The pineapple and me at 33 weeks

Isabella is doing great!  She is apparently the weight of a pineapple- of course, that is generic and I am sure she is bigger.  She continues to wiggle and move as much as ever- I just feel each and every movement so strong now.  At our appointment last week, my ob asked how things were going.  I said, "well, my legs get tingly, I have to eat tums, I can't bend, and I still have stabbing pains in my sides." 
He said, "you know those are all normal pregnancy symptoms."
I said, "yeah, but you asked ;)"

He reminded my IM that I am a great incubator and there is nothing to worry about. 
I contemplated packing a hospital bag, but why tempt fate?  I am holding out until 34 weeks, and then I will give in and pack.  I definitely don't want to be left without a bag like I was last time.  I also don't want to drive myself to the hospital again either, but we'll see.
I am enjoying this pregnancy so much- I think because it is not twins!  Twins hurt.  Isabella doesn't, usually.  Her favorite times to wake up are at bedtime and 3:00 am.  Jason will wake her up and "play" with her if he can't sleep.  He apparently did this last weekend and I slept right through their playtime!  Her mother has told Jason she will call him when she wakes up at 3, thank you very much for training her to wake up then :)
I dream about Isabella being born very often, I think because I am so ready for her to be born.
I was thinking about her parents.  The last time (and the only time) they had a daughter born, they were unable to enjoy her.  They were faced with her eminent death even as they basked in their newfound parenthood.  I remember how relieved I was when I saw each of my children- their screams, their hair, their toes, their healthy pink skin.  I remember how afraid I was with the twins- that they were too early, that they would not cry.  I remember the relief I felt when L cried, and then her brother.  They were pink, they were breathing, they were whole.
I have never lost a child fresh from the womb.  I have never felt the anguish of loss instead of the miracle of life.  I have only seen the fruit of my labor grow and flourish.  I have never seen one wither and die even as I bleed for my work in bringing them here.

My goal this entire journey has been to give Isabella's parents a LIVING miracle.  Her sister was a miracle, but she was a gift that God wanted back home with him too soon.  For about a month, from 28 weeks to 32 weeks, I had not dreams of her birth, but nightmares of her birth.  I was soo afraid of losing her, so afraid I would fail in bringing her parents their promised gift.  Now, at 33 weeks, I feel safe.  I feel we are in the "clear" and that I will not fail.
I anticipate her birth in a way I never have before.  I want to see her- pink, screaming, chubby, ten-toed, dark-haired, in the arms of her mother.  The moment of my joy will not be the moment when she comes out screaming, but the moment that she is placed in her mother's arms- the moment I see a healthy, whole and perfect child in the arms of love.  Can you imagine the vision of wholeness I will be privvy to?  I cannot wait.

6 weeks, 5 days, and counting...

28 weeks already :)

Well, in good news, we are having a very boring pregnancy!  Isabella is growing strong, I am gaining weight like an athlete on steroids, and everything is normal.  Isabella's parents came up on Friday for a 3D/4D ultrasound.  I didn't know what made an ultrasound 4D until the tech explained that 3D was seeing the baby with color and "regular" shape, and 4D was the movement.  So, her parents now have a video of her playing and pictures of her in color.  What we know about Isabella now:  She has a perfect button nose, beautiful lips, big eyes, all of her fingers, and some amount of hair on her head already.  What we already knew, but enjoyed watching:  She is a wiggle worm!  When the ultrasound began, she was head down and by the time it ended, she was transverse (sideways) with her head buried in my hip.  I had never seen a baby this big move around so quickly.  She stopped moving for a few minutes, but the constant prodding of the ultrasound detector kept her moving in protest. 

I enjoyed watching Isabella, but mostly I enjoyed watching her parents.  I loved to see their faces when they recognized a part of her, or when they discussed whose lips she has.  Everything that was cute and fascinating to me was miraculous to her parents.  The best part of being a surrogate is being able to watch pregnancy become real and tangible to a family that didn't think they would get to be part of this process. 

My Katie commented the other night that this pregnancy is going so much faster than the last one.  I feel the same way.  I, of course, just refer to my skinny ankles when asked how this pregnancy is going.  Last night, for the first time this pregnancy, I went to turn to check behind me as I pulled out of the driveway and I couldn't- the belly is finally in the way. 

I am enjoying this one little girl.  I am enjoying getting to know her personality and smile at the thought of her keeping her parents up all night long, since she is a night owl.  Jason has a habit of tapping on my belly, and she taps back.  It is as if they have a game together and he is helping her practice for future pat-a-cake games with her dad.  We are, after all, a surrogate family. 

