Last Friday mama D got a call from the embryo adoption agency saying the embryos she had her eye on were adopted out. I'm so sad for her. She seems at peace with it.
What was special about those embryos is that there were 9 ... all genetically related so she could do sibling journeys with them. also higher chance of baby since if defrosting therea a chance some don't survive thawing as well as if we needed to try multiple cycles we could and wouldn't have to wait for a new adoption.
The problem is they have so many single or double embies. She's hopeing for multiple embryo's.
So in the next week shes searching through California embryo adoptions and if she can't find multiples she'll look outside of CA .. which is tricky cause the further they travel the higher chance of something screwing up and not surviving. So over all caution has to be implimented.
But as my montra in life says .. Everything happens on purpose and as it should be. Her embryos she's meant to have are out there , will be transferred into me and she will have an amazing beautiful baby. Its just a matter of finding them ...
I am at peace with that.
Off the topic .. I will have a minor procedure done today. I have a swollen Bartholonin gland that's turned into a small cyst. I've had it for almost 2 years now. Its not a big deal and It wouldn't affect the surrogacy or pregnancy. But I forsee in pregancy it could get alittle annoying and I think it needs to be drained. And since I'm on a sex fast anyway for the surrogacy I figured I'd go ahead and get it done. ;) (after the procedure you can't have sex for 4 weeks)
So yesterday I got the call that I have been waiting for I've been waiting for over 19 years!!
GOt the go ahead for the first "medication" for my surrogacy journey... something about taking medications makes it more REAL...
So its not like I'm on progesterone day 1 .. surrogacy its a rotation of medications !! Starting with birth control... Seeing as how all my TTC or Surro friends are posting pee sticks I also thought I'd post mine :P along with me BC packet :P
I took the pregnancy test to verify I am not pregnant (not that I thought I was LOL seeing as I'm not another Mary we all read about in the bible) but I think it was more so that I was jealous everyone else was peeing on stick too LOL :P
I love having spiritual experiences! Can I just start out with that? .. well ... I do ... :P
Today I spent at an 8 hour training with a very inspirational friend of mine. His name is DJ ( picture is with him in 2011) and every time I have ever heard him speak, its almost like my spiritual, universe oriented, christ like, GOD ears attune!! and I am very focused on spirit! as personal development guru Dr. Wayne dyer says.- living inspired, by listening TO spirit.
Along with the MANY things I was inspired by today .. I was inspired to help my friend Jill with her personalizing affirmations for her transfer... As I was creating and recording the affirmations I had an overwhelming warmth and peace in my heart, that I recognized as spirit... I love feeling those deeply spiritual connections to the little souls waiting to come!!
**sigh**smile**
I have such peace in my heart in this moment...and I don't want it to go away!
There is no major thing I am posting BTW.. no major surrogacy topic, not major goings on ...
just an experience...
and gratefulness for this peace and calmness I feel.
I have also been asked to do personalized affirmations. Yes I will...
I have thought about cost and I have decided to do them for $40- I will make custom affirmations using your name, and create affirmations specific to your situation :intended fathers, intended mother, intended father,baby- babies, any specific fears or problems releasing allowing for your transfer to go smoothly etc. I will also have you do a few exercises to allow me to help guide you to better affirmations. I normally charge $80 an hour for my energy and therapeutic services and this does take some time to make, record and cut the affirmations. So $40 is a pretty good deal :)
However if you want generic ones that are FREE feel free to download and use these!
Feel free to share them and I hope you enjoy them!
Its something that I have KNOWN is effective in our lives and is a POWERFUL source of energy that we can harness and help our lives. Including our Surrogacy journey's!
I came to the power of affirmations with the labor of my baby DD. I used Hypnobirthing in my labor and came to the strong belief of affirmations. I listened to my Hypno Birth affirmations every night for 2 trimesters!
In Graduate school I learned how affirmations help therapy clients change their perspective of life. If we declare positivity and think positively every 5 positive thoughts negate 1 negative thought. So there fore the more positive affirmations that are put out we will naturally have less negative thoughts.
In my upline's organization in Herbalife we are taught similarly. The more positive you put into the universe the less and less negativity you have. Even moreso the universe Aligns to the intentions of those affirmations.
In my own herbalife business I have seen this happen, both to me and clients!
