Episode 27 – Jess – surrogate

00:00
Welcome to Surrogacy Australia’s podcast series. I’m your host Anna McKie, and my aim is to raise the level of awareness of surrogacy through these conversations. This podcast is a recording from a webinar that I host, and you can find more details about those and upcoming dates on our website at surrogacyaustralia.org. The webinars are free, go for an hour, and will take you through how surrogacy works in Australia. You can ask questions, typing them in anonymously if you prefer,

00:43
and you hear from a co-host who has navigated surrogacy in Australia, either a surrogate, a gay dad or a straight mum. This episode, recorded in November 2023, features Jess. Jess and husband Jayden live in Adelaide with their two girls and she birthed another two girls as a surrogate, Amalia in May 2020 and Oriana in July 2023. The dads, Baden and Nelson,

01:07
Previously strangers and now friends for life live in Queensland, so their journey was long distance and the first time around in the peak of COVID when COVID first erupted. As you’ll hear, this team had challenges and Jess thought she might not see baby Amalia grow up. To their credit, they built up their friendship again and embarked on a sibling journey as a stronger team. Their team had fortnightly counseling for the second journey, mainly with Jess having the sessions but sometimes as a team or just the IPs.

01:35
She says their counselor, Katrina Hale, was the backbone for their journey. Her husband, Jayden, was one of three guests when I hosted a webinar about partners of surrogates. I’ll add a link to the YouTube recording of that, and my aim is to release that as podcast episode 36 in January 2024. Her advice for surrogates, you know what you want, and it doesn’t have to be the same as other surrogates. When considering the sibling journey, what if I did surrogacy for another couple and it’s worse?

02:03
that the second pregnancy for the sibling didn’t go as planned, but the journey itself did. And she talks about the value of holding newborn babies, even if it’s not the baby that you birthed, and how she held another baby for two and a half hours and she felt like she could breathe. It’s pretty powerful stuff. I hope you enjoy this episode.

02:21
So Jess is joining us tonight and we’ve got some beautiful photos to work our way through of her two journeys that she’s done with the same set of intended parents. So Jess, tell us who’s in this photo to start. So that’s me on the left, my husband’s in the back and then you’ve got my two intended fathers, Baden’s on the left with the Sunnies on, Nelson’s on the right and then my two daughters, my own children, Lucy and Charlotte. They’re so little back then, weren’t they? They are. Well, this is the- I’ve been on this journey for a while but it feels like it’s- Well you have.

02:50
Yeah, it doesn’t feel like it’s that long until you see pictures like this. And the adults might not age that much, but you notice it in the kids particularly. Yeah. Take us back to the beginning then Jess, how did you find your IPs and why did you want to be a surrogate in the first place? We’re back to the beginning. I have a younger sister who I’m very, very close with and she was having fertility issues and it was always just that bit of a joke between me and my mum because my mum was still young as like, I wonder who she’ll ask to have a baby for her or will she ask? Either way, we’re ready.

03:20
second you’d ask me, be there for it. It was very clear that she would be whatever it took and thankfully she did. The sister, she fell pregnant with her second child because she had her first child when she was very young. She was a teenager. That was like in itself. When she fell pregnant, I remember just looking at my husband and thinking, why not? We were gonna do it for her, why not? Surely other people out there.

03:42
want to have a baby. Thankfully my husband was like, he was just on for the ride. Yeah. I suppose as you say the idea, the seed had already been planted that we might do this for your sister. You clearly had chats with him so it was just then she might, doesn’t look like she’ll need me to do that so but, but I’ve still got this drive to do it. Yeah. I think because he’s seen, you know, that obviously we went with intended fathers, he’s seen the impacts of what infertility does to a person, to a family and certainly made it easier I think in him.

04:10
on board. Indeed, probably a good opportunity to do a little plug there that your husband, Jayden, did join me on a webinar once with two others when the theme was partners of surrogates. So I’ll make sure I share a link to that when I share this episode here. So if you ever want to hear Jayden’s side of the story, you can look that up and hear it. As you can see, you did carry for intended fathers, even though perhaps you were initially stepping into surrogacy.

