Surrogacy: Chapter 2

October 26, 2007

Sheona’s only condition was that she wanted to have another baby before she had ours. She and Jon were already actively trying to get pregnant and in fact had had a miscarriage a few months before.

We were – and still are – a bit incredulous, constantly wondering if she’d think about it some more and realize how nuts she was to offer. To make it feel more real, we all decided to set the wheels of the process in motion and made an appointment with Dr. Laskin that summer. His clinic, LifeQuest, specializes in infertility issues, and we had already worked with them attempting to “fix” my problem with anticoagulation during my last two pregnancies. Dr. Laskin was happy we had decided to move on to a more probable scenario and even happier to learn that we had such a selfless friend wanting to give us such an amazing gift. He suggested the four of us see Sherry, their counsellor, so that she could assess our level of preparedness and compatibility for such a procedure. We quickly made an appointment and went to our four hour session with her in early June. First it was the four of us in a room with Sherry, where she explained the basic aspects of surrogacy to us; then, Sheona and Jon saw her for two hours and we saw her for the remainder of the time. Sherry told us she thought we made an ideal team, that we all knew our limitations and that it seemed we shared a policy of frankness that would come in handy, since it is a process that is so emotionally charged and where you could start feeling insecure because on the one hand you may feel you need to “pay back” or that you owe your friend for carrying your child, and on the other hand you don’t want them to change their minds so you could also feel like you’re treading on eggshells. She gave us the example of taking care of each other’s dogs. She said something like, “You may feel like you can’t say no, even if you can’t take care of Rosa. And, conversely, they may not want to ask you to take care of Rosa, for fear of making you feel like you have to. All of a sudden, the open minded and frank relationship you have could become one of cautious politeness, or worse – you could start to mask your real emotions with fake ones and let tension build within. You don’t have to invite each other to every dinner party you organize, because that’s not what you do on a regular basis. You have to almost make an effort to not change the dynamic of the relationship too much. You can’t assume anything. Everything needs to be verbalized.” So she advised us always to be up front with each other and that together with sessions with her as needed, we should be ok.

At that time, Sheona was getting ready to go to Florence to take a film production course. She was very busy with preparations and I remember her looking radiant that day, at the counsellor session. A week or so later she announced she was pregnant. This made it even more real, since her only condition was being met as we spoke.

Around the same time, we started to talk about documenting the process. Sheona is a documentary filmmaker and producer and it was only natural for her to want to do a doc on such a crazy experience. Since I am also a documenter of sorts - of my own thoughts and life through my journaling - it seemed like a great idea right away. Little by little, her idea evolved from being a doc on the emotional side of the process, to being a time capsule for the child to be to uncover when s/he came of age, partly because filming any of the process had legal implications for the clinic that they were unwilling to assume. The time capsule idea seemed more organic too, and not as “produced” as the previous idea could have become.

Sheona took off for Florence on her own, pregnant with her second child. She wasn’t happy with the film course itself, but she loved Florence. Jon and Henley went to visit her towards the end of her stay. I can’t imagine how homesick and familysick she must have been by then. Six weeks away from your daughter and partner, from your pillow and your dog, from your streets and your routine, your friends, your bed... and on top of it all being pregnant, full-on hormonal and sensitive... really trying. But she is such a trouper. I totally admire her attitude toward life. She is just always looking at the bright side, thinking in practical terms. She’s very cool. :) Another little surprise was that she came back from Florence with a rock on her finger. Jon had proposed to her and she had said yes, having a coffee by the Giardino di Boboli – HOW ROMANTIC!!!!

Soon, Sheona’s tummy was starting to show and then was just so obviously there!! The weeks flew by and it got bigger and bigger. We talked about the birth and Sheona wanted us to be there to witness the experience of a home birth, so we could consider it as an alternative when our time came. All of a sudden, February was here and her due date was just ‘round the corner. We organized a sort of baby shower at the last minute. I guess that’s how it goes with a second child. But it was Sheona’s idea to do it at a bowling alley so that it could be a more family-oriented thing and husbands and children could come too, so no need for babysitters. Sheona bowled better than any of us. You could barely tell she was pregnant from behind. She would take her bowler stance and then do her little steps and gracefully fling one leg behind the other as she let go of her ball. Then she’d stand up straight, wait for her ball to strike the entire set and then turn around and do a little celebration dance. It was shocking even to me every time she’d turn around and you could see her full term belly. She almost nailed them all, scoring an almost full row of strikes on both games we played. Unbelievable!

That night, shortly after we arrived home, we got a call from Sheona saying she was pretty sure she was having contractions, that they were timing them and would let us know. An hour later, Jon called and said that the midwife was on her way, that the contractions were pretty steady and that we should be ready to come over at any time. 45 minutes later, he called back saying we better get moving, that she had dilated 7 cm. I’m not kidding when I say it took about another hour and a half for her to push Keaton out. I was standing at the foot of their bed, with Henley in my arms, when it happened, Andrés standing in the threshold of the room. It was the most wonderful, incredible thing to see. I couldn’t help thinking as I watched in amazement how maybe, just maybe, we’d be doing this again in a year and a half and it would be our baby we’d watch being born. As Henley joined her family on the bed to coo over her new baby brother, I hugged Andrés tightly and half-cried, half-glowed with joy and emotion.

When I think of how to explain what I felt, I have a hard time deciding which words to use. You have to understand, I had never witnessed a live birth before. Being there made me think of those two baby girls that could have been, of how sad my two deliveries had been. This was the total opposite: it was one of those brief moments in life that together form what we call happiness.