In the surrogacy I know that the power of Intention and affirmation is a STRONG powerful force that can be used for the greater good!
I pulled out the old Hypnobirthing affirmations for another surro friend and as I was listening to them I realized those affirmations don't really fit surrogacy. There is a lot of "my baby" in them and we need to have a "surro friendly" set of affirmations to listen to to allow the suros to still have the comfort of Affirmations through out the process!
SO Mary's little brain started churning :) I created a nice list of affirmations that will help with the medication IVF and 2WW time period for surro's to listen to. I plan to create Pregnancy and Labor affirmations for Surro's and IP's.
and here is what I created.. I hope you enjoy them!
Please let me know what your favorites are :) and suggestions to improve or to add
I recorded an audio version as well as the written version
2 people went searching.. looking for THE ONE someone to fulfill their dreams and truly make them HAPPY!!! Searching... looking..... getting set up to meet....meeting people online.....meeting in person.... Talking , skyping, texting.... then They meet the "one" they have a feeling about and just have a great emotional connection with and they want to learn more about each other! They soon fall in LOVE with each other. They dote all over each other and tell everyone they know about how AMAZING the other person is!! They talk and text each other daily... they learn the most intimate details about each other. They introduce her to the family..
Then one of them says that SHE is THE ONE they want to commit to!
Eventually they set a date.. the date is what everyone is looking at and excited to have it happen eventually its LEGAL! She is PART of the family! They are a "perfect match!!" They cant wait to get pregnant and start right away! They are ALL on cloud 9 when they find out they're gonna have a baby! They spend the next few months in the honeymoon phase and doting over every detail of the pregnancy and each other !
You rarely see either of them not smiling.. they are both SO excited and happy!
Miscarriage may happen but they are both there for eachother and are there for the ups and downs!
They come to all the Dr's appointments and she feels like she will be in their lives forever!
The baby comes and the parents come and take their baby.. they are grateful for her but the texts end, the calls stop and she is abruptly not in their life... they are busy with their baby and are forever grateful for her bringing life to their child they respect and love her for that.
Their calls and texts become less frequent and she falls into the role of auntie that lives in another state that gets called every once in a while and eventually months pass without calls, then years... She is at peace she is fulfilled in helping them be happy and have a baby...
Doesn't this story kinda feel like dating, marriage and divorce ?? ... it does.. but its the story of a surrogate...
On one of the surro groups I'm on one of the girls asked the experienced surro's to tell her how it "really is."
As I was reading the responses some of them expressed they missed the frequent calls/ texts, the relationship with their IM's changed, some expressed being lonely in the hospital after the birth, all knew that everyone was loved, but their dynamics just changed... I got to thinking that as a therapist I specialize in Divorce therapy and teaching the "new roles" and Dynamics when you are not longer focused on each other but more focus on the kids.
My feelings...
Granted I have yet to have a surro baby. However I can see how these feelings can hurt none the less. I think that if I know the dynamics change in advance it will help prepare me for it. Being AWARE of the feelings and having a set plan for the future allows the surro (and the IP's) to prepare for the dynamic change :)
I am personally so excited for the day that I deliver MaMa D's baby and she is sitting across the room snuggling on her baby and I'm on the other side of the room snuggling on my daughter. I think that will truly make me SO full filled :) One of my surro friends posted a picture of her IM from when she had her baby.. and WOW .. the look on her face just makes ALL the surrogacy worth it! Honestly my favorite Surro mom/ IM/ baby pic I've EVER seen!
I think it is important to establish an AFTER plan as well as when you planned the HONEYMOON phase... This is great to establish how the relationship change goes before it happens.
How do you feel your experience (or if you haven't done it yet how you anticipate) relationships will happen for you ? What are/were YOUR desires? Thoughts?
WOW so today was a tearful and SUrro filled day...
So I was on a high yesterday from passing the Psychological (I wasn't worried I wouldn't, but it was a "big deal" according to the lawyer) but today took the cake Thus far!!
So this morning Mama D had her Appt with the fertility clinic. They told her they are accepting all of my testing and if I can get a Dr here to monitor my uterus lining thickening (I don't know how correct that phrasing is but you know what I mean) that they wont need to see me till transfer.
