I swear, I never expected this aspect of the surrogacy process! I'm still talking to someone. But I get that feeling of "Ohmygod! I hope she likes me!" way more often than I would care to admit. Each time I send her an email, I find myself worrying 6-12 hours later that maybe the fact that I have no new e-mail is because she's decided that she doesn't like me. Completely illogical, I know. I mean, come on, this is a woman who has FIVE children (three older, two about a decade younger), she has a job (she's a NICU nurse), and just generally a lot going on with the graduation of one child and the rest getting out of school for the summer. It's not like she's spending all of her time waiting for e-mail!
Of course, surrogacy isn't an entirely logic driven endeavor. There are issues of the heart, trust, and love involved in all of it in ways that are much more complicated than I had anticipated. I think the best way to describe this part of the process would be to compare it to a romantic relationship in fast forward. You meet someone, you start to get to know them, you talk about things like birthing processes (natural? vaginal? c-section? vbac?) and philosophies of life (abortion? selective reduction?). You talk about your health, your families' health, your financial situation, all leading up to getting someone pregnant and delivering your child. For me, this is someone who will always have to be a part of my life and of the life of my child. This is someone that I have to be certain is worthy of being introduced to and involved in the life of the lowercase as well as my future child (or children). I want her to be someone who we'd enjoy meeting somewhere for a vacation together...essentially like adding another aunt to the family.
So when I find someone who, to this point seems like someone who could fill that role? I worry that she might find someone else that she thinks would fill that role better for her. It's something that she could very well do (I don't know how many intended parents she's talking to and have been too chickenshit to ask). And of course, we've been talking less than a month and neither of us are looking to move forward until winter (she wants a VBAC but isn't cleared to do so until then; we don't have the money to do so until then) so there are still a lot of things that could change about the way we both feel as we get closer to that point. Still, right now? I'm a ball of nerves!
