Delores Melon

I realize I haven’t resumed this topic. Not that I’ve been avoiding it. For me, blogging is totally about my mojo. I have a blogging mojo, and a cleaning mojo. If it ain’t there, it ain’t happening. Anywho, I’ve come back to this topic for a couple of reasons. First, I’ve deluded myself into thinking there are mobs of people reading my blog and are just on the edge of their seats for more. Granted this mob scene of readers is sharing one computer, since my blog stats shows very limited viewing. I hope they have a very wide screen.

Secondly, and I’m hesitant to broadcast this reason, frankly I’ve been thinking about it a lot lately. I am one of those freaks that actually loves being pregnant. I love everything about it, even the crappy aspects of it. Maybe because those are the parts I get to complain about and honestly, who doesn’t love to complain at least once in awhile.

I love being pregnant. Surrogacy or not, I love it. I love the neurotic way I get in that hellishly long “two-week wait”. To those of you in the non-surro world, this is the time between having the eggs implanted and being able to take a pregnancy test. Analyzing every possible twinge, cramp, ache. Counting trips to the bathroom. Am I nauseous, or did I just convince myself I am? Is this a symptom? From the outsider looking in, it’s quite silly. For me, it’s all part of the journey. Every step is so meaningful in some way. I’m doing the very thing someone can’t. So they asked me to do it for them.

I’ve never really been able to say, “I’m honored”. No one has ever nominated me for anything. Maybe most annoying , but we never had a dinner ceremony or anything. But for someone to say, “we’d like you to be the one to carry our child”. I’m totally lost at how to express gratitude for that. That’s beyond honored. So not only do I get to be pregnant, which I love, I get to finally feel honored.

*my thoughts here are getting skewed, since I’m supposed to be cleaning up, and the kids are being bad and I had to stop and go referee, and I guess I ate too close to taking Adderall and it’s not absorbing well in my body or something equally stupid.*

So, I’ve been thinking about it a lot lately. One minute I think, I want another baby. Then roughly 30 seconds later one of my kids impales the other with a pencil, or tracks mud through the house, or spills their drink for the third time, or back talks, etc. etc. Then I think, hmmm… I’d like to be pregnant yet not give birth to another spawn of satan. I’m hesitant to blog about this since there are people that are aware of this blog, and I don’t want my blogging about this to be seen as anything other than my thoughts. I have no motives, no hidden agendas. I just wish to lay my thoughts out here because, surprisingly, I actually have thoroughly enjoyed blogging.

Anywho, “would you do it again?”. I got asked that a lot. I can’t say I’m surprised. The number one comment I got was “wow, I could never do that”. Usually followed by “I hated being pregnant”. I’m mystified how someone could determine they hate it, yet go on to produce several more children, in the same fashion. Clearly they have a very short memory, or just don’t know how they are getting pregnant.

Would I do it again? I wish it were as simple as yes or no. I took two years out of my life, and honestly, that of my family, to have a baby for another couple. I did it willingly, don’t get me wrong. There’s no regret there at all. I’m just saying, it was two years I made myself available for someone else’s needs. I didn’t spend a lot of time worrying about it. I met a couple that had a need and it was a need I could, hopefully, fulfill.

I often made the comment that I was the perfect surrogate. I didn’t go into it for the money, I wasn’t after attention, accolades, awards for my selfless nature, humanitarian of the year, all that. I simply wanted to make this couple a family. In all honesty, I don’t think I’m terribly obnoxious, or annoying to be around. A plus if you’re going to carry someone else’s child. I’d hate to imagine the poor couple that are wooed by a seemingly wonderful woman, only to find out, too late, that she’s annoying as fuck. What can you do? You can’t just ignore her, she’s carrying your kid for god sake. Man that would suck. I just think my personality, my pragmatic views, my motives, were all on target for making a good surrogate.

So, I took two years, happily, to do this. In the very beginning, I was not aware this would take two years. Researching it is pointless as everyone’s timetable is totally different. Some are match with a couple, and cycling onto the embryo being implanted in a matter of months. Some take considerably longer and that’s just to get to the cycling. Some take ages just to match with a couple. I am a devout believer in the theory “it was meant to be”. I practically stumbled on the lawyer that matched us, and she had only had them in her file barely a week I believe. We had to have clicked, otherwise, I wouldn’t be blogging about this. When it’s right it’s right.

We went from “hi how are ya” to bloodwork out the wazoo, and I mean bloodwork. I’m surprised I’m still alive after all the blood letting that went on. Vampires. Oh I’m sure some of it was actually used for testing, but the rest had to be for some wealthy vampire funding the clinic or something. Aren’t vampires notoriously wealthy? Next onto the psychological screening. I now have certified, psychologist approved documentation that I am OK. I’m not nuts. I tend to brag about that. Probably should tone that down.

Then the butt pricking began. Oh how I wish that were as dirty as it sounds. In actuality, it was Man poking two inch needles in my ass every night. I had to do it every time we went through a cycle, and lasted about 4 or so weeks at a time I think. That was about four times, then on the final transfer, which resulted in pregnancy, I had to keep getting needles up until I was fourteen weeks pregnant I believe. Two needles *one in each cheek* every third night. Yeah, good times. Actually, not that bad. I even learned how to do it myself since Man would sometimes be getting home late from work, I’d be so tired, I’d have no choice but either do it myself or wait up for him. I became quite smug that I did it myself.

It took three tries to get me pregnant. I hate the cliche ” third times a charm”. I can’t help but roll my eyes at that. Since I do have ADD and little patience for long winded stories that can be summed up and be just as informative: IM *Intended Mom* had cancer, emergency hysterectomy, saved ovaries. Tried twice with her eggs. The chemo and radiation had damaged the eggs. So they found an egg donor. Now, this is the part I find amusing. The first two tries, they *being the clinic folk* were very optimistic and positive, “these embryos look great” yadda yadda. Obviously those two cycles failed. The third cycle, they were all but crying when they came in for the transfer. “Embryos don’t look good, poor quality” etc. etc. Being me, I knew then this cycle would work. I refuse to join in on boo hoo bandwagons. That and my intuition is really quite awesome.

So they transferred three embryos. Technically, for a while at least, I was carrying triplets. Scary indeed. I wasn’t worried though. Nine months later, one little butterball popped out.

Now, I’m leaving out several details, mostly because I can’t stop thinking about all the other shit I should be doing right now, none of which involves this computer. I would like to get as much as I can remember posted if nothing else so I have it somewhere since it’s only a matter of time before my dysfunctional brain forgets it all.