My last post introduced the LETTER that we sent to my in-laws when their issues with our adoption plans became serious. Here is the letter, continued. Remember – they think that our adoption agency is “second rate� for some crazy reason that we cannot even begin to understand, and they also think that we should spend our time and money pursuing a gestational surrogacy to build our family, rather than adoption.

Erin started contemplating HOW the second child would come around basically the minute she went on bedrest with her first pregnancy. After Isaac was born, we consulted with more than one doctor about another pregnancy. Without getting into the specifics, we learned that another pregnancy (even if that was possible given our history – just b/c IVF works once does not mean it will work again) is VERY high risk and NOT recommended. One of our doctors (a woman around our age who has had two pregnancies through IVF, two high risk pregnancies with bedrest and two preemies) actually LAUGHED when Erin asked her for an opinion on another pregnancy. A very well-respected and highly reputable high risk OB/GYN with UAMS in Little Rock recommended STRONGLY against another pregnancy, noting that another very small preemie was incredibly likely. There is no way either one of us can go through that again. The thought of another pregnancy makes Erin’s almost hyperventilate . . . . it’s not worth it and it would not be fair to us, Isaac, our families, the medical community, but especially another child. The risks involved are too great, and another stellar outcome for a small preemie is statistically unlikely, and just not acceptable to us.

So, as you know, that leaves us with the decision to build our family through surrogacy or adoption. After, literally, YEARS (yes, years) of discussion, research, and planning, we have chosen adoption. You are not supportive of our decision, and have asked us to explain why. So far, we have attempted to remind you of our past so maybe you can understand a bit of where we have been coming from. We wanted to remind you that our experiences are NOT your experiences. Our decisions are not based on a whim. We have put more time, more energy, more planning, more reading, more research, more discussion and more money into building our family then probably anyone you know. We NEVER make decisions lightly, especially regarding the health and happiness of the most important thing in our lives – our family and each other. We are not kids. We are adults. We are quite a bit older than both of you were when you started having kids. We have been through a lot. We have been through Erin’s cervical cancer. We have been through a move across the country where we both started new jobs and established our selves. We have been through almost three years of infertility, and the medical tests, paperwork, procedures, and ethical/moral decisions that go along with that. We have been through an incredibly high risk pregnancy with the fear of losing a much wanted and loved baby. Michael watched Erin and his unborn son being transported by helicopter to a city 3 ½ hours away, without him as he prayed and hoped he would make it in time to be with Erin when she gave birth. We watched our son come into this world 3 ½ months before he was supposed to. We watched him struggle for life every day for weeks and weeks. We made decisions about his care and his medical situations that you can only imagine. We watched that boy LEARN to breathe, learn to swallow, LEARN to eat . . . wow! We waded through MOUNTAINS of paperwork regarding insurance, employee leave, social security, Medicaid, hospital bills, doctor’s bills, therapy routines, therapy bills. We learned how to navigate it all. We are educated. We are intelligent. We are capable. We know what we are doing and what we are getting into. All of these life experiences have brought us to a place in our lives to be able to make decisions in an educated and mature fashion.

In regards to family building – we have read books, articles, web sites, had discussions and arguments. We have talked to experts and family and friends. We have TALKED AND TALKED AND TALKED. Erin has READ AND READ AND READ. Michael has LISTENED. Erin has LISTENED. We have watched friends and family go through infertility and adoption. We have made a DECISION that is best for us and is SO exciting. We are going to adopt an infant — most likely, a newborn. We are working with an agency call Adoption Angels in San Antonio, Texas. This is not a “second rateâ€� agency. We did not just blindly jump on the band wagon after Erin’s sister adopted their baby. Adoption is not something you can just jump into blindly. You must fill out mountains of paper work. You must be evaluated by a social worker. You must be accepted by an agency and birth parents. You must answer questions about yourself, your life, your parenting, your reasons for adopting. You write letters to the birth parents, you put together photo albums about your life. You are confronted with the “what if’sâ€� and the “do we really want toâ€� at every step. If you make it through all of that, I truly believe that you have made an informed decision. You CAN “accidentallyâ€� get pregnant. You CAN get pregnant easily with very little thought other than throwing the birth control pills out the window. You CANNOT “accidentallyâ€� adopt – it’s impossible.

Adoption Angels is a fully licensed agency. It checks out perfectly in terms of credentials and meeting standards and legal requirements. We decided FOR SURE in September or October that we were ready to move forward with adoption. We decided that we would most like to adopt in a city or town in which we don’t live. We knew of some friends that had very good experiences with their agency in Dallas, but the fees are extremely high and the wait time is long – it is not the right agency for us for many reasons. At that time, Erin was helping her sister sort through agency information. They looked over the information about several different agencies in Texas. It is such a hard decision to make, and finally, they went to San Antonio to verify their “gut� instinct that Adoption Angels was right for them. They had a wonderful experience with the staff that works there, and after their adoption happened so quickly, so easily, without any problems or issues, we knew that it was the right agency for us to use as well. There is no better way to figure out this type of thing other than research and referrals. We have done the research and we know a family that has had a wonderful experience – the rest, just like almost everything in life, is just a leap of faith! You seem to think that our decision to move forward with Adoption Angels after our nephew’s adoption is a negative thing – somehow we are making a rash decision based on their success or something. We think nothing could be further from the truth – we knew we wanted to adopt, but we were unsure about picking an agency. We watched close and trusted family members go through a wonderful experience with their son, and it helped us make our decision. We certainly did not let their experience be our ONLY guide, but we would be silly not to look at their positive outcome and overall experience as a means for narrowing down the agency we will use.

