It’s now May, 2016 and Cody and I are ready to start our 2nd
attempt at making a baby; a full year after initiating our first one. I stumbled over proper phrasing of that
sentence, but plain and simple that IS after all what we are doing. We are making our baby through science and
the kindness of others. We finally found
out in February that Cody would be going to work in Papua New Guinea after
waiting for relocation since November, 2015.
We were so excited, our 1st emails were to our surrogate
agency in Idaho and to the 2 clinics we have been waiting to interview. We immediately scheduled with Seattle
Reproductive Medicine the first week of this month and with Utah Fertility
Clinic shortly after. I joined a
plethora of surrogacy forums, FB groups and websites to gain support, knowledge
and communication with other families going through the same, in my eyes,
surreal experience. It didn’t take me
long to find a few women close to us who had great insight, recommendations and
tips for us.
Remember how I said our 1st email was to our
surrogate agency??? Well she replied to
us by telling us that our GC we had secured in October of last year had been
matched with other IP’s and had gotten medical clearance early, so we had to
start over- from scratch. We were now
looking at appointments with clinics but didn’t know if we should keep them or
cancel them since we didn’t have a gestational carrier. Our agency told us that she would email us
some new GC profiles for us to look at and we could start interviewing them as
they came available, but to know that she didn’t have any at the moment. Well, 1 week went by, 2 weeks turned into 3
and 1 month later she still hadn’t forwarded us profiles, so I contacted her
and asked her if she had any carriers yet.
She didn’t respond to that email.
During this time and all of our waiting for contact from our
agency I started networking with a few women through the surrogacy sites I was
a part of. They were incredible. I immediately found women in our area who had
been GC’s before. We talked about
attorneys in our area for writing our contract, we talked about experiences,
our needs and wants as IP’s and the tough road we’ve been on to get where we
are right now. One night on a FB
surrogacy support page I voiced our need for advice in suggestions for finding
a GC in our area sans an agency. This
page does NOT condone matching or even advertising for that matter. A bold woman commented on my post, another
supportive woman voiced her opinion as to how wonderful it would be for the
brave woman who commented and us to become a match, the administrator of the group
called scolded our brave woman and told her she’d hate for her to be booted for
suggesting I contact her, she immediately deleted the comment and I began
speaking to this amazing human named Bridget.
Suddenly we went from not having a gestational carrier to a network of
support and a potential gestational carrier.
A little frightening when pursuing this now, agency free, AKA Indy. J
May 4, 2016
We had a phone consult with our Dr. at SRM, Dr. Paul Dudley
and immediately felt at ease. He
listened to our story and realized we were far ahead of most couples at their
initial consult. We knew exactly what we
needed and how to get there. As usual,
we were on the run that afternoon with plans for an open house at my Mom’s new
work and had our phone consult at Mark and Karyn’s house. I thought it was special to have that
conversation with Cody’s Dad present, listening to what we were working
on. It’s one thing to tell them what we
are doing but completely different to have them hear it first hand. They are on board with us and in the last
year have been incredibly supportive and shared our excitement and unfortunately,
disappointments as well.
The next day Dr.
Dudley’s whole coordinating team had contacted us and once again put us in
motion towards our baby. We were set up with many egg donor profiles
that Cody, Jaiden, Olivia and I looked at.
That has been a fun for us as a family to sit down and get their input
and see excitement and sometimes lack of excitement on the egg donors we have
available. We pulled one particular
profile up and immediately were sold by the resemblance of her baby picture and
mine. We made them into a picture that
we cropped side by side baby pics in and sent to our families. Most didn’t understand what we were showing
them but after much explaining and revealing that we were once again moving
ahead with our attempt at surrogacy we received much support. We are even receiving support from the
girls! WOW.
Our timing must be right, finally. I took the advice I was getting, felt
incredibly supported and decided to pursue a GC that I felt connected to and
confident in. I can not explain the
feeling I had when communicating back and forth with her via email, but we just
meshed. Our lives are so parallel and
for me to feel a part of this process I will need an emotional attachment. More so than just being the gate keeper and
coordinator. She is truly a blessing and
that is an understatement. We started
communicating on April 25th.