04:33
to carry for a female. When you then went looking for intended parents, did you have a set in mind if you were gonna carry for hetero or gay, or it’s just who you’ve made the click with? We had no differences. It didn’t matter if they were single, couple, same sex, heterosexual. It didn’t matter to us. And I remember I joined the South Australian Surrogacy Group and I was in there for a few months and just didn’t…

04:57
I didn’t click anyone, I was talking to a lot of people, but it just didn’t, I remember thinking, there was a period where I thought, maybe my people aren’t out there, like I’m not sure. And then come across the Australian group, so I didn’t join that for a few months later. And I remember, you know, doing a post and commented on it, welcoming the group or whatever. And it was instant, like it was just a click. I remember just talking to them and it was just like they’d always been there. There wasn’t that weird or like initial conversations. It was just like they’d always been in our life.

05:26
that isn’t it? Yeah. Do you remember what month and of what year that that roughly was? I’m just trying to create a timeline here. March. I would know that’s the thing. They would be able to tell you the exact. I’ll have them on as co-hosts. I was 23. So seven years ago. So maybe. No I couldn’t even I don’t know. I’m the maths teacher I should be able to do that right. It was at 27.

05:47
No, maybe it was at 16 or 17. Did we join about the same time? I think it’s probably 2017. March 2017. Yeah, right. So March 2017. And when you birthed the…

05:58
The second baby in like 2023, a good six year journey then from beginning to two babies. But it’s still ongoing really, isn’t it? Because it’s a long friendship. Yeah, wow. A natural click between you guys to start with and then the friendship building stuff. And so we’re going to keep working through these photos here. Well, there’s clearly a lot that happens now getting up to this point of being very heavily pregnant. Maybe give us a time frame before getting here from that chat in March.

06:24
2017. Do you remember the timeline then of how things went through to get to the point of looking at May 2020 for birth? So about two, oh no, was that three years later? Yeah, we initially started chatting quite a fair bit. We all knew that, you know, we wanted to do it for each other. Like we never…

06:41
It directly spoke about surrogacy from the get-go, like we just, that relationship. We did a few video calls because I lived in Queensland, Toowoomba at the time. And there was actually a period where my age came up. When I initially met them, I was only 23. And for a surrogate in Queensland, you needed to be 25. And I remember there was a time when I said to them, I would love to do this for you. I understand not waiting for me to turn 25. It was almost like a heartbreak. It was like I was…

07:10
breaking up with a partner I didn’t want to break up with like I was secretly just being like no don’t go you can go. Yeah it was a very sad moment because they agreed. It was split? Not split, they you know they said no like yeah maybe we take some time and think about what our timelines look like and it wasn’t long, it wasn’t long, we weren’t apart for long and you know every day I was kind of like checking my messages like you know are they coming back to me?

07:35
We just kind of come back together and said, time’s not an issue. Like, let’s spend this time growing our relationship because we could do all the surrogacy things. I just couldn’t sign my surrogacy agreement until term 25 and I did. I signed it on my 25th birthday. So then I think we did our first transfer about four days later. Wow, good timing. Unfortunately, it wasn’t successful. So we ended up going through two miscarriages and a failed transfer. I remember on the third transfer, I just thought,

08:05
I can’t keep doing this, like something’s not right because we did three medicated cycles and it was just, it was a lot on my body. I spoke with the dads and thankfully they were on board. Decided to do a natural cycle for our fourth. Whether it was a natural cycle, who knows, it worked. So thankfully, our fourth cycle, we fell pregnant with a baby that we’re pregnant with there. Everything was going really, really well. And then COVID.

