Finding another Gestational Carrier

January 2012

After McKay’s death I could not pull myself out of this deep depression that I found myself in. I became obsessed with having another baby. Since Kim almost died with McKay she did not want to be our surrogate again. I could not blame her. She had done so much for us and was physically, emotionally and spiritually drained.

I wanted another baby so bad, yes to the point of obsession. So I sent out a vast email to everyone that I knew to see to if they would be interested in being our gestational carrier.

Just to clarify, a gestational carrier is sort of like a baby sitter. The baby is our biological baby, and Kim’s uterus is our baby’s home for the next nine months. A surrogate on the other hand is usually the surrogate’s egg or a donor’s egg and then the husband’s sperm. This would mean that the baby would not have any of my DNA.

Also, to clarify, if we had to use a Gestational Carrier Agency it would be a least $100,000.00 just to hire someone to carry our baby. This doesn’t include the $25,000 for the Attain program. This program states that if you pay up front for two and a half IVF cycles ($25,000) then you get six tries at IVF, three fresh cycles and three frozen cycles. The attain program does not include the 3 to 4 thousand dollars for the infertility meds. It doesn’t include the 500 plus for the egg retrieval surgery. It doesn’t include the $1750.00 for the initial freezing of the embryos and it doesn’t include the $3000 dollars to be able to freeze them for a year.

It is a very expensive and stressful and grueling process, but like I said I would do anything just to have another baby.

Some of you might think why don’t we just adopt. Well, we are trying to adopt through LDS family services. It has been almost two years and a few close call yet no baby L. If we were to do a private adoption agency, it would be $12,000 non refundable for the agency just to represent us. Private adoptions now days are around $60,000 to $80,000 dollars. How can any normal family afford this?!!

Since we did not have a couple hundred thousand dollars to spend, I tried to find a gestational carrier on my own. I sent out a vast email, to all my friends to see if by chance they would want to be our gestational carrier or if they knew of someone who would. Jazzy, one of my best friends said that she new a couple of girls that would be interested in having our baby. I was so excited and contacted them right away. Sadly however it did not work out with them. Time to move to plan B. I begged, and pleaded with Jay to send out an email to see if any of his friends would be willing to carry our baby. Jay was not ready to go through the whole IVF process again and said he didn’t want to send out the email. He was still in mourning of our twins. I was too, but I was obsessed and if I get my mind on something I will not stop until I get it. So for the next few weeks of begging and pleading with Jay, he finally gave in and sent out an email to all of his friends to see if they or they knew of anyone that would want to be our gestational carrier. Within a couple of days one of Jay’s friends wrote back and said that he had a friend that has always wanted to be a gestational carrier. I was ecstatic, happy, thrilled and overwhelmed with excitement. It was if we had just found a needle in a haystack. I could not wait to meet her and talk to her to see if she really wanted to go through with this. We set up a meeting to meet at Chick-fil-A in Riverdale. It was as if we were going on a blind date. Its not every day you go and meet a perfect stranger and say, “Hey, you don’t know us but would you be willing to carry our baby”? I was scared, excited, nervous, and anxious.

So we went to Chick-fil-A on a Saturday and in walked Nikki…!!  J