On May 5th the day after our SRM appointment she accepted our
offer to be our gestational carrier and said the most moving words, “Let’s make
you your baby!”, as you can imagine, after the long disappointing road we have
been on with all of our plans and initial agency falling through I was
completely humbled and beside myself. We
have finalized our decision to ditch Rocky Mountain Surrogacy and pursue our
dream of having a baby completely independent.
One of the most ironic things about our GC and us finding
each other is that so many parts of our lives are similar. One of the most important things for us was
that we had contracted Rocky Mountain Surrogacy to help us find a GC and guide
us through the process. Come to find
out…So had our GC. She is experienced,
having delivered twins 4 years ago and was supported by Rocky Mountain
Surrogacy. She was actively (or so she
thought) looking for Intended Parents to be matched with, again, with RMS. But she was told her there weren’t any IP’s
available. On the same day, May 5th
out of the blue RMS sent Cody and I an email asking about how our appointment
went and if it went well she had profiles to send us. I politely told her we found our own GC,
would be pursuing surrogacy Indy and thank you for her time. Once again, nothing from her as far as a
response. Both our GC and I have been
disappointed by RMS. There’s something
empowering in knowing that we found each other on our own, and we took a leap
of faith and are pursuing this journey solely on our own. This will allow us to have complete honesty,
open communication and I hope, the relationship we want so badly with her. We’ve shared a month of our lives with each
other, communicating daily and getting to know one another, saying that we
crossed paths at just the right moment and that the universe sends you exactly
what you need at the exact time that you need it is an understatement. The lesson learned…Steer clear of Rocky
Mountain Surrogacy.
May 8, 2106
It’s Mother’s Day and we spent the evening with Cody’s Mom
and family. After everyone left Cody and
I sat at Ruth’s table with her, Jeff and Ty and explained where we were as far
as progress this second try with surrogacy.
We told them about our GC and how wonderful she was, what the process
was and looks like and our time frame.
They had great questions and a lot of love and excitement for us. It’s quite fulfilling for Cody and I to
include our families in the work we are doing.
An even more rewarding feeling is the support they give back to us.
May 12, 2016
After taking Cody to
the airport I decided to take Jaiden and Olivia to dinner to sit down and
discuss their feelings about having a baby.
Not only having a baby but having one in a very unconventional way. I wanted them to have the opportunity to give
me their 100% truthful opinions and not worry about offending Cody or anyone
else. I am a safe place for them to be
truthful with their opinions and I thought I would hear some concerns. Boy was I surprised when their biggest
concern was, “Are we getting a bigger house?”
Other than that they both expressed excitement and support. Jaiden is my rock, my best friend and will
almost be out of the house when a new baby comes home. Her opinions resonate with me and she offered
nothing but love and support, she knows- I’ve always wanted to be a mother of 3. Olivia will be well into middle school and
was vocal about her ability to help me out and be as involved as possible. Their reassurance made my heart swell with
emotions. My girls are amazing young
women and I am so blessed to have their support, understanding and love. That private conversation with them was the
final reassurance that I needed to be brave and push forward.
May 13, 2016
We signed our financial agreement paperwork with SRM, all of
Bridget’s medical questionnaire clearance paperwork has been approved and we
have Super Day appointments scheduled on June 14th! Cody and I are working on travel arrangements
and couldn’t be more excited about what we’ve pieced together. It’s hard for me, especially with Cody being
at work while all of this is transpiring, but I have to take a deep breath and
realize, I love him and this is his dream that has become ours and I’ll do
anything in this world to make it come true.
He’s already made mine come true by loving Jaiden and Olivia like his
own. Hurry up June 14th, we
are ready to get going.
May 14th 2016
Today is Saturday and we haven’t had any substantial
happenings today. It has been a nice
break for me, I’ve had time to soak it
in a little more. My days have been
spent coordinating and communicating between our GC and Cody which leaves me
little time to daydream about this journey we are on. My mind took me to all of the things I want
to do with this non-traditional, none the less incredibly important
pregnancy. Since I have the time, here
are some of my thoughts.
1.