Your big question is, why not do surrogacy? The main reason that you need to know is that we don’t want to. It is not the right option for us – we have thought long and hard about building our family, about the risks involved, and decided to move to adoption. But, because we respect you enough to know that you really want to know our reasons, we will elaborate. If we had never done IVF and never had embryos in frozen storage, surrogacy would NEVER have come up as an option on our radar. The only compelling reason for us, at this point, to pursue gestational surrogacy, is to use the embryos that we have frozen as a result of the IVF that created Isaac. That is a compelling reason, to be sure, but not enough. Those embryos are not babies. They are ONLY the mere possibility of a baby – maybe . . . After evaluating the risks and pros and cons, the frozen embryos are not enough to make us move forward. As I mentioned earlier, we decided, long ago, that the most important part about having children for us is being parents. Infertility and adoption literature will take you through many steps to see if you are ready to move on regarding infertility treatment. We have explored many ideas, including the need to experience pregnancy, the desire to create a biological connection to ourselves, the need to pass on our genetic “line�, etc. We have asked ourselves so many questions. While we both have grieved various aspects of giving up another pregnancy or another biological child, we have come to the conclusion that ultimately, all we want is another child in our family, and we want that child to join our family sooner rather than later. We have a time-line for building our family, just like most people. We don’t want to wait another two, three, four years to have another baby. We would like another child in our family within the next year. We would like Isaac to be only 3 to 3 ½ years older than our next child. With adoption, that is possible and almost guaranteed. Gestational surrogacy is a process – a highly complicated, incredibly risky and expensive process that involves Frozen Embryo Transfer. The outcome is either that the surrogate becomes pregnant or not. Frozen Embryo Transfer has about a 20% clinical success rate for pregnancy (not a live birth). Some clinics do a bit better than that, but it’s around 20%. The steps for surrogacy are very lengthy – they involve finding an appropriate surrogate – friend, family member, acquaintance, networking to find someone to hire or using an agency to find someone to hire. In our case, there are no friends, family members or close acquaintances who are willing or able to be a surrogate for us – we have fully explored that option. That leaves networking to find a person or hiring someone through an agency. Both of these steps would take at least 3 or 4 months to complete. These steps include serious medical and psychological testing of us, the would-be surrogate and her partner. If we were all found to be in good medical and psychological health to move forward, we would also have to “get along�. We would have to feel like we would be comfortable entering into an amazingly difficult and emotionally draining experience. We would have to agree on medical and ethical decisions – how many embryos to transfer, how do we feel about medical and genetic testing during pregnancy, how do we feel about selective reduction if we end up with triplets or quadruplets, how do we feel about terminating a pregnancy if we find that a baby is terminally ill or has a serious complication that is incompatible with life? We have to agree on and trust a surrogate AND her partner to be honest with us about their health, habits, etc. After we have reached all of these decisions and found a match, we have to get the surrogate pregnant. Maybe we would be lucky and she would get pregnant right away. Statistics tell us differently, they say that only 30% of embryos survive the thawing process in good enough shape to be transferred. Statistics say that only 20% of those embryos that are able to be transferred, actually result in a pregnancy. Even if she got pregnant, then we have to wait to make sure she does not have an early miscarriage – very common. Then we have to make it through 9 months, and w e all know what can happen during those 9 months – any number of complications. We have to be ready to pay for any medications, any lost wages for bedrest or illness. Let’s say she does not get pregnant the first time, and we try again. We are looking at another 2-3 months before she can try, and another 6 weeks before we know if she’s pregnant. That’s making sure that she wants to move forward. Maybe we find out that we don’t get along. Maybe her husband changed his mind. Maybe the medications make her feel terrible. Maybe it’s just too stressful. Then we have to find another person to work with. If she does move forward but does not get pregnant a 2nd time, we probably have one more chance to do a frozen embryo transfer based on the number of embryos we have frozen. We could, maybe, try one more time with this person before we ran out of embryos. Would it make sense to use her again or to find someone else? All of a sudden, we could be 1 year, 2 years, 3 years down the line. The end result? Maybe a baby in our arms, maybe NO baby in our arms. As “attractive� as surrogacy can seem when you have not thought it through, we know the reality. With adoption, at the end of the 1 year or 2 year wait, after the testing, the paperwork, the waiting and the risks – we WILL have a baby in our arms. It’s a guarantee. That’s what we want.