The dr also even went over my options for the progesterone.. I can chose either the shot, or a suppository in combination with a nasal spray (I haven't heard of the nasal spray but I guess the Dr says it makes the suppository more effective) Whatever no problem!! I haven't decided which I want t have yet.
Eeeeeee :) I am so excited :)
So I messaged my doctor (I have a pretty awesome Dr... advantages to living in a small town right!) and he said yep he sure can! He is also the local fertility Dr too so it works out well :)
I cant express how exciting that has all been for me!! I cannot WAIT to help Mama D's baby happen!!
OK so after that was all squared, I called the health insurance company to make sure it was all good cause they mailed me something they needed. Apparently my insurance started on the first :) but I just needed to change the billing info to MaMa D ... so THAT was all done!!
Then an Herbalife friend of mine is also a life insurance agent so I called her and MaMa D said lets just get it done and in place to make it more efficient. (I love how we have that same feeling of efficiency!) SO we called her up and got it all done too.
So now the only thing to wait on is Legal (which she emailed her lawyer today to get her going on our contract.)
I was telling her I was hoping to get on BC meds in the next couple weeks and I would love to transfer end of September. She said she thinks it will likely be early October. Either way .. it will be happening soon :)
HYPOTHETICAL HERE!! (I love to think of things like this!!)
If I transfer October 14th , putting me at "2-3 weeks pregnant" depending on the age and progression of our embies. Thats a good week for me cause its "fall break" for my daughters school and she can help while I'm on bedrest after transfer. I am in vegas for an Herbalife thing 11-13th and thats where I fly out of any way :)
Major dates IF we transfer then:
That would put the due date of the baby(s) at June 14th ....
2 ww starts Oct 14
5 day pee stick Oct 19th
Beta testing likely Oct 26-28th ish
Heart beat ultrasound around Nov 4 (6 weeks) Nov 11th (7 weeks) or Nov 18th (8 weeks)
Dec 25th end of first trimester :)(13 weeks)
Feb 10th would be 20 weeks HALF WAY MARK!! so it would also be the gender ultrasound and ultrasound checking for heart problems, development and body development (if her embryo's weren't tested ahead of time)
April 7th is 30 weeks (which is when I'd go to California for multiples)
May 19 is 36 weeks (which is when I'd go out to California for singleton baby) (which is perfect for KK getting out of school! cause school gets out 2 weeks later so she wont miss much and will be able to turn her assignments in online)
As I make this calendar of events that may or may not happen I want to remind ya'll of the power of intention! and the more you solidify something with the universe the better it reacts and helps make it happen!!
I know its poor humor... but its true.. I'm not psycho in any way and I've got the papers to prove it LOL sorry therapist humor... I have my Psych Eval and the Psychologist that did it with actually said it was a pleasure to work with me and that I have the "perfect perspective" on being a surrogate... and have no signs of psychosis...
Not shocked :P
Its just funny having another person doing the history and the questions and giving the test. She used another test that I haven't seen before.. it was like 350 questions in comparison to the MMPI's 30-40 I feel it was more through .. however monotonous in the question asking.
But I'm glad that is done and we are ready to proceed forward with our paperwork to get a calendar started with the clinic :) I foresee the next couple weeks should go fast with legal and clinic stuff ;) and cross fingers on meds in 2-3 weeks!!! Aunt flo arrives on the 20th so I'm hoping we can get on a natural cycle... but it also depends on her adoption of the embryos too.
Before going into this deep conversation of birthing that is always a heated debate especially by natural birthers I want to update everything with my personal Journey:
Today I received 3 emails...
One from the therapist doing my psychological .. It has been postponed to Tuesday .. sad face .. but thats OK I'm happy to have it done soon :)
One from the insurance company saying I have been approved for the insurance through underwriting and that I just need to call in to arrange the billing for my IM :)
One from the fertility clinic saying they received all my paperwork and lab results and everything looks great, just waiting on Dr's official approval.
so YEAH !!!! everything is MOVING ALONG WELL !!
OK so today's subject I want to address simply because I want to educate. The title is not to demean of belittle those that chose hospital birth, but more to educate on the statistics, and possibly open the discussion of hospital birth VS natural birth VS home birth.
IP's have ad thier share of broken hearts and babies that haven't been able to come to their arms! I posted this blog and WOW I had quite a back lash, honestly made me wonder if they actually READ the post.
