One of the most common questions I get from people is how I found somebody who wanted to be our surrogate. Well, believe it or not, there are actually websites with classified ads for this exact purpose. As soon as I found out about this website I was all over it. Shortly after returning home from the hospital with Brynlee, I spent night after night combing through the potential surrogate profiles in order to see who was out there. I NEEDED to know that this was really a possibility for us. When I posted an IP (intended parents) ad, I was pleasantly suprised to find that my inbox was flooded with responses from women who wanted to help us out. As you can imagine, it isn't easy to pick out the woman who will potentially carry your baby. Fishing through emails and choosing who to respond to was like a full time job-I felt like I was in the online dating world! If you don't know me too well, I have to admit that I have a bit of a stubborn (I like to call it "determined") side to me. Thanks to this, as well as Thom's patience with me, I was successful in finding some wonderful people.
I talked to an amazing woman ("A") from TN for almost a year. She knew that we were not ready to get started right away but we got along really well and had planned to move forward on this journey together. In the end, timing did not work out for us but I made a lifelong friend. In fact, she is the talented lady who crocheted the famous "Hello Kitty" hat that has become Brynlee's signature accessory for this winter! Thanks, A!! And I'm VERY excited to say that she is currently moving forward with another couple and hopefully we can journey through this together!
I was pretty bummed when I realized things were not going to work out with A. I feared that I would not be able to make that connection with somebody again. Fortunately, the stubborn side in me came out again and I began the search all over. This time, I found Laura. When she emailed me back (this was August 2011), I could tell immediately that we had a lot in common. However, she had already been talking to another couple for awhile so I was not too hopeful that she would be interested in getting to know me. (Now do you see how this feels like online dating??) After only a few emails, we developed quite the connection. Her husband was deployed at the time and, though she was busy taking care of her two little ones, she somehow found the time to email back and forth with me all day! I could tell that she was in this for all the right reasons and that she would be the perfect person to take care of our baby for 9 months. She also found my "Ed Beard humor" (as my friends would call it) to be funny which is always a good thing! :) We started skyping (the hubs finally got to be involved too) and talked on the phone a few times. During this time, Thom and I were faced with the VERY tempting offer to potentially work with a surrogate ("A") that lived just one town over from us. I couldn't believe it... I had hoped all along for this opportunity because how amazing would it be to be close by for the pregnancy and to have our baby delivered right here in MA! We went to her house, talked for hours, and met her husband and children. They were a wonderful family but something just told me it wasn't the right decision for us. I can't really explain how you "know" that you've found the right woman to be your surrogate, but you just do. And that was Laura...allll the way out in GA. After just a few weeks, we all decided that we wanted to move forward in this journey together. And, well, the rest is history!
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