I want a
photographer to follow us through everything, so not only do we have our
experiences in our mind, we have our experience in pictures. I would love this not only for Cody and I but
for the girls and our families as well.
I want our families to be included as much as possible. I’ve tentatively asked Ruth to be with us for
the birth so she can photograph it. I
would hope that our parents will all be able to come as well and I wouldn’t
want them tied up with taking pics. At
the end we can take all of the pictures and videos and make one big presentation.
2.
IF, we have a baby shower, I’d like for it to be
non-traditional, like this whole process, with all of our friends and Cody to
be a part of it. At our baby shower I
would ask that everyone bring a small gift for our GC- so our friends can
pamper her a little as well. She is the
one doing all of the hard work.
3.
A gender reveal party, either independent of the
baby shower or at the baby shower if we are lucky enough to find out what we
are having. I haven’t decided and I’ll
need to talk to Cody about it as to whether or not we find out at the
ultrasound or if we have Bridget keep it a secret until we do a reveal, in
which case she could be the one who tells us what we are having…All while the
said photographer captures all of these moments.
4.
As soon as we get home with the baby I would
like to have a welcome home party (I’m full of partying ideas!) at a convenient
location where both Cody’s grandparents and mine, our parents, brothers,
sisters and the girls are all presents and we take generation pictures and the
baby gets to meet great grandparents and possibly great-great
grandparents.
May 15 2016
We are traveling…soon!
It may seem like a small detail but it made both our GC and myself feel
very excited, Cody purchased our GC’s husband’s plane ticket from Seattle back
to his work after our appointment. It is
the first large expense that we have covered for our GC and it proved to be an
emotional milestone for us. We exchanged
texts with love acknowledging that it’s FINALLY really REAL this time! I know we are going to continue to make great
strides.
Our GC and myself discussed a lot of contract details
throughout today and it’s very reassuring that we have a lot of the same
feelings and thoughts on what this journey together will look like. I feel so at ease talking to her, asking her
questions and trusting that her ideas and feelings are the same as mine. This is quite a difficult road for me to be
on, entrusting someone else to carry a child for me, that I want, to complete
my family, with my future husband. Yet
as soon as I met her I knew that she was the one that I would undoubtedly trust
and we synched immediately. To have that
connection, as a mother, to another mother is an undeniable feeling and one I
lacked our first round. What a blessing
to have crossed paths with our GC.
Countless hours of talking to complete strangers, having potential GC’s
email me with the craziest reasons to why they were seeking being a surrogate
and sleepless nights lying in bed praying that someone like our GC would come
along have finally come to fruition. I
will continue to coordinate, communicate and be present in all things
surrounding this.
Tonight isn’t any different, as I sign off from journaling,
I am flipping over to 2 previous GC contracts, a checklist of ideas to include
in our contract and an empty notebook to make notes to tailor our
contract. I have 10 short days to
prepare ours for presentation to our attorney.
One more HUGE step in the right direction!
June 15th
In perfectly typical fashion for Cody and I our lives have
evolved quite quickly over the last month.
I am on the plane to Seattle RIGHT NOW!
Cody is on a flight to Seattle from California (his very last time
leaving work, which is bittersweet for him) RIGHT NOW! Bridget and her husband are driving to
Seattle from Boise right now as well. We
will all meet for dinner tonight. Very
exciting day for all of us.
It's been a real struggle for us the last month though. We still aren’t sure what the outcome of our
trip to SRM will be, we have reservations about our contract and commitment to
much larger financial obligations then we had intended. We still love Bridget just as much as ever
but after drafting our preliminary contract with our attorney the expectations
fell very short for Bridget. Cody and I
have headed this whole process ourselves and are essentially paving our own
way. We walked away from our agency
because we didn’t feel comfortable with her abilities and communication
thinking that we knew enough to get us to where we needed to be. We have felt confident and well versed when
talking to the Dr.’s, coordinators and financial people at SRM. For the most part I’ve felt incredibly
comfortable speaking with Bridget and Cody has started dialogue with her as
well. I’m glad he’s making an effort to
be involved as much as possible. The one
thing we were not expecting and have very little experience with is our GC
contract. I have a friend who is helping
us create it and I feel extremely fortunate to have someone I care about
helping with this portion of our journey.
