the pictures we took.

It really was a lot of fun seeing Grandma and all of my aunts and uncles, cousins and their families. There were a lot of kids and dogs running around. Emily was a hit, especially with my cousin, Brenda's, girls Haley and Kendra. I regret that I didn't get any pictures of these little mommies taking care of Emily. Next time, girls, next time!

Angel Whisperings

Choosing a name for your child is a daunting task. As a little girl I had the names of my babies picked out long before I even thought of getting married and starting a family. I was determined to use these names for my children and I was sure Kevin would agree with me because I was going to be the mother.

Things don't always turn out as you plan. Kevin not only hated the names I have adored since I was a little girl, he wanted to use family names! Kevin is the youngest of 10 children and his father passed away when Kevin was 2, so he was very close to his mother Mildred (Mill). She passed away in 1997, before I got to meet her. It breaks my heart because she was such a great person and I wish I could have met her. He was determined that if we had a girl we name her Millie. Everyone loved the name Millie except me. I was crushed that he didn't like my names. I knew how much his mom meant to him, so I was determined that there would be a compromise. I offered to use Mildred as a middle name. For a while that was the plan, then the plan changed.

We decided to discuss boys names. I had the name I wanted. Kevin hated it. He said it didn't sound like an 80 year old man's name. I argued that I didn't want my baby having an 80 year old man's name and by the time the baby was 80 years old who would care anyway! Kevin wanted to use the name Brett James. Brett James Borer was born in 1977 and suddenly died of Addison's disease in 2005. Brett was Kevin's oldest nephew, only 5 years younger than him, and the favorite. Brett's passing was a surprise and saddened not only family but friends and friends of friends. Brett was a wonderful young man who was taken before his time and he is very much missed by all who were touched by him. I didn't want to use Brett James. I thought we should leave the use of the name to Brett's younger brother, Jonathan, and his wife, Jacque. My compromise was that we could use Brett as a middle name.

The first week of January 2009, Kevin and I were both home desperately ill with the flu. On January 2, Kevin was sleeping and I was half asleep and half awake. I heard an angel whisper in my ear "Emily" and I knew we had our girls name. I will swear to God that it was Kevin's mom that whispered in my ear. Some might call me crazy, but this is what I believe. Emily still needed a middle name. The first pick was Ann (my mom's middle name and my middle name without the "e"). I didn't like that because the initials would be EAW, even though that seems okay now. The next pick was Caroline because she is our egg donor and one of the people who gave us this gift of life. So, if it was a girl, the name was going to be Emily Caroline. I won't give up the boys name because we might still use it, who knows! The best thing was that we had decided on names but we weren't going to tell. :)

The last week in February 2009, my wonderful Aunt Alice (my dad's younger sister) died from multiple battles with cancer. I was heart broken. I hadn't been to visit her for a long time and missed her. She taught me how to make the best egg salad ever. I will never forget her. I love her very much.

All of a sudden, we had a middle name for our Emily. She would be named Emily Alice for Kevin's mother and for my aunt. I never wanted to use family names, but I am glad we did.

Kevin's sister, Ann, called tonight. She said Jonathan and Jacque, who are pregnant and due at the end of August, had picked Emily Alice as the name for their baby if it is a girl. Alice is a family name from Jacque's side.

Kevin later said "I'll bet it was Brett whispering to you just to stick it to Jon one more time!" That would have Brett's good natured way of teasing his little brother.

It's A Girl!....and other random thoughts.

Wow! I can't believe it's been such a long time since I've written anything. Wait! Yes I can believe it. I'm a new mom! What a wonderful feeling. Let me catch you up on what has been happening.

On 3/2/09 on our way to Des Moines for the birth of our first child, we got pulled over for speeding. I was so oblivious to the fact that I was going 67 mph in a 55 mph speed zone. Luckily the cop didn't give me a ticket, just a warning to slow it down. He did however give me a ticket for not having my registration in the car. There goes $62 to Poweshiek County! Kevin blames himself because he usually takes care of that kind of stuff. We still haven't put the current registration in the car. Oops.