So let me clarify:
#1 I would do hospital birth if told I needed to deliver in a hospital, or even if my IP's would prefer it
#2 Midwives transfer to the hospital for complications,
#3 Complications and death in connection with natural birth or home birthing is DRASTICALLY LOWER than a medicated birth.
#4 1/3 of european births are home births and of the 2/3rds that use hospitals or birthing centers 2/3rds are natural births and have HALF of the infant mortality rate of the US. Leading conclusions to show that it has benefits the baby. If both IP's and Surro are on board with it.
#5 I dont think less of those that do hospital and medicated birth's
This comes from the CDC (center for disease control, statistics). :
Home births have a lower risk profile than hospital births.
The percentage of home births that were preterm was 6%, compared with 12% for hospital births (Figure 6).
The percentage of home births that were low birthweight was 4%, compared with 8% for hospital births.
Less than 1% of home births were multiple deliveries, compared with 3.5% of hospital births.
The lower risk profile of home births
Natural Birthing.. is there a place in Surrogacy for HOME BIRTH and Natural, Unmedicated birth's?
I don't care if you prefer hospital or home birth... its the birthing mother's choice of where to birth, and yes the IP's need to want to be on board as well... but ultimately its about the health of the baby. But lets educate ourselves what IS "best for the baby" right ? After all we have all worked so hard to help this baby exist. I hear arguments about why "risk" the baby. If the baby is at risk the midwife will send the laboring woman to the hospital, period. However 99% of home births have no complications.
Here is my Birthing History with my girls that have molded my views:
When I had my oldest daughter (KK). I did what I was told and got an OB. I was 19 and expected to go in the hospital, be induced, listen to the doctor, sit and push and the baby would be whisked away to drink a bottle and eventually come back to me wrapped up all pretty.
I scheduled my induction, to allow for planning in my family. I went into the hospital the night before at 4:00 because there was only 12 L&D labor rooms and they had 10 full and wanted to make sure I could have a bed the next day. I was supposed to get started on my pitocin at 6am the next morning but my body naturally went into labor that night. at 2 AM I woke up my friend so that she could tell my nurse I was uncomfortable. She realized I was in active labor and quickly gave me pitocin to "push it along" .. after all I thought thats what you do. she gave em a shot of Vicodin to "let me relax" and I went to bed. I woke up at 4 AM really hurting. She ordered an epidural, because after all thats just what is done right? Even with the epidural I could still feel pain, however I just couldn't move then! SO I was STUCK! I couldn't feel half of my body and I just thought it was just how an epidural felt, after all I hadn't had one before. I was given IV fluids, to keep me hydrated. and I had my water broken at 7:00 AM At 7:15 KK was born. I had a birth plan NOTHING on my birth plan was carried out.. I wanted to see her born, I wanted to have her on my tummy right away. She was left on the table for over 10 minutes. by herself. I kept asking for my baby and no one would give her to me and I was ignored. Watching the video is so sad... It breaks my heart thinking of KK's birth.. honestly her birth was torture and I had no control of my birthing at ALL. For heavens sake no one said anything to me after I had the baby, I layed there when my mother and the OB was delivering the placenta yacking about the election, as i begged for my baby to be put in my arms and no one ever responded to me! for over 10 precious minutes! She eventually came to me after they weighed her, and gave her a bath (without me there).. I was THEN allowed to bond with my baby.
I look back on the videos of my birth of my KK vs my Video's of DD's birth they are NIGHT AND DAY!
I don't BLAME anyone but myself for this occurrence, as I didn't EDUCATE myself and learn there was another choice.. I didn't even KNOW I had another option or choice. . Ultimately the interventions including the bottle given to her after her bath (before she was given to me) caused her to be a lazy sucker and ultimately have poor nursing. which caused her poor nutrition. Which to ME is the most amazing thing you can do as a mommy is to nurse your baby (Quick Surro note here... there are great IM alternatives for teaching your baby to nurse on her true mommy!! she can Induce lactation while her Surro is pregnant and breast feed as soon as her baby is born and if she cant do that, she can nurse using a feed tube attached to her breast, so she can still feel like she is nursing her baby!) All of this made me feel like a failure as a mother! I was also left with a "permanent spinal injury" from the epidural, which made my right hip numb for 10 years (it is finally gone now, took me a lot of research to find this out but it was recently explained to me that your bone cells regenerate every 10 years, and it took that long to shed the epidural from my bones! OMG!! ) and I didn't want to end up with even more severe Injury from my my baby DD. So I looked for natural birthing methods!
