But Do They Like Me Like Me, Like I Like Them?

Oh my goodness, oh my goodness.  I was all prepared to be patient and not get word back about P and M's response to my profile until Monday.  I mean, some people aren't moms and get days off, right?  So, to say I was pleasantly surprised to receive an email from my director saying P & M want to send my med records off to their doctor for approval, and from there, we'll move on to a conference and then a Magical Match Meeting!!!  So, I'm thinking that means they like me.  :)  I mean, it's not quite the "Are you kidding?  She's amazing!  We love her and want her to have our baby(ies) immediately!" that I was hoping for, but it'll do. ;)

No idea how long it will take the doctor's office to review my records, but that's what particular flavor of waiting we're doing right now.  I am rather nervous about this wait too, of course.  This doctor has already said no to one surro, and I don't know why.  The agency just said this doctor is apparently very strict.  So now I'm wracking my brain to try and imagine anything in my records that would paint me as anything less than a perfect incubator.

And then, the conference call...  Eek.  I think I'm more worried about the conference call than the eventual Lupron shots, and that's saying a lot.  But I am not what you would call "at ease" on the phone with new people.  In general, I battle a cripple shyness from my youth, but I am a lot better these days, especially with Tony to lean on.  But, on the phone, that's a different story.  I literally write a script when I'll be calling a new person.  So this is intimidating.  But my director has promised to give me a thorough pregame on the call, and I hope P & M will give me the benefit of the doubt if I come off like a blathering idiot.  Oh, and I'll also need to make the call from my sister's land line, because we've been getting ridiculously poor reception in our house as of late, and I'm sure that 70% of the call consisting of "How about now?  Can you hear me now?" will not make a positive impression.

I'm so excited about the possibility of P & M becoming *my* IFs.  This could really be happening!  Then testing, contracts, preheating and baby-making!  Could this really possibly happen by July/August, the time period during which I would prefer to get knocked up?! (Not that I'm terribly particular, but that would mean I don't have to be huge during blazing hot summers.)

I hope you're all having a fantastic weekend!

I Like Them, I Really Like Them!

This morning, whilst running around, I was thinking that a nice thing about the wait is that you never know when that awesome email will be landing in your email box, and that makes everyday potentially magic.  As it turns out, today might be my magical day!

I received Profile #4, IFs from the Bay Area, relatively close to me, and I got so excited reading it.  I really think these are my IPs.  They've been together for 13 years (They met at Oxford, how cool is that?), and this is the first profile I've received of a couple that was presented as a unit, where "This is us, and we want kids," while the other profile (with the exception of the single IF, of course) were more like, "This is me, I want kids and my partner is okay with it."  They seem to want a moderate amount of contact, but I'm hoping once they see how awesome I am, I'll be beating 'em off with a stick.  ;)  I'm not sure how much else to share about their profile, but I can tell you, after reading it, my husband had his first remotely positive reaction to a profile, and went so far as to say, "They are great."  After giving my sister some high points, she said, "Wow, they're perfect for you!"  And I hope they feel the same way.

So now a new wait begins, one that I'm feeling especially nervous about because now I'm the one up for judgment.  I keep wracking my brain, trying to remember my profile, trying to think if there's anything in there that would turn them off.  So tomorrowish, they should be getting my profile, and, if they like me, my medical records will be sent to their doctor.  Wherein more nerves lie, because the doctor has apparently already turned down the first surro they were matched with.  Then, if all that goes swimmingly, we will set up a phone call or meeting.  And THEN, if we all still like each other, and I'm not to old to be a surro at that point, then we'll be matched!  I have no idea how long that all will take, but I'm hoping we're finally on the road to baby!

Another plus, hopefully, is that they already have frozen embryos, so there will be not waiting for finding an egg donor and to screen her and sync our cycles.  So, if I understand this process, once we're matched, Tony and I do our screenings, we do contracts and then maybe make babies!  Wow!  Can't WAIT!

I Hate Technology

Just stayed up half hour past my bed time to have Blogger crash when I hit publish. Boo! Most important point, P and M have my profile and I am...waiting. :-)  Maybe a rewrite tomorrow. Night!

Call from Boss Lady

Sitting here, amongst a growing pile of dirty dishes, blogging.  :)  It's been a crazy day, and a crazy week, and I am determined to sit here for a few more minutes, guilt-free, and enjoy the quiet, me-time.  Okay, maybe just a little guilt.