She is an amazing attorney but as you can imagine, small town MT has
very little experience with gestational carrier contracts- so she’s worked tirelessly and diligently on
our behalf. For a week after my initial
meeting with our attorney we emailed back and forth additional needs, wants,
things that didn’t matter to us and details for our contract. By the end of that week Cody and I were
exhausted by all accounts and felt ready to submit it to Bridget’s attorney in
Idaho. I felt it would be appropriate to
also send it to Bridget for her to review, because the more prepared she is for
her appointment in Idaho with her attorney the faster we will be able to sign
it and get to Transfer!!! J In short, we took things out of the contract
that we didn’t feel were important, added some things that Bridget didn’t care
for and needed to revise our payment schedule.
Thankfully Bridget expressed her needs, wants and expectations to us and
after consulting with our attorney revised the contract and have submitted it
to her and her attorney for the 2nd time. The financial obligation that Cody and I had
prepared for and have in our savings will run out far before the end of our
journey. We want to do everything possible
to accommodate Bridget and have tentatively agreed to everything she
wanted. Cody spent this last week at
work crunching numbers to see what our max out of pocket will be should any
worst case scenarios happen and if we are able to absorb those costs. He feels very confident that we will be able
to. At the end of last week I expressed
my anxiety to Bridget and told her we’d revisit the contract after our trip to
SRM. I want her as well as us to feel
100% comfortable that we are all able to hold up our end of the contracts. She has been incredibly understanding and
helpful.
Before Cody left for work last week on in the middle of all
our chaos and stress ( I am also taking 15 credits in summer school right now
and am maxed out) we got married on June 6th.
We decided on Friday June 3rd- bought our marriage license in Bozeman
and sent out a group text message to our immediate families that we’d be having
a BBQ at our house on Monday after work.
I immediately sent our attorney a text because her father is a Judge in
the town Cody and I grew up in asking if he’d be available to sign a marriage
certificate on Monday afternoon. Of
course she said yes, she’s amazing and we made an appointment for noon on
Monday. Let’s go back to the group text,
which I’ll forever remember is NEVER a good idea when you’re texting your
father who is technologically handicapped, I mean really, he doesn’t even own a
computer. Our great surprise was ruined,
or maybe not ruined but made extremely laughable by a personal text that was
intended to go only to my father after he said he couldn’t make the BBQ to let
him know Cody and I would be getting married on Monday afternoon and that we’d
be telling our family at the BBQ after the fact- but SHHHHH, don’t tell anyone,
it’s a surprise! None the less, it was
still a surprise to the group, gave us all a great laugh and we made it through
Monday, my dad ended up coming to the BBQ and we celebrated wayyyy into Tuesday
morning. Cody left for work on Tuesday
morning. Our whole first week of
marriage was spent apart.
Almost 4 years ago Cody and I reconnected at a truck stop in
Livingston while he was on vacation and I was waiting for my precious niece
Madison to be born, July 11, 2012. We
spent a whirlwind summer enjoying each other when possible, floating the river,
watching baseball, an eye opening weekend at my cabin and learning about each
other’s lives since losing contact almost 15 years prior. We talked about our greatest goals, biggest
fears and accomplishments. I’ve loved
him since Snoopy School. The best friends I have in my life also grew up with
Cody, our roots are deep. We had a tough
year the first year after running into each other. We both had tremendous losses in our
families, where we spent hours talking and crying on each other’s shoulders but
our lives were still moving in opposite directions. His greatest goal was to have a child and my
greatest hope for him was happiness, I couldn’t give him a child biologically,
so we chose to stay our courses. We
tried to continue life as we knew it without each other for the next year and
at essentially the right time again, we both had life changing experiences in
the relationships we were in and knew that we had one shot at being happy
together. Cody moved back to MT from
California, the girls and I moved to Bozeman from Livingston and our life has
fell into place precisely as we had dreamed while sitting on the deck in the
middle of the night in the Crazy Mountains years ago.