08:28
So obviously being an interstate team during COVID, this was one of the new pregnancy pictures we actually got together because we couldn’t really see each other during our pregnancy unfortunately. I think we were when I was 13 weeks pregnant and then the next time I saw them was basically birth. Because when they came, we had to quarantine. Yes. So this was also like…

08:50
May 2020, you were at the peak of the beginning of it. So it was the two week quarantine. So when they eventually did fly down from Queensland, yeah, they were in quarantine. That was not the pregnancy journey anybody planned, right? No, it wasn’t. And we, as a team, didn’t handle it the best that we could have. It was certainly a relationship during that pregnancy. I was…

09:10
There was a point that I thought maybe I would not see them again. Down the stresses that we were under and it was our first time for all of us like and we just go into it expecting it to just be perfect but it just didn’t work out that way for us the first time around. We mentioned this before off air that we’re going to come back and unpack this a little bit more. As you’re saying there, the stresses of an interstate pregnancy with COVID and you know just surrogacy generally puts strain on relationships that your team was struggling to handle that and…

09:36
And so then you got to birth and see, cause we’re friends, we’re part of the Adelaide crew. And so I was part of this time watching this stress unfold for you. I remember hearing about your birth cause you came onto one of the Zoom monthly catch-up. Actually, I think you were even in the hospital post-birth, one of the times.

09:52
but you were a big part of those catch-ups then. So then you had the birth and obviously, I mean, we could talk for so long about any one of these things, couldn’t we? And that it was strained in terms of not having them in the room and it was restricted times and stuff. So they were around for birth, right? So you had the birth and I’m just trying to think what our next photo even is here. Well, that’s a catch-up post-birth, but is there anything you’d like to summarize about the first birth in a nutshell? I mean, it wasn’t ideal. They weren’t at the birth. They weren’t allowed a lot of time post-birth

10:22
at nine days post-birth. Again with COVID if they didn’t know, they didn’t go then, they didn’t know when they’d get home. That was a really hard goodbye, May, because in my mind was goodbye. Because you were worried that the relationship was so strained that you might not see them again? Yeah. Yeah, that was hard and that goodbye was captured on television too because they had some…

10:42
film crew involved following their journey a bit, didn’t they? And so we are, I remember watching your heart break when you handed the baby over to them, sort of essentially at the airport. Yeah, I didn’t quite realise then you weren’t sure if you would see them again and if they’d sort of had their baby and go home and not keep in contact. How was that first year post-birth? Was the relationship still strained or things got better or what happened in that first year post-birth? It definitely was strained. It was definitely strained. They did the best that they could from Queensland. I tried to keep the best contact.

11:10
we did our relinquishing counseling with Katrina. That’s when like a lot of my concerns were brought up. And of course they were always saying they were never gonna leave. Like I think a lot of it was my fear. It never gave me a feeling that they were gonna run, but that was a lot of my fears. Yeah, in that first year, I just kind of took time to let it settle what we had all just been through. Try to keep up the contact, what we could, and do what we thought was the right thing to be doing in that first year, and just let the smoke sort of settle, I guess.

11:40
caught up here. She was only a few months old here. We went up and seen them and it was nice. Yeah, it was just that first year was just about letting the smoke settle. And then what other photos have we got here? Is this a birthday or christening celebration? Yes, that was her first birthday and her christening celebration. We flew up there and we spent a bit of time up there because my husband’s a Queenslander as well. I remember a birthday, one of the independent fathers like pretty much, I mean really quite cheerful, which is not his usual personality.

12:07
say thank you and it was a pretty big moment I think me I just thought how did we let it go bad I think that moment like the moment the higher that I was looking for around the birth that I didn’t get probably got around her birthday and I think I maybe even remember you saying at the time even Amalia letting you hold her and interacting with you a little bit you were getting some of those connections that maybe you were craving yeah because I was did miss her a lot in that first year I think only leaving at nine days birth was

12:33
I remember at six weeks post-birth, I went to a party and someone else had a newborn baby there. It was for my brother’s birthday. And I think he’d told them before what had happened because she pretty much just like said to me like, you want to hold this baby? And she was, he was around the same age as Amalia would have been. I just sat there for like two and a half hours with this baby. It was just like, felt like I could just like breathe.