The director of my agency called me today, not only to discuss IF#3, but to discuss my IP search in general.  She said she wanted to have a conversation to get a better feel for what I was looking for, and when I apologized for being difficult, she assured me I wasn't, and expressed how important she feels it is to match their surros with IP(s) they feel passionate about.  She said, the IPs get something tangible, a baby, and "all" the surros get is the journey, so she wants to make sure it's a good one for them, so I felt pretty positively in general about the conversation, and the attitude of my agency (I never felt negatively about them, I just worried they were getting annoyed with me, but that's a common fear I have in a variety of situations).

We did discuss my issues with IF#3, and she totally understood my concerns, but says that, over the phone, he comes off as an incredibly friendly person (which does not translate to the page).  If I was comfortable with it (and I am), she said she would have another conversation with him and address my concerns, and get back to me later this week.  I feel like I'm a person who expresses themselves, generally, very well through my writing.  Could be he's exactly the opposite.  I'm willing to give him the benefit of the doubt.  :)

This is What I Get...

For making such sweeping proclamations about decisions in my last post.  Well, I did make a decision, but it didn't quite work out like I hoped.

Instead of "early" this week, I received the profile I've been all aflutter about Thursday morning.  And it was not quite what I'd been hoping for.  I identified a lot more with the parenting ideals of IF#3, and he seems like he'll be a fantastic dad, and his future child(ren) are going to have an amazing extended family, but he does not seem like he has any interest at all in an ongoing relationship with his surro, and seemed more like he was looking to hire an employee.  And that is not the situation I'm looking for.  And could be he just came across poorly in the profile, or he hasn't considered the possibility of a long-term friendly relationship with his surro, and doesn't realize that a lot of surros are interested in that.

But it made me realize how much I liked the things IF#2 had to say about himself, and what he wanted in a surro, even though he's in China.  So I asked to arrange a phone interview with him.  Turns out he's been matched.  Boo! That's what I get. :-(

I expressed my concerns about IF#3 to my agency, and they agree he comes across poorly on paper, but seems a lot warmer in person, so they want to talk to me further about him on Monday (would have done it today, but my family and I have been enjoying the wondrous natural beauty of Big Sur, which apparently does not include cell towers).  So another weekend in a level of surro limbo.  :-)  But I'll be spending it with my family, enjoying the amazing weather in Santa Cruz and San Francisco.  I love my state.  :-D

Decision incoming in 5...4...

The director of my agency emailed me yesterday to let me know she met with a single IF this past week, from the Bay Area, just an hour or two away, and she should have his profile for me early next week. 

Originally, I chose not to see the profile of single men, and I have thought a lot about it since then.  I think a lot of that was me projecting; I can't imagine raising our kids without my husband to lean on.  Yes, as a stay-at-home-mom, I do a large percentage of the day-to-day stuff, but most seconds of the day I'm looking forward to him being home.  And he happily jumps right into the kid-wrangling as soon as he walks in the door (as if the kids and I give him any choice).  And, admittedly, we are very codependent.  We prefer to spend just about all of our free time together.  So, no, I wouldn't want to do this (any of this, this life thing) without my crazy amazing partner.

But, ya know, that's me, I've come to realize.  Not everyone wants or needs that.  Maybe they just haven't met "The One" yet, or, maybe, like my mom, they were born to be parents, but not partners.  My patents have been divorced since I was in second grade, and I think everyone would agree it was about damn time.  Since then,  my mom has briefly dated for approximately one short period of time.  Otherwise, she has been more than happy to spend her time and energy almost solely on her children, and now her grandchildren.  On the rare occasions she goes out, she always gets hit on, even now, so it's not a lack of options that keeps her single, she's just happier this way.  She very much prefers things her way, and has no desire to compromise that or to spend her time any differently than she does now.  And let me tell you, she's done an amazing job raising 3 children on her own.  *Maybe* she was (is) a little overprotective, but I count myself lucky everyday that she's my mom, and I have never wished for things to be any different.

So, why was I, of all people, hesitant to work with a single person?  I'm living proof that children of single parents can grow up to be freakin' awesome.  When it was mentioned to me that the profile of a single man might become available soon, I really started ruminating on these thoughts, and I've decided that if someone wants a child this dearly, I'm not the partner police.  I will be happy to help create a family, even if it's a little smaller than I had originally envisioned because I know, from personal experience, the child would be no less loved than a child of two parents.