I KNEW on my next birth I would do birth naturally.. but where to look. I thought I still needed to have an OB so I went to the OB in the hospital and told him I wanted a natural birth... at 32 weeks prengnat I started taking Hypnobirthing classes to help me in my natural birth. I learned SO MUCH from that class. I went to my doctor asking that he respect my birth plan. To my Chagrin and surprise he was NOT going to agree to no pitocin after 12 hours of labor and wouldn't agree to no c-section after 24 hours. He felt labor needed to be done and over in 24 hours.. there is no leeway period.. I fired my OB and got a more natural birth inclined OB, (which I LOVE!!! BTW! ) Who's own wife had 4 natural births, which made me VERY happy to hear! Every aspect of my birthing with DD was DIVINE! I lost my Cervical mucous on the 28th I had random contractions throughout the day, went to get acupuncture to get it more regular at 5ish .. in the 15 mins sitting in the acupuncture chair I had 4 contractions (that I breathed right through with ZERO pain!!) which was so assuring and made me so confident I could actually do this! When I got home (which was a block form the acupuncture clinic) I used the breast pump to stimulate more contractions, After 10 minutes I thought I would time them.. they were 3 mins apart lasting for a minute each and I didn't even notice because I was so relaxed and at peace with the experience!! Honestly this labor was WONDERFUL! So once I realized I was in active labor I told KK to call Grandma and my Doula and the rest of the team. I had a birthing photographer, doula, an assistant doula, my sister, along with my daughter and mother as my birthing team. They all had jobs that I gave them well in advance and I was so excited to execute this birth that was in MY control! My doula arrived quickly. I made the decision to transition to the hospital (where they are equipped for and respect natural birth WAY better than my KK's hospital of birth!!) just as my mom and assistant doula arrived. So with my "entourage," I called them, we descended on the hospital. My sister and the rest of the team met me at the hospital, as it was only 2 blocks from my house. It was great I had my birthing ball in one hand, and water in the other. I stopped when I needed to bounce through a contraction. It was actually funny cause my dr's partner passed me as I was in a contraction asking if I needed help I just said "nahhh, I'm just having a baby I'll check in eventually".. in full honest sincerity and very matter of fact LOL.. at this point this doctor knew of my desires of a natural birth and understood me well :) it was great :) He could see I was in no distress and that I was very clearly in my peaceful birth zone. I made it to the L&D where everyone promptly did their jobs assigned. I clicked off the lights when I walked in, put on MY birth gown.I didn't want to have my butt hanging out in the ones from the hospital so I bought my own! My computer was plugged in, my music was playing and I was ff and going and happy! I labored in many ways, honestly, ALL were phenomenal, my favorite was bouncing on my labor ball, and being in the water. It was INCREDIBLE! I remember thinking when I was around 7 cm dilated that THIS is what birthing is about and it was HEAVEN!! I birthed how I wanted to, I was in whatever position I wanted , and DD SLID OUT like a worm at 7:10 AM. It was the most incredible experience in my life. She was put on my body immediately and I was so happy! Definitely 1000000% better experience than KK's birth HANDS DOWN!!
I KNEW that any future births NEEDED to go down as amazing as this!! I wanted a water birth from the time I was little and heard of them , actually around the time of me hearing about surrogacy (13 years old). and let me tell you.. laboring in water is GREAT!
OK so there is my birthing history to this point!
After doing my hypnobirthing class and being educated on the unhealthy and unsafe practices that go into a medical interventioned birth and how AMAZING the natural birth WAS and FELT! I knew I wanted natural births from here on out!