12:54
I just felt so tense and holding this. It didn’t matter that it wasn’t the baby either. My body was like, there’s a baby, okay. This is gonna be okay. We’re gonna be okay. And you have this sense of peace.

13:05
over you. I’m so pleased you told that story. I have told so many people that story when, you know, people in the outside wonder what surrogacy is like and talking about how the head and the heart might know where baby is and we know what we did but the body sometimes feels a bit lost. Like, hang on, where’s the baby that I birthed if you’re not having regular cuddles and that this lady’s baby was a substitute baby and that your body just needed to hold something about the same weight as it. So yeah, it’s really fascinating how the mind and the

13:35
you know chatting to you among the community in that year post-birth and there was this drive that you wanted to do surrogacy again. You wanted, you’d always thought you’d do it twice and so there was this big question of who do I do it for again. Let’s just keep going through the photos and we’ll come back to the fact that you clearly did it for the same intended parents and how you got to that decision to let’s do it again. I guess there’s some photos here of the continued catch-ups post-birth in the planning of number two? Yes it was just a weekend of them down here just to catch up and some time together.

14:02
strawberry picking in Adelaide at Handel? Yes. It must be lovely sometimes to see these photos of all these babies you’ve birthed. It’s strange because I don’t look at it like that. Like it’s just like it is. It’s like you said before when you’re looking at Baker, that’s just your friend’s baby. That’s how I look at the photos. It’s just like that’s a cute photo. Oh yeah I did birth her. Yes you’re right. Funny I look at this photo of you with the three but I didn’t make that connection with me. We’re seeing three kids in the same photo going I birthed all of them. I didn’t make that connection for myself. So sometimes you need other people to point this out.

14:30
And then in the lead up to birth number two you got to involve Amalia in like announcements of her being a big sister. Yes, that was a big driving force for doing number two. Was that one of your drivers to give her a sibling? Yeah, I think initially that was one of the big driving forces. I mean, because I’d made the Nelson parents, I wanted to make her a big sister. I wanted her to experience…

14:52
Chaos being a big sister. Chaos, jealousy, mucking around. Yes. Wonderful, like your girls and I know in your own family have too. And you did it Jess. And then, so Jess, airport photo here of them arriving, is that what this is? This is, yeah. And believe it or not, I’m only like 34 weeks there but she’s round. Yeah, you look full in that photo. Picking them up from the airport as they arrive. And so they came down quite a few weeks before birth this time? They came down…

15:18
About two weeks before our planned C-sections. And how long did they stay post-book? Month.

15:23
Just over a month. That is nice. That is nice. And so then yes, birth number two here. Tell us about that. Was that a more positive experience for you, for you but all of you? Birth? Yes, 100%. One of the fathers actually got to attend birth this time which was lovely and we actually were convinced she was a boy. Not that they wanted a boy but just everything was different. Thought she was going to be a boy but I couldn’t hear the doctors being like it’s a boy. I held out hope.

15:50
she would be a girl. And I remember like with everything that went wrong, not wrong, I shaped with Amalia, we spoke in depth.

15:58
so many times about what birth would look like. I remember when they held her up and they said, it’s a girl, everything just went out the window. Everything that we thought, you know, because it was initially like, I was gonna have the first hold and it was gonna be all these things. As soon as they said she was a girl, just looked straight at Nelson and we were just like, we were in shock then, held her friendly for maybe a minute and I just thought, no, go to your dad. You should be with your dad.

16:23
It was just such a powerful pull in that moment. Felt like the right decision at that moment. I just thought, no, like you need to be with your… And it was beautiful. It was what I’d always hoped Amalia would have been, but unfortunately didn’t turn out to be. Yeah.