So, I'm really excited about seeing D's profile in the next few days.  He's a local IF, which is what I've been waiting for, so very patiently, the past few weeks. Now, of course, I don't know D yet, and we could have nothing in common (I'm hoping that's not the case), but I'm hoping that seeing his profile, a local profile, will give me the confidence and comfort to make a decision one way or another.  Maybe this will make me realize that I really do feel a connection to B, my last international profile. Or maybe I'll realize I just need to wait some more.  I'm really keeping my fingers crossed against that option. I really do want to get this adventure started, but I don't want that to push me into any decisions.

Hope to have a positive decision sometime this week!

Waiting, and Thinking, and Thinking, and Waiting

So, at this point, I have received two profiles of IFs, both from the same country (not this one), and, while I did feel a greater connection to the second profile, I'm still not sure they're "the ones."  How cliche does that sound?  I know, I know.  But you have to understand, I research and carefully plan just about every decision I make.  And this one is pretty damn major.

Right now I'm trying to decide how important it is to me to have IF(s) that can attend OB appointments and surro-babies whose birthdays I could possibly attend (if I were invited).  Or will it be enough for me to see pictures and follow Facebook feeds?  I know I should have thought this part through completely before filling out my app, but my surro journey is lacking a how-to manual.  :-) 

I've asked my agency to send me a more local profile when they get one, to see if I feel the spark there.  I figure I can hold out a week or two, before my desire to get this show on the road outweighs my desire to experience that magical, perhaps mythical match feeling. And I've heard from more than fellow surro that they had a hard time getting a feel for international IPs through their profiles, but once they spoke with them, they were in love. I really appreciate everyone sharing their experiences, since, like I mentioned, my how-to guide was lost in the mail.

So, am I waiting for a certainty that someone as analytical as myself will never experience, or is having IFs on this continent really that important to me? These are the thoughts that will be occupying my brain for 85% of the next few weeks or so.

Not the ones for me

.Yesterday I received my first IP (Intended Parent) profile.  I was so excited to get one so soon, but, after reading it, I was a little underwhelmed.  A lot of other surros talk about falling in love with their IPs' profiles, and I just wasn't feeling it.  I don't know if my expectations were too high, but this just didn't seem like my family-to-be.  A big issue is that it seemed like there would be a significant language barrier.  They are an international couple with not great English skills, and I don't know anyone who speaks their language, and that seems like that would be an impediment to the warm, fuzzy relationship we have in my fantasy.  I'm certainly not averse to an international couple, as years of exchange students can attest that we love forming cross-cultural relationships, but I know how frustrating it is to try and convey important information to someone who doesn't quite speak your language, and I don't want to add that to an already complicated situation.  And there were a few other little things about the profile that didn't quite speak to me.

On the other hand, it was hard to say no.  Even if they're not my perfect couple, they still seemed like nice guys who really wanted a child, and I wish I could help everyone.  I hope they find their perfect surro soon.

Also, it's just tempting to get this show on the road.  I know I've hardly even begun the wait, but I know there are waits involved with every little step, and it was so tempting to just hurry up and jump to the next step.  But, knowing me, I would have always doubted it, even if things went mostly smoothly.  I need to trust my instincts and be patient.  I know me, and, as my (current) marriage proves, I know when something is right.  ;-)

So, time to put on my patient panties and get comfy.  :-)

Monday, Monday...

Tomorrow is a busy, busy day for us!  Kizzy has school, I have cake class, gotta pick up Adii, pick up blood test orders, Kizzy has kung fu, and then I have another cake class.  Sometime during the day I should probably feed the children.  I also need to find time to call the kindergarten to discuss Kizzy's assessment, and my Amazon package better get here!  I need it for cake class (This not-having-free-Prime anymore is BS!  I placed this order last Monday!  Waaaahhh, I am so spoiled by free 2 day shipping!).

And, of course, I'm still waiting for that magical match email.  Last I heard, there were possibly two couples for me to check out soon, and...that was last I heard.  I emailed on Friday, hoping to get a little snippet of info before the weekend, but, alas, nothing.  I'll give 'em tomorrow, and then I'll email my original contact, see if she knows what's going on.  I know I should just be grateful I have this much going on so early, but I don't know what's going on with everything, and that's not a situation I like to be in.  If it were just a case of them not having an appropriate match right now, I like to think I could be a little more patient.  Maybe.  :-)  But I feel like I've gotten a little taste of information, and I'm hungry for more!  :-D

Hope you all had a fabulous weekend!