Today I write this as Erin Sigler, my best friend Cody’s
wife, while on an airplane to meet a family whose matriarch is going to make me
a mother for the 3rd time (I’ve always, ALWAYS wanted 3) and Cody a
father for the first time. She is going
to complete us, bless us and it would be an understatement to say make all of
our dreams come true. Cody is already an
amazing influence and support system for Jaiden and Olivia. He has given me the opportunity to be the
mother I’ve always wanted to be for my girls, the woman I want to be in a
relationship and the person I’ve wanted to invest in for myself. We’ve come so far together and because of
each other. Cody is in a role he didn’t
think he’d ever occupy. He’s a step
father, a husband, a son, brother and soon to be father on the brink of
starting a new career. He loves without
failing, laughs without reservation and works harder than asked. We are EXACTLY where we set out to be in our
dreams.
Tonight we meet Bridget and hope that the 18 months we’ve
invested into making this happen, falling short, picking ourselves back up,
being patient and loving each other through tears and triumphs is the start of
our miracle. I fully believe that I was
put on this earth to experience every aspect that life has to offer, I’m fully
prepared to embark on this journey with my best friend, soul mate and
husband.
July 9, 2016
Seattle was quite the experience, fast, furious and worth
it. We left with a great impression. We really enjoyed our time with Bridget,
Shawn and Rylee. The clinic was quite
impressive. Our “Super Day” was
coordinated incredibly well. From the
moment we walked in the door we had a team leading us from one appointment to
the next. Bridget let me come into her
intake exam with her provider who is Dr. Davis as well as the ultrasound that
looked at the inside of her uterus. Even
her Dr. was surprised that I accompanied her and multiple times throughout our
visits we heard how unique our situation is.
It was humbling and heart warming to have this whole team working on our
behalf and offering their support. Both
Cody and Bridget’s medical clearance was easily obtained, our counseling
sessions were beneficial and we finalized all of our paperwork and master
plan. The last thing we had to complete
was our contract when we returned to MT with the hopes that we’d be making
arrangements to return to SRM ASAP. J
The contract has turned out to be one of the most difficult
things I have ever navigated in my life.
We went into it completely naive’, thinking it would be very easy to
come to an agreement with Bridget. I had
talked to her for months, asked specific questions, came to many agreements
that I included in the contract, many things I took out thinking we were being
kind by not having crazy, neurotic expectations of her. Come to find out a lot of the things that we
took out of the contract are standard things that needed to be in it. Which is crazy to us, but we put them back
in. After seeking an additional lawyer
for guidance, almost giving up and starting completely over and many hours of
reading, rereading and reformulating our contract we finally agreed on a
contract that is quite fitting for our gestational carrier. If I am ever asked about advice in surrogacy,
without a doubt I will refer to the contract phase and the importance of having
extensive knowledge going into it. This
31 page document has haunted me for months, caused many sleepless nights,
anxiety filled days and more tears than I could have ever imagined. We are incredibly thankful to have that
signed and behind us so we can move on!
That being said, we couldn’t have done it without the guidance and
ability for me to just be myself with our attorney who is a dear friend and now
far more well versed in surrogacy than she would probably like!
7/20/16
Today is the day!
Actually, for many things! All
which leave me with the most amazing feeling of hope, love and confidence in
our future. This morning our niece
Everleigh was born and joined her big sister Cambria to assure their parents
Pat and Randi have another 2 years of sleepless nights. 4 years ago today was Cody and my first
date…ish, floating the Yellowstone. And
now, tonight, Bridget started her fertility medications. I think I’m more nervous and anxious than
Bridget is. She’s so laid back and I’m
such a worrier. It is going to be a
great balance. I was trying to send her
flowers all morning today but kept getting pulled in different directions, I
found the greatest flower shop in Boise and they are working on a special
arrangement for her tomorrow. So in
typical Cody and Erin fashion…the flowers will be late- but hopefully make her
smile. Today marks many great things
that have happened in Cody and my relationship and is truly humbling to be able
to watch and be a part of our growing families.
Olivia and Jaiden both even sent encouraging texts in our group chat
tonight that I sent to our family letting them know Bridget had started her
meds and we are in fact in motion. To
know that we have their support is wonderful.
Hold us in your hearts because HERE WE GO, FINALLY!! :)
