Successful Surrogacy: An Intended Parents’ Guide to a Rewarding Relationship With Their Surrogate Mother
Author
Susan MZ Fuller
Author Bio
Susan Fuller is a seven-time gestational surrogate mother who has delivered nine surrogate children over the course of twelve years. Her surrogacy experiences include two sets of twins, miscarriage, stillbirth, homebirth, waterbirth, and two cesarean sections. Her relationships with her intended parents have ranged from a distantly cool “business transaction” to intimately close and rewarding, and everything in between.
After repeatedly being asked for advice on surrogacy and realizing that there were limited resources available for couples who need to use a surrogate, she decided to write a resource-rich guide to gestational surrogacy, focusing on the relationship between intended parents and their surrogate mother. She draws on 13 years of experience with five different sets of intended parents to compile a candid and heartfelt look at the surrogacy process as it unfolds over the course of a year and beyond.
She is the homeschooling mother of three and writes about her experiences at surrogacybydesign.com.
Description
With Their Surrogate Mother is the only book of its kind in the world of infertility resources. It provides intended parents a first-hand look at the gestational surrogacy process from start to finish from a surrogate mother’s perspective and addresses their concerns and questions every step of the way. Written by Susan MZ Fuller, a seven-time gestational surrogate mother for six different couples, Succeeding at Surrogacy is an essential resource for couples who are considering or currently using a surrogate mother to build their families.
Whether couples pursue surrogacy as a way to combat infertility or because of a preexisting condition (or two men seek to have a child together), surrogacy can be fraught with anxiety, concern, and fear of the unknown and it’s easy to see why – how can anyone trust a virtual stranger to carry their baby for them? Couples wonder if it’s awkward to watch another woman pregnant with their child. And what would possess someone to be a surrogate mother in the first place?
While it’s is true that surrogacy is one of life’s most emotionally intense events to go through, it can also be one the most uniquely rewarding and joyous experiences for couples and surrogates alike. Succeeding at Surrogacy helps couples select a surrogate who is the best match for them and then candidly walks them through the surrogacy process from the surrogate mother’s point of view, from deciding to work together through the birth of their baby and beyond.
The book explains each phase of surrogacy in detail, starting with initial medical evaluations and undertaking a medicated cycle leading to the embryo transfer and elaborates on what a surrogate mother is going through physically, emotionally, and socially so intended parents can better understand and relate to their surrogate mother. The surrogate’s perspective on the phases of pregnancy as well as the birth and afterward is also detailed in chronological order as the surrogacy journey unfolds.
Formatted as a series of probing questions and discussion items for couples to explore together, Succeeding at Surrogacy gives parents-to-be a unique guidebook for exploring their own thoughts and feelings on the various aspects of surrogacy. The book also gives a surrogate’s perspective on the same topics so parents can consider the issues from both sides and if necessary, broach individual topics with their own surrogate mother, allowing them to more easily develop and strengthen their relationship with her.
Succeeding With Surrogacy: An Intended Parents’ Guide to a Rewarding Relationship With Their Surrogate Mother is a quick yet detailed read that is designed to be a handy step-by-step resource and discussion toolkit that couples can consult throughout the phases of their own surrogate pregnancy experience. It’s also a wealth of information for loved ones, friends, and family members supporting any couple embarking on the surrogacy process.
Book excerpt
Deciding to Use a Gestational Surrogate
For a lot of women, realizing that they need to use a surrogate mother can be a difficult revelation to process and come to terms with, and understandably so. Some women find out early in their lives that they’re unable to carry a baby, so they have many years to get used to the idea and accept it. Others find out much later, often after their own failed fertility treatments, and it becomes a last straw before pursuing adoption or choosing to remain childless.
Depending on where you are along the process of finding out you need to use a surrogate mother will determine how the following questions and tips apply to you.
1. Have you grieved the loss of your fertility yet?
Some women are able to move fairly quickly from the notion of being pregnant themselves to having someone else carry for them, while some women need more time to work through their range of emotions. There is no timeline that applies to all, or even most, women – it’s a uniquely individual process. I encourage you to explore this issue with yourself, until you’re able to feel good about using a surrogate; using others or a counselor as a sounding board if necessary. You may not resolve all of your feelings of sadness or loss, of course – that’s natural – but it’s key to enter into a relationship with any surrogate mother, feeling more excited about the idea of becoming a mother through alternate means, rather than feeling overwhelmed by grief over what you cannot do for yourself.
Any good surrogate understands that her intended mother will have a variety of emotions about the pregnancy and should do her best to be sensitive to her intended mother’s feelings, but surrogates also want to, and generally expect to, share their pregnancy experience with her intended parents.
Ask yourself: Am I in a mental and emotional state of mind where I can support a surrogate mother and enjoy, through her, the pregnancy as it develops?
2. Is your partner equally supportive of using a surrogate mother?
Pregnancy and childbirth are very intimate things to experience, and no longer will it be just be you and your partner journeying through the next nine months. Your partners on this journey include not only your surrogate, but her partner if she has one, her children (which she should have, because rarely does any fertility center allow someone to be a surrogate mother without at least one previous pregnancy and delivery), and family members and friends, (both yours and the surrogate’s), who will naturally be curious about the arrangement.
Both partners do not have to be equally enthusiastic or in search of an equal amount of contact or intimacy with the surrogate. However, both partners must respect and support what the other partner wants and needs from the experience. It’s not about equality across the board, rather it’s about respecting and supporting everyone’s desires so that all needs can be met.
Ask yourself: Are both partners open to starting or growing a family using a surrogate mother, without blame or resentment toward the intended mother who cannot carry for herself?
Author Website
http://www.surrogacybydesign.com