My kids don't always love that I do this, but sometimes they say such awesome things, and I know that they see the goodness of their contribution to another family.  I talked to my boys for the first time last week about Emma, Isabella's big sister.  They are so wise in their innocence, and understand what a loss her parents feel, and how special it is that Isabella will always have big sister watching over her.  We are able to not only help give a child to a family, but at the same time we are able to gain understanding and appreciation for the many blessing that we have.

I am always so excited to reach the end of our journey so that my IPs will have their child in their arms.  But after my last journey, I know that the end is bittersweet.  Sweet in these parents holding a healthy, living child in their arms. Bitter in the end of such an amazing and beautiful experience.  I cannot even describe my joy at having such amazing IPs, both my last IPs and my current IPs.  I have friends who have never heard back on how their surro children are doing.  I am in contact with my surrotwins and their awesome family, and I have such involved IPs now, and it is truly a blessing to my family.
I have 12 more weeks scheduled with Isabella.  I am going to grow her as strong and healthy as I am able.  And when she decides to make her debut, I will be so content, so happy, and so appreciative of the amazing parents who will be by my side, ready to welcome her with open arms.

Rutabegas, not children, for Thanksgiving

So, nobody really knows what a rutabega is, I mean come on!  But that is what Babycenter has decided to compare Isabella to at 25 weeks.  She is about 1 1/2 pounds now, which is roughly the weight of a rutabega.  She is growing so quickly, but I think she seems so small.  I pulled up a picture of me pregnant with the twins at 24 weeks and am going to compare it to the one I took a week ago at 24 weeks- and then you will see why I feel so small!

Isabella at 24 wks                                                

                 Twins at 24 wks

I feel wonderful, aside from some heartburn and an inability to bend, my body is doing well (I think it is just praising me for not putting in twins again ;).  The crazy pregnant lady hormones are out in full swing, but I can live with those.  Isabella is still moving and happy, or so I always imagine her to be.  She is so easy to get along with and so peaceful.  I hope she stays this way for her parents.
Last Tuesday my surrotwins turned one.  Their mother had sent me a picture of them from Halloween (they were Thing 1 and Thing 2 from Dr. Seuss) and they are beautiful.  I think they grow cuter every day, and they have such charming smiles.  Sometimes, I have amazing surrogate moments.  For example, I kept thinking their birthday was on the 19th, and I finally had to ask Jason what the date of their birth actually was!  Obviously, that is information that moms keep track of, so it was just another reminder of how completely I am their not-mother.  I look at those children the same way I look at all babies I love, and I wonder that they grew inside of me for nine months.  I wonder at the miracle of God that He saw fit to allow me to carry children and never doubt who they belong to. 
Yesterday, my children left for a Thanksgiving trip with their father.  I was sad all week leading up to their departure, and I feel like a piece of me is gone.  Divorce is such an evil beast, but sometimes necessary and sometimes it brings good.  One of the ironic good things it has brought is that my love for my children is so strong.  So many parents wish for a "break" from their kids.  Well, I get mandatory breaks from my kids, and I realize every time they leave how very much I love them, how very much they are a part of my heart, and how very devastated I would be without them.  I am sure the pregnancy hormones don't help at all, but I just miss them.  Thanksgiving is one of my favorite holidays, and I will enjoy the blessings I have, and praise God that He has given me my children.  So, even though I won't have them on this certain date, I have them in my life.
My greatest blessing is that I am a mother.  I can never pay back the gratitude I feel to God for this gift.  All I can do is pay it forward, and help other women becomes mothers as well. 
My husband is coming home.  He just drove all around town looking for the movie we wanted to watch.  I will climb in his lap (and enjoy the last few weeks I fit) and he will hold me.  When my children are gone, I still have his warmth to remind me that I am not alone- even if it otherwise just me and the rutabega.

