Which way now?

It's been 3 months now since our 4th and final Indian attempt.  The Indian bureaucracy machine is working as expected with the prospect on any resolution regarding unmarried couples access to Indian surrogacy a distant reality now.

Each day, we are glad of our move away from SI.  After our last attempt, we received no correspondence from them until we received this e-mail in early April:

Dear GB & LC,

Greetings of the day!

We have been referred about your blog through a couple and have gone through it. There are some points that we agree upon and have noted it and working on it and some point that we have a different perspective. We wanted to know how you would like to proceed as we have your frozen embryos. If you are confident that you would not like to proceed with us then we would request you to fill up the embryo and semen discard forms.

I think this e-mail sums up the clinic in a nutshell.  Reading between the lines:

1.  We've read the blog and don't care to provide any apology or comment about your claims because we have done nothing wrong
2.  Are you going to pay us more money to cycle again?
3.  If not, fill out the forms to dispose of your embryos/sperm so we no longer have to correspond with you.

At no time have we been contacted by either Dr Yash or Dr Sudhir to discuss our comments or claims.  Their ambivelence is deafening, arrogance obvious and disinterest in their client welfare very clear.  Again, it makes me wonder how SI treat their Surrogates if this is how they treat the "gravy train".

We're not prepared to go down the Thailand route just yet.  The influx of IPs that would have otherwise gone to India worries us about corners being cut and fly-by-the-night operators out to rip people off.  So we're considering domestic options of altrustic traditional or gestational surrogacy.  It might be a little more tricky and time consuming, but at least we'll know that if we do get pregnant the Surrogate will have access to the some of the world's best healthcare and we'll know with absolute assurance that she is not living in a share house or be away from her family.  I'm not saying whether this is good or bad, or if clinics in India are doing anything dodgy, but for our piece of mind it means a lot.

It's great to see that everyone that started blogs around the same time as us, now have 3-4 month old babies exceeding any expectations they ever had of being a parent.  Congratulations to all those that have come before us and endured this incredible and emotional journey.

I am sure our time will come and when it does, I'm sure all the trials and tribulations to get to final destination will become distant memories and parenthood will exceed our expectations too!   


    

So are we pregnant?

Well your guess is as good as ours!

I'm writing from a pretty angry place right now as SI advised us, only after we e-mailed this morning asking when our test results would be available, that the bHCG would only be done today.  The test was supposed to be performed on Saturday.

No e-mail, no phone call - no chance of knowing why there has been a delay unless we e-mailed them to ask what was going on.  And even then, it was a simple one liner late this afternoon saying it will be done today and the result would be provided tomorrow.

And this is what our normal experience has been like with SI since June.  No consideration, no care and no communication.  I recognise the massive opportunity we have being able to access surrogacy in India but we are beginning to face the stark realisation that we have made a monumental fuck up by choosing SI.  From all I've read on other blogs, there are more things to worry about in the process than whether or not the people trying to help you have a baby 1. care, or 2. will bother communicating with you once they have the money deposited.  And really, communication issues are just the tip of the iceberg and leads me to concerns about the other people involved - our surrogate.

Most people experience the emotional highs and lows of surrogacy arising from their attempt at getting pregnant and watching the pregnancy develop.  I feel that we now have the additional burden that if we did get pregnant tomorrow that we have to face with this level(?) of support for a further 8 months.

Over the last few months I refrained from criticising our clinic, thinking the culture is different and our expectations need to be adjusted - and they have.  But the truth is basic communication and consideration are business fundamentals in any country and they are simply not present here.  It is very isolating to feel this way as there are limited options of venting the level of frustration we're experiencing.  Generally family and friends don't understand fully what you're going through, and close friends, while being endlessly supportive, always play the role of trying to keep you positive.  There's no surrogacy ombudsmen, no regulator and no chance that things will improve in the near future for us.

 I read blogs about people going through SCI and can't believe how lucky they are to have a clinic who can communicate effectively and actually talk to them after a negative result.  Following our final bHCG test on our last attempt - there was no correspondence from SI at all until we approached them about another attempt 6 weeks later.  I don't expect a full blow by blow dissection of the what happened from FET to HCG result - but I did expect a phone call or e-mail - saying something along the lines of "We're sorry your received a negative result.  When you're ready to move forward and discuss your approach please contact us and we can have a chat."  We suggested this after our first negative, but alas it has fallen on deaf ears.

I'll end there because as cathartic as this is, I could probably go on for hours.  So thanks for listening and tomorrow we prod again to remind them to send our result...but I can't say at this point in time I'm overly optimistic about the outcome.

GBLC

Deja vu?

Okay - so we're back in the 2WW again for the third time.

We received e-mail confirmation on Tuesday that our embryo transfer occurred on Monday 15th October.

3 buns were put in the oven, all Grade 1, with 1 x 4 cell, 1 x 8 cell and 1 x compacting.

We have also just received the news that some of our friends received the fantastic news that their little one arrived on Tuesday night and have since flown out to Mumbai to meet their new bub.  Congratulations boys!  We look forward to meeting the little tyke once you get back.

The good news keeps coming with an offer being made on our flat in Melbourne - which we have accepted.  So things are looking good at the moment after a very trying few months, both on the Surrogacy front and with some quite unsettling times at work following major restructuring.  Thankfully, we're not directly affected, but the number of colleagues and staff has certainly created an air of low morale, angst and unhappiness - as you would expect! 

Sydney was a great break and we really enjoyed the time out.  The downside was coming back to reality - but there's plenty to look forward to in the next few months and we're hoping that we can add a pregnancy into things to look forward to.

So for now, we wait until 27/28/29 October we we'll get the result of the bHCG test.

Fingers and toes people....fingers and toes!

No Veuve tonight....

The second beta today showed declining HCG levels.... so it seems there'll be no pregnancy this time round.

The little one just didn't want to stick.

So the bottle of Veuve will stay inside the fridge door for a little while longer until we decide what to do next.

Thank you for all your well wishes and we'll see you here again soon.

Cheers

GBLC

Here we go again...(2WW)

Today we received confirmation that the straw of GB's 3 embryos defrosted, reanimating to give us 2 Grade 1 Morulas.

The embryos were transferred on the 16th of August, although we are a little concerned that they weren't Blastocysts as was expected after day 5 and we did expect the clinic would wait the additional day to transfer (as suggested in their correspondence).

While we're trying to stay positive that we'll be successful, the continuing disorganisation and conflicting information coming from our clinic is not instilling a level of confidence one would hope to have at this stage in the surrogacy journey.

I have every hope that the embryos and the surrogate are of good quality and am positive about them - but the people we expect to apply their expertise and skill in the helping us become parents  is beginning to fall far short of expectations.

So today marks the beginning of the two week wait and we should know on the 29th of August if we have been successful.  Fingers, toes and everything else crossed.  Thanks to all those who have been reading the blog and your continued support.


GBLC