16:37
That’s lovely to have shared that beautiful moment in birth there. Yeah, leading to the second pregnancy we haven’t done, but we’ll come back to that in just a minute. And then I think you had some beautiful photos here as a whole. Surro family post-birth, some professional photos there. Yes, so that’s all of us, me holding Oriana, my girl’s on the right and Amalia on the left. And so she’s still only a few months old now. Four months. And when is the play-off for the next visit? 30th of this month. We fly out in a few weeks. Wonderful. And actually, we’ve got a parentage order on Friday, actually.

17:05
Are you up for that or are you just zooming in? No, so I’m going to zoom conference in. That’s just what works for us. And then we’ll catch up on the 30th because turn 30. That’s right. Yes, you’re about to be 30. Baby’s done. That’s what we thought was right. I remember we wanted to be done birthing by 30.

17:23
Okay, so many other things to unpack there Jess. The second pregnancy, how many transfers did that take? Just tell us a bit about the pregnancy. How did it feel in comparison to the first and your own, that sort of stuff? We took a lot out of the first. So basically we spent a good year and a bit rebuilding relationship, should have been. Put a lot of time and effort into it. We put a lot of planning in place of what the second pregnancy would look like. It wasn’t until I actually flew up for her.

17:48
birthday that my husband knew when I flew up there that it was going to be not make or break but he’s like if you come home and tell me that you’ve offered I understand because we’ve spent so much time working on it and yeah it was ended up off very beautiful moment between all of us and we went into planning for baby number two. Unfortunately our first transfer didn’t work thankfully our second did however pretty much from the get-go it wasn’t what we had hoped for I think you know

18:15
I always hoped for that perfect journey in second one. Looking back now, I think it’s not about a perfect journey, hopefully having perfect outcome. As for us, it wasn’t perfect. I mean, I had a lot of feeding, we had some health scares, very significant eyes. And we handled it, you know, we handled it as a team, all the precautions that we put in place. So, you know, we did fortnightly counseling throughout the whole pregnancy. We did not miss it. There was a lot more supports in place. So even though pregnancy didn’t

18:45
as planned, my journey did, essentially. When you said fortnightly counselling, was that you individually, them individually, team, was there a pattern that it did? Plan was always have fortnightly counselling, if an issue comes up then don’t have to bring up counselling, it’s already booked in, we’re already doing it. So it went by me, most of the time I needed it more, so I spent a lot of time.

19:09
I’m doing a lot of it. Then she would go back and feed back to my IPs based on what she, at the end of the session, she’d say, now, what do you need me to take back to your IPs that I can sort out for you? Because, you know, I didn’t have to have those conversations. So it was very much on a needs basis of who needed or what our team needed in those weeks. And when you say she, this is Katrina Hale? It’s Katrina Hale.

19:31
Yeah, wonderful. She was a lifesaver. Yeah, she’s so knowledgeable and experienced in this world, isn’t she? She gets both sides. She’s not playing sides like she’s I was having a bad day She just look at me and be like she put me in my place many times Like I remember one time I told her instead of getting my IPs to buy me more bras. I cut my sports bras She’s like Jess, what are you doing? She’s like I will take that back to them and and then say like yeah, she’s just incredible

20:01
she does. Probably was the backbone for our second surrogacy journey. So let’s unpack that more. So you’ve done the first journey, the relationship was strained. I mean you’re at the point where you’re like I’m not even sure if they’re gonna keep in contact and we’re gonna see each other again. To the point where I do want to carry for you and we ended up at from a relationship point of you having a great journey. Tell us about that in between time. What did you do to patch it up?

20:23
and therefore like sort of what advice would you give other people that you worked on that relationship together to go you know I want to have a second journey essentially you did do it and had a better journey because you learned from what you learned wanted to learn from the first time around tell us more about that. Just took it back to basics I took it back to

20:40
my values, what did I want to get out of it and probably what role I played in our relationship breakdown because it was definitely both sided. I played a part in all of it. And then I remember just talking with my husband one night and I thought what happens if I do it for someone else and it goes worse? It’s the chance I take because there was a point where I thought maybe I do do it for another couple. That’s not to say it’s going to go better. And then obviously me and my husband had a lot of long chats about it. We just fell in love with them for a reason.