When I realized I was ready to be a surrogate my first thought was I WISH I can have a home birth for my IP's if they are comfortable with it. My first experience with a debate on this in the surro world was on a surro board. I had posted that I wanted to have a natural birth and would be open to a home birth for the IP's. I feel it would be a great service and intimate gift I can give to the IP's and ultimately I feel is best for the baby! When I posted this an 8 time surrogate (I'll call Octo-surro) told me that I was stupid and foolish for "risking" someone else's baby and would never find an IP willing to risk their child that way and that I was irresponsible for even suggesting it! I wanted to scream back "SERIOUSLY LADY you risk that baby more in a Hospital interventional birth" but resisted! I just said thanks for your opinion. and moved on. A friend of mine Jill (aka the Mormon Surrogate) , had her first surro baby naturally and that just sounds like HEAVEN!
However this Octo-surro threw me back...
THEN.. got me thinking...
WOW.. perhaps not everyone research's and just "goes with what's expected" as I did in my first birth. convinced that its the "best thing."
I have talked about the idea of natural birthing with every IP I have ever talked to.. often I get the scared sounding voice on the other end, worried that its not good for the baby. I just want to educate people on healthy birthing not put BABIES in RISK!
Fortunately one of the things MaMa D and I talked about was my desire for a healthy birth with natural birthing with a midwife. Mama D seemed hesitant, as in her profession she see's EMERGENCIES ALL DAY and is always worried about the worst case scenario. After much discussion we agree'd on a birthing center, which is the best of both worlds! Where I can have a homebirth feel, but with the "security" my IM needs in her babies birth :) Which made me happy as well!
I really could talk about this all night but I'm tired and need to go to sleep :P (its 1:49 AM)
Here is a GREAT video called "The Business of Being Born" its an amazing documentary on the history of natural birth, and the history of hospital birthing.
I wish to share this video to open up the possibilities of having more natural birthing IN the surro community.
After watching the video. Tell me what your opinion is on natural birth in the Surro environment?
If you'd like to Reach my Hypnobirthing Teacher Jill DiPietro, she does classes through skype and can do this WITH the IP's and the Surro together no matter WHERE you live!) click HERE! (btw tell her I sent you)
If you'd like to learn more about Doula's let me know I would love to share more, as I am a Hypno Birthing doula and LOVE IT!
Happy Stickies!!
BTW my friend Jill I referred to earlier is starting her meds for a new cycle tonight so lets all give her Happy happy cervical lining thoughts :)
Friday is my Psych Evaluation. Not worried its easy... heck I did them for a living so I know how simple they are :P
This week my IM should be getting with the fertility clinic to work out the financial stuff and then they will be reviewing my records and determine if I am OK to be at their clinic...
In the meantime her lawyer is reworking our contract to make it legal for California. So everything is rolling on.
In the meantime I've been contacted by 2 other IP's... one I was thinking about matching with a few months back, they established they couldn't afford to have a surro. They have since been figuring out financing and is now ready. They were sad to hear I was matched, but understood I couldn't wait for them.
Then this morning was another set of IP's who's hearts were broken by their surro 10 days before transfer.. so rough!! If I wasn't matched already with the amazing MaMa D I'm sure I would have matched with the lady I talked to this morning... I feel so bad for her situation.. she lost a family member this week, lost her surro and found out another family member is terminally ill... I feel so sorry for her situation and her heart! (sending serious positive vibes her way)
Which brings me to my subject I'm going to write about today...
Psych Evals
Not just on my mind because:
I did them for a living
I will be having one done on ME this week.. (which is funny cause I've GIVEN probably 100+ of them, but never had one myself.. except for in grad school as practice on each other.. but I'm pretty sure that doesn't count)
one of the things this IM and I talked about, even though her surro passed her eval she failed to mention that she was cheating on her husband, her marriage was on the fritz and she was living with her friend with her 3 kids to "save money". can we say red flags?
As part of the surrogacy process we feel more secure doing a Psych Eval so that we are sure that the other part is SANE enough to work with and trust each other with our lives, bodies and babies. However How easy is it to manipulate?
First I'm gonna preface this post with a disclaimer: GET A PSYCH EVAL!! Both IP's and Surro's need to have them cause it WILL show some red flags.. however not all!! This post it will ultimately boil down to.. don't put all your eggs in the basket if they do pass. There still may be hiccups. People lie, and withhold truth from the therapists! I know I have personally done Psych evals where I flat out said "not suitable for ____". Just because the person gets it done doesn't mean its listened to. It is sometimes overlooked and they still move forward with whatever I did the eval for. So how much do you need to look at the evals?
