The Contract

We received the contract today form India.  As we start looking it over some things stand out immediately.  It is longer than expected - 39 pages in total.  The paper itself has a bit of a purple hue to it - not quite the stark white office paper that we're used to.  Instead of a staple, paperclip or metal fastener the contract is instead held together by some sort of string tie.

We also see that our surrogate and her husband "signed" the contract via a thumbprint rather than by a signature.  They live in New Delhi and are 32 and 38.  Not too young, not too old.  I notice that our surrogate's thumbprint is about the size of mine - she has small hands like me.  I wonder what this surrogacy and money will mean to them.  Will they buy a house?  Put their kids through college?

We start reading through the details to make sure that everything looks correct.  We have already spent a significant amount of time educating ourselves on surrogacy and the terms of a surrogacy contract and everything is in line with our expectations. 

We then headed over to the bank to sign and get this notarized.  It is official - we have a surrogate.

Because I don't already have ENOUGH stress in my life......

The red dot.  Your period.  Your Aunt Flo.  We all have our own special name for our favorite monthly visitor.  Mine decided to come today.....two days early.  That is a problem when you are normally every 28 days like clockwork and your have a lot riding on the expected date of this and your next two periods.  WTF?

This morning I ended up staying home from work and staying in bed because I was having horrible abdominal cramps.  I thought for sure that I ate something bad yesterday.  I go to the bathroom and have another surprise...blood.  There's not supposed to be blood.....not for another two days.  It's not quite like my normal period blood either.

Now that I am moving around I can tell that the pain is more localized on my right side - right in the ovary region.  SHIT!  Do I have a cyst again?  Is this really my period?  Things kind of stop for a while and then start to pick up more around noon.

I call my doctor and we think that today is day 1 and could very likely be triggered early from a cyst.  I get to reschedule all of those labs that I worked really hard yesterday to schedule.  I go in tomorrow for my Day 2 labs and ultrasound so stay tuned......

Now, for the best part.....I don't know what day to plan the India trip around anymore.  Will my next period be in 28 days and the next 28 days after that?  Who knows......

Phone tag....you're it

So today I got to spend at least an hour and a half playing phone tag with the clinic to get my labs scheduled and playing liaison between the clinic and India.  The clinic can't get through to India's fax, India's emails are getting bounced to the clinic, we use different abbreviations for things in the US vs. India.  I expected some of this to happen at first until we got all of the kinks worked out.  I try to remember to breathe and exercise patience.

Labs, labs, labs

 

We got the list of test and labs that we need to get completed ASAP.  I am expecting my period to start on Friday August 1 making Saturday August 2 Day 2.  Awesome.  Nothing like a short time frame to get these done.

The Deer Stand

For the last month or so, Mark has been building a deer stand in the backyard.  The goal is to eventually move this up to the hunting ground up north.  I made sure to get Archer in the picture so that you can start to get an idea of scale.  Hmmmm.....have I mentioned that I think this thing seriously weighs 500 pounds?  More to come.

Internment

Today we traveled to Northfield, MN for the Internment ceremony for Mark's Grandmother who passed away earlier this year.  His uncle had the most beautiful glass bowls created for each sibling as part of the ceremony and to keep.  It was very touching.  We went to his cousin's house for lunch afterwards and spent the afternoon chatting with his family.  Our India journey was a topic of conversation and everyone wished us the best of luck.

On the drive home I noticed the strangest thing.  I really enjoyed chatting with Mark's family.  I actually just feel pretty all-around good today.  I actually feel "happy" for the most part.  I honestly haven't felt really "happy" for a while now.  Maybe it's the blog, maybe it's the fact that things finally seem to be moving forward for us on the baby front.  Maybe it's a little of both.  Regardless, it's a nice change.

To Blog, or not to Blog: that is the question.

Every time I chat with someone regarding our journey they always tell me that I should have a blog.  I honestly had never considered blogging before.....I never thought anyone would find what I had to say all that interesting.  I had the evening to myself, and as I sipped on my glass of wine I thought - why not?  I have been helped by the blogs that I have read.   Maybe I would in turn help someone else.  Maybe no one ever reads my blog.  Who cares really?  This seems like a way for me to tell my story and my end up being quite cathartic.  Mark and I had already decided that we were going to be careful about who we shared our news with and that we were not going to share on Facebook at all...so this could also be a great avenue to keep our close friends and family up to date on our journey.

So over several glasses of wine I start to write my story and the story of Mark and Teri.  Some parts were painful.  It was tough reliving my pregnancy losses and being told that I would never have my own children at such a young age.  Some parts were fun, I still chuckle when I think about our Sake Bombs on our first date.


On and on I began to write and start filling in the story.  Cheers to Death and Taxes!