And it begins....

So today is the day that I have decided to start a blog of our experience going down the road of surrogacy in India.  I (and my partner) expect it be frustrating, expensive, exhilarating, stressful and emotional.  But above all life changing.

How did we get here...?  Cue the blurring reality, watery imagery, harp and clock winding backwards...

The journey really started around 9 months ago when a work colleague returned to work after being on parental leave for the previous 6 months.  As I had only commenced my role around 5 months earlier, I had never met this person, but had heard from a number of staff that he and his partner had recently had a baby through a surrogacy arrangement in India.  My partner and I had thought about being parents, although fleetingly, and knowing the various - often inconsistent - laws across Australia, we knew our only real option was to undertake a surrogacy arrangement.  We knew the US was out, purely because of cost.  However, at the time, we had no intention of becoming parents anytime soon so we could worry about that later.  But as I liked to be an informed decision maker, I thought it best to find out as much as possible in advance of any intention to become a parent.

I plucked the courage up to e-mail the unknown work colleague, asking if he would chat about his experience of going down the surrogacy route in India and answer some questions.  Thankfully, he was incredibly open to discussing his experiences and was more than happy to explain the process and answer any questions I might have.  I rose to the challenge and spent an hour practically interrogating him about prices, and how this worked and what happened in that situation.  The hour that I suggested we meet for barely scratched the surface and we soon caught up again to continue our discussion.  Over the next few months, evenings were spent trawling the internet for surrogacy information and e-mailing clinics, while regular coffee shop debriefs with my new found work friend (of course peppered with occasional work gossip), helped me build a strong knowledge base of what to expect from undertaking surrogacy in India.

By November of 2011, I had become a quasi expert on surrogacy, reading copious blogs and Wikipedia articles (the source of all truth) as well as IVF, egg stimulation and the various drugs required to pull off this sort of caper.  My partner and I attended the surrogacy conference in Melbourne run by Gay Dads Australia and Surrogacy Australia to know for sure what we were getting ourselves into.  By this stage, we had read a fair bit about potential changes to Indian laws as well as further intentions of the United Nations to develop a convention around surrogacy (possibly suggesting restrictions should be put in place), leading us to the conclusion that it was either now or possibly never.

After weeks of deliberation and a bunch of e-mails to clinics, we decided on Surrogacy India (SI) as our clinic choice.  As pricing between the 3 major players is fairly consistent these days, along with success rates and services offered, the final decider came down to the responsiveness of SI.  They quickly responded to all of our questions, and unlike one of the other clinics, didn't take offence or become exasperated with our detailed, but very relevant questions.  NB: To date, Dr Ajja has been supportive, responsive and considerate in all of our dealings and we're both looking forward to meeting him imminently.

So, in February 2012 we underwent the barrage of blood and swimmer tests and enrolled with SI.  Thankfully, both of us were good to go and for the first time in my life I finally knew my blood type!  As the weeks progressed we linked up with successful parents in the Ukraine to choose our egg donor (ED) and continued working with SI to choose a surrogate.  By the end of April we had our date for travel to Mumbai.

And....Cue the blurring reality, watery imagery, harp and clock winding forwards.

So here we are today, 10th May 2012.  Tonight/Tomorrow, we find out if our ED has passed all her hormone tests.  The ultrasound of her follicles appears very good according to the doctor and other blood infection screenings have all come back negative.  The surrogate in India has been chosen and the contracts are being prepared as we speak.

So on 4th June 2012 we fly out from Australia, heading to India to hopefully create a new life.

Stay tuned.....