The next day, 3/3/09, our beautiful baby girl, Emily Alice, was born at 11:13 AM. She weighed 9 lbs, 7 oz and was 20 3/4 inches long. We have a video of her birth if anyone wants to see it. Pretty graphic. I don't advise it, but we'd be happy to send it out to anyone.

This is the most graphic picture I have for now. This is me cutting the umbilical cord. I was so greatful to be allowed to be part of the delivery process. On the video, you can hear me yelling "It's a girl" I was afraid I was going to pass out, but it never happened.




Julie, her husband, Mark and I went into the delivery room (there were only a certain amount of people who could go into the room and Kevin got the short straw. Sorry honey!) at 11:00 AM, were out by 11:15 AM and Kevin and my parents hardly had time to get to the nursery to see Emily and I come to the window. Once again, I yelled (through the glass) "It's a girl!". Although we weren't totally decided on a name until about two hours before delivery, I yelled out her name and Kevin translated to my parents who were with him. I think my dad cried a little bit. My Aunt Alice had just died of multiple cancers a week before Emily was born. Kevin and I had decided that Alice was a wonderful middle name for Emily (later on her name).

This is Emily and her daddy with her first bottle. Right after birth, she was extremely loud and screaming. Her blood sugar was determined to be low. After she ate her blood sugar was fine. What a surprise. Julie hadn't eaten anything for the past 12 hours before the C-section so baby was pretty hungry I guess.

This is Julie with Emily relaxing in bed. Julie was the only one that got a nice, comfy bed (ha!) at the hospital. The rest of us had to sleep on a very uncomfortable fold out sofa. Ugh!

Emily had lots of visitors at the hospital. First, Julie's family came and brought a lot of pink clothes. They knew she was going to be a girl because Julie had an ultrasound about two weeks before delivery and she knew we didn't want to know so she kept it secret from us. We were so excited to see all of the adorable and cute pink clothes.

Kevin's friend, Eric, from high school came to visit. He wanted to steal Emily. Fortunately for us, the hospital had a rigorous security system. The babies get banded like criminals and if they get too close to the outside doors, the doors lock and a security system comes on. People come running from all over and the lights start flashing in the halls. Pretty impressive. We got to see it once.

The picture above is of Uncle Bob, Kevin's brother. He came to visit Emily also. Aunt Ann and Aunt Sue, Kevin's sisters, also came to visit. Ironically they came on the same day so we all got to go out to dinner with Cousin Jessica who was a little sick and didn't want to get anyone else sick. What a sweetie!

We were discharged on Friday, 3/6/09. Emily had a slightly high bilirubin of 16.7 so they sent us home with a bili blanket, which is an ultraviolet light that you strap onto your baby and she glows like a Glow Worm. Kind of freaky. The thing looked like a vaccuum cleaner. Emily didn't mind it and after a while we got used to it also. We were able to send it back three days later. At a cost of $4000 for the machine, I was glad to get rid of it.

Emily slept the entire way home. At home, we were greeted by our furry babies - Daisy (minature pinscher, age 8), Molly (lab/pointer mix, age 6), Killannie (greyhound, age 5) and Willow (cat, age 4). They were all interested in Emily, but more interested in seeing us. Then Grandma and Grandpa came over to see Emily and I think they've been over almost every day or every other day since!

On Sunday, March 9, Aunt Amy, Cousin Hillary, Aunt Kay and Uncle Dan came to visit Emily. They just loved her (or that's what they said anyway). They came to visit again near the end of the month, so they must like her.

Over this month we have learned a whole lot of love we never expected to learn. Our love for Emily is something different than we have ever felt before. She is such a little being that needs us so much. We have taken her everywhere with us. I can't imagine a life without her or remember life before her. She is truely a miracle.