A mango, two dogs, and three monkeys

Isabella is a mango this week.  Well, obviously she really isn't a mango, but she is roughly the weight of one ( 1 pound) according to babycenter.com.  Every week, I get an update comparing her to some kind of fruit or vegetable.  Then, her mother and I can talk about her "little mango".  Isabella is a wiggly, tumbly, bouncy little girl.  I love it when I am at work teaching, or sitting in a meeting, and I feel a "bump", "Thump", "BAM" in my belly.  I love to know that she is thriving and playing and happy.  I am gaining weight like mad this pregnancy.  6 pounds last month, and 5 each month before.  That puts me up at least 20 pounds so far- and we are barely past the halfway mark.  So, 23 weeks and counting... this pregnancy is going so well that I often forget she is in here- until she wakes up and starts to play :)
Two dogs are currently racing around my house trying to prove their dominance over each other.  Whisper is here for the week, so our (very new and very young and very hyperactive) dog Charlie-the-crazy-border-collie has a cohort to wreak havoc on my home with.  They both drive me nuts, but they entertain the children, which brings me to...
My three precious monkeys.  I don't know if it is pregnancy-induced hormones, or just me, but the kids were with their father the last two weekends, and both weekends, I just wanted to cry.  It has always been so easy to have those mom moments where I am screaming in my head, "I need a break!", but now that I have spent so many weekends and summer weeks alone without my children, those moments always come with a grain of salt.  I realize now how fleeting my time with my children is.  I never know how much longer I will have them, how much longer God's grace will allow me to be so blessed, or how quickly the remaining years of their childhood will fly by. 
They are growing up so fast, so smart, so talented, so beautiful.  I look at them sometimes and just think, "of all the things I could have done in this life, I chose this."  And I look at the chaos of my home, and I listen to them screeching and hollering and squealing, and I smell popcorn that nobody is watching burn in the microwave, and I think about all the places they need to go tomorrow and the things that must be done by week's end, and I realize, "this is exactly what I was meant to do; this is exactly who I was meant to be."
I cannot imagine my life without them.  I do not hide from them that Katie was nearly here when I married her father, or that I think getting pregnant at eighteen is a very bad idea.  But, I tell them, with all honesty, that I chose to be a mother the day I chose to keep her.  I tell them that I did want other things and I did have other plans, but that I wanted to be their mom waaayyy more than I wanted any of those other things.  I tell them I had made a deal with Heavenly Father when I was a little girl that if I could only do one thing on this Earth, I wanted to be a mom.  And I know with Katie's coming, He was holding me to my end of our deal.  And He has held true to His.  I have my children.  Every day, I see them grow.  Every night, I kiss them goodnight.  Every moment of my life, I am a mother.  
So, when people look at my surrogacy journeys as a sign that I am totally insane, I am flabbergasted.  I was given the miracle of being a mom.  I was given the gift to be able to carry a child safely into this world.  I would choose being a mother- in fact, I did, choose to be a mother- over anything else.  So, my question, really, to those women who look at me like I am nuts is, "how could you not?"  How could you not want to help another woman know the joy that you get every day? 
  Really, am I the one who is crazy?  Or am I the one with compassion, with courage, with love in my heart?
Most of the people I talk to about surrogacy say, "Oh, I could do that for my sister, or my best friend, but not for a stranger."  Well, I happen to believe that God created all of us and we are brothers and sisters.  So, you know what, I am doing this for my sister.  I am doing this for another child of God, another woman who wants to be a mother just as desperately as I did. 
I sit here with a mango-baby in my belly, two dogs running amuck, and three children eating a bedtime snack.  It is probably chaos.  It is probably too noisy for any of these thoughts I am having to be coherent. But, I am smiling through my tears of gratitude.  I am humbled that I have such great blessings.  I am humbled by the grace of God that allows me such joy. 

Growing Isabella

When we were 12 weeks into this pregnancy, we had a high tech ultrasound to check the baby and make sure that the baby was growing normally, and to ensure that this baby had no birth defects looming in the future or any developmental problems.  For a couple who has been through so many trials and so much pain, this was very important.  I was just excited to see the baby on a fancy monitor!
Everything with the ultrasound went smoothly.  The baby was moving around a lot for being so tiny.  We were totally unprepared for the doctor to ask A if she wanted to know the baby's gender.  She said yes.  He said, "Give me two name."  A said, "Isabella" and "Mateo".  The doctor said, "Mateo is a beautiful name-"  and A interrupted, "It's a boy?!", and I interrupted, "I knew it!".  And the doctor smiled and finished, "Mateo is a beautiful name, but you will have to save it for later, this is Isabella."  And A started to cry.  Her mother, who was in with us, started to cry.  And I, well, I was surprised that I was wrong (haha, I had thought it was a boy!).
For this appointment, A's parents were up visiting from Mexico.  I had met her mother before, but not her father.  Her mother was as sweet as always.  She told me how wonderful I was, how young I looked, and other words of kindness.  She told me how happy she was that I was doing this for her daughter.  She is a beautiful lady who carries herself so well and speaks so kindly, I see her so much in her daughter, and it makes me love her too.  At this visit, A's father said to me something to the effect of how much he appreciated what I was doing for his family, how much it meant to his daughter, and more.  He did not say many words, and my lack of ability in speaking Spanish made it impossible to respond with anything at all meaningful after he just poured out his soul, but the intent of his words, the love behind his words, and the raw emotion I saw in his face will never leave my mind.  His words touched me so much, I hope that he understands how much those words mean to me.  I hope one day I will be able to find the words in his language to tell him that it honors me to bring his grandchild here.  That it honors me that his daughter and son-in-law chose me.  That it honors me to share this miracle with them.