I'm sure you may have heard of this lifetime movie called "The Surrogacy Trap" Its a movie that just came out on the Lifetime network, and lets be honest it was FREAKY!! and if I was an IP and I saw it I would rethink ANY surro!! Heck the girl in the movie had a psych eval, passed with flying colors... Lets be CLEAR...99.99% of surro's are usually NOT off their rocker!! But I can totally understand the terror of an IP trusting a stranger to have their baby. So HOW do you help calm fears?
Reality:
#1 WE ALL SEE WHAT WE WANT TO SEE! .. #2 PEOPLE LIE!
IP's often look beyond clear signs of an unhealthy surro because they are just so grateful to have a surro, and eventually baby!!
Surro's often look past an IP's psych eval because of the same thing, they are just happy to have an IP!
We are naturally inclined to trust people but make sure you A: Communicate. sometimes things ARE misunderstandings however also B: get 3rd party information as well. and C. Check facts!
You can have the best Therapist in the world, but they only spend 3 hours of one on one time with the person to get my conclusions. It is all based on what they see, as well as what they tell them, so they CAN BE DUPED just as easily as you. However here are some things I suggest you do to protect yourself even more:
So HOW do we prevent from unhealthy people in our surro relationships? ..... GET TO KNOW THEM!!
I know this is a given... a psych eval may weed out super loonies.. but I suggest a few things that will help you make this IMPORTANT decision that goes BEYOND the psych eval.
#1 GOOGLE THEM
Don't forget to google all names they have used. Look for histories not listed on the Psych eval. (there should be a section where it asks about marriages, relationships, and legal history) and ASK QUESTIONS about them.
#2 ADD THEM ON FACEBOOK!
You can learn a lot from a person's facebook. Nothing is better to get to know someone than seeing how they interact with their friends and family; you can learn their attitude about life; learn of their support system. Look for photos they are tagged in, look throughout the postings for flighty unhealthy posts. Posting about self hate, unhealthy body distortions and negativity towards others are always are red flags. Think about how they talk about other people and how you would be posted about if something doesn't go their way!
#3 BACKGROUND CHECKS
Legal- Obvious reasons... check for drug charges, physical violence etc. also let them tell you their side and as for the court record.
Marriages/ divorces - who is supporting them ? how often do they move on to another person? don't go with someone that's had 6 marriages with 5 kids in a 6 year time frame!! use common sense here... if it smells fishy.. there is bound to be a carcass somewhere!
References- Personal, family, previous surro matches, therapist, work. Ask about positive and negative points of the person.. DON'T ask yes or no questions. People are polite and want to help thier family, friend, co worker. so get in depth questions.
#4 Talk to them as if you were looking to date them.
Analyze them as though you were intimate. so that you can know if you can handle sticking by them in hormonal times!! I know this sounds WEIRD... but honestly you are committing to them for a year (or more) so you need to know them very intimately!
I hope this post isn't overboard but its been on my mind. I want to make sure people are aware of risks and there is NO guarantee! Its all an experience! and hopefully it ends as a good experience.
My services:
This posting and blog is not about self serving my profession as a Life coach-with a Masters degree in Marriage and Family Therapy. However.. I chose this profession so that I can help people! I love my job ! I enjoy helping people build on positive communication and helping families grow in a positive way! Before entering the Surro world I specialized in Marriage's (love working with my couples!) Divorce (providing healthy parental relationships as dynamics change so that children have a healthy positive environment while their parents are divorcing) Sexual dysfunction/ Addictions (self explanatory), and Families with children or parents with disabilities. (helping the whole family cope and deal). I am PLEASED and excited to add infertility and reproduction to my specializations!
I am able to be a single stay at home mom, and not burden MY IP's with lost wages by doing online coaching via Skype. This allows everyone to win.
So I will do a selfish plug here and offer my life coaching services. I can contract for both Individual, family, Surro sessions. I was previously licensed as an Associate Marriage and Family therapist (licence JUST expired, with no problems and can renew whenever I choose) and I have a masters degree in Marriage and Family Therapy. I chose to do life coaching because I chose to look forward and not focus on the past in life.
Using me throughout the surro process helps you be confident that you are helping another surro and her IP's as well as knowing that she has been there done that as well!
Give me a call if your interested! (435) 531-1242
Happy searching and being a PI to look into each others lives!