After our appointment, and in thinking about it, I realized that it might be important to A and H to have a little girl since the child they lost was a girl  I don't know, but it just feels right that they will have another daughter.  I know that she will carry a piece of her sister's spirit with her back to Earth, and that her sister will always be watching over her.  This touches my heart, and I know that E is watching to make sure I take good care of her little sister.  
In the meantime, I will be here growing Isabella for her waiting family.  Grow strong Isabella, grow strong.

Drugs suck even worse the second time around

In May we started drugs.  Estrace, nine gadzillion other kinds of drugs, and, pills, pills, pills... And then by June we had moved on to the fun stuff, namely progesterone and shots, needles, ouch.  Apparently my body remembered the needles because it bruised up right away, and I bled on a very regular basis when I gave myself shots.  I mostly think this is because (TMI warning) I have so many spider veins- maybe varicose veins- in my butt and thighs after having the twins.  Whatever the reason, my body was much wiser this time and let me know those needles were unwelcome!
We had an amazingly quick cycle, everything went really well, and in the middle of June (yes, it would be awesome if I remembered this stuff, I do remember it was a Tuesday ;), we transferred two beautiful embryos.  A, my IM (the baby's mama), was able to go in with me while we went through the super fun procedure. 
I stayed with A and H the night after transfer.  A made food, and we sat around talking and getting to know each other.  She made wonderful food, and I was able to look at pictures of their families.  I was able to see pictures of their daughter, and I determined in that moment that they would have a living child.  I looked at the refrigerator door, which contained pictures of when they were happy.  H said that the pictures were there to remind A of happiness, and that they would have happiness again.  And in that moment, I determined that A would only cry happy tears.  And that is my goal.
I peed every day during the two week wait, watching the line grow darker and darker.  A & H (mom and dad) didn't want to know what the pee tests said, so I just took a picture of the one that said "pregnant" and waited until beta day (the real blood test). 
Once we had positive numbers from the doctor, I sent A the picture that said "positive" because seeing the word is soo much better than hearing "242", right?
Our numbers were about the same as they were with the twins, so I was terrified that I would be carrying another set of twins, A was overjoyed at the thought of twins, but I trusted that God would do what was right.
At 6 weeks, we had an ultrasound and saw one perfect little bean growing in one perfect little sac and heard one perfect little heartbeat.  I knew that A and H had wanted twins, so I felt bad at my relief to only have one, but I was still happy and they were too- for one is so much safer to carry, and they have had too much risk in becoming parents so far.
A cried, and I smiled.  For her, tears are a sign of joy.  For me, her tears are a sign that all is well.  So far, I have only seen happy tears. 

How I met her parents

It has been so long since I have been able to write in my blog about surrogacy- well, specifically, that I am in the middle of another journey!
After I delivered the twins, I was not only overjoyed at their safe journey to life, but, honestly, I was sad that it had ended.  As a surrogate, there is so much time and concern invested in carrying another family's child to their arms.  It is a blessing, a calling, and a privelege.  Within a month of their birth, I knew that I would do another journey.
Luckily, I am married to an amazing man.  When I said to Jason, "I want to do another surrogacy," he didn't say no, or let's wait, or tell me I was off my nut.  He simple said, "I know, and I want you to."  It is the most amazing feeling to know that I have a husband who loves me, understands me, and not only sees my dreams, but is willing to support me and love me as I strive to fulfill them.  Without him supporting me, I would never be able to be and do all that I want to.  With him in agreement, I was off...
It was the end of January when I walked into the restaurant.  I was certain that I wouldn't like these people, certain that nothing could go as well as it did with my first journey, and certain that it would take much more time and many more such meeting before I could find a couple that I would be comfortable working with. 
I knew that I would trust my gut, and when I walked into the room with Jason, I saw a beautiful couple looking hopefully and expectantly at me.  We had a wonderful conversation and talked for much longer than I thought seemed reasonable.
 I learned that their daughter, whose name is precious to me, died the day she was born of complications that nobody realized existed until she was already here.  I watched as this woman's eyes filled with tears as she began to tell me the story- realizing belatedly that I had asked the wrong question.  I asked her to stop; I did not want to bring up pain on a day that should have been about hope.   I remember her face as she said, "no, I am fine" and continued to tell me the story.  As I remember her telling me about her child, I remember her pain, but mostly I remember the love for her child, her determination to have a living child, and her hope for the future- to bring her child a little sibling. 
As we drove to the hotel, I told Jason, "It shouldn't be this easy."  And he knew what I meant.  I did not expect to find another couple to work with so quickly, but this couple had won my heart.  Instead of despair, they held a memory.  Instead of fear, hope.  Instead of grief, action.  Instead of sorrow, promised joy.  They were perfect for me, and I know they will be amazing parents.
Within an hour, I had called to say, "If they will have me, I am in!"
And, fortuitously, they decided that they were in too, and here we are.