21:09
Something there between all of us that I think we probably lost a little bit along the way. I want to see Amalia as a big sister. And so I think that’s what we did. We spent a lot of time. Surrogacy was off the table. Yeah. We just cracked on us. We just put the friendship up again.

21:24
not as a surrogate relationship as a family now and I created that family. It was about building that relationship back up again. Did you do it in an intentional way, sort of saying to them, well everybody knew there’d been a relationship fallout but we want to work at this, not just let’s spend time together and hope it goes well. Did everybody sort of know we are, everybody’s going to work at this a bit, with the intention of making it better? Whether or not they were sibling but everybody both wanted to make it better? Absolutely. I mean it was definitely all of us that wanted to work on that and get better.

21:54
to mean Amalia had a better relationship growing up. Like it was never talks in this period of like a second child. We all had it in the back of our mind that that’s we would love for that to happen but we also knew that’s not where we were at. I remember the thing that made me as I mentioned before um I went up for the birthday and my husband said if you offer like you’ll know you’ll you know. I remember basically we were just sitting there after her birthday and just like taking a deep

22:23
I had, I apologized, I brought up without me saying anything and that’s when I knew we’re all so sad about how it turned out. We’ve all… there was no blame and finger pointing. No, no, you know, like yeah, it was just just a beautiful moment and it was that moment that as soon as it happened I was like crying. Like yes, like you know, let’s do this again, like you can do it. It was just a really beautiful moment between all of us. I think that’s a credit

22:53
relationships with your life partner are tricky and this is a relationship with four adults. Of course it’s going to be complicated. I think it’s such a credit to you and your team, the maturity that you all brought and different walks of life but you’ve become family together. You’ve made this work and it’s a bond like nothing else really is it? This journey that you’ve been on together and you got to do it twice. I know. Wonderful. Any other teachable moments that you would like to pass on for people at the beginning based on your journey? Thanks especially for

23:21
You know what is right for you. So for example, like what I was looking for out of my ongoing relationship and everything, it’s not whatever, every surrogate is looking for something different, just because that’s what you’re looking for, doesn’t mean it’s right or wrong. You can’t be influenced by other people because this is a big thing you are undertaking, and you need.

23:44
be satisfied and it’s because I think it’s easy to get caught up. You know, people want this, have a lot of needs that they want met, which is great for them. It doesn’t mean that’s what you need to be. Have a successful relationship. And I think on record here, I have learned so much from your journey Jess, and I’ve learned a lot about myself and sometimes how I come in with an idea of how things should and could be. And you’ve been somebody that came at it under 25 and it was, some of us are like, oh who’s this whippersnapper?

24:11
had her ideas and it’s like, you taught me that you had these ideas of what was right for you and it challenged me that it doesn’t have to be a cookie cutter shape journey of what perhaps the majority do. Who cares about majority? You’ve got to do find your journey and what you’re in it for and what connection you want.

24:27
how deep or not or how frequent or not with your IPs. And that’s okay. And I think if you come in with open eyes and are willing to learn from lots of other people’s journeys and take the bits that fit for you, that’s the best way to do it. I’m so pleased I’ve got to learn from your journey too, Jess, over the years. And even particularly going into that second one when so many of us are like, we only ever saw your side though. And what happened, it’s like, there’s no way she’s gonna carry for them again. But wow, you did. And what you made out of it, it’s like, proved us all wrong again. Such a credit there.

24:57
Here’s a question. People say, would you do it again? I keep saying, never say never. Reality, I don’t think so. I think what I have, that little family, my family, for me, is enough. And I feel complete. And my husband will be very happy with that answer. Because he’s done. Everybody’s done. That’s right. But I’m assuming it’s something that you’re glad that you’ve done in your life. You’ve had this dream to do it and you’ve done it. Yeah, absolutely. Like I can’t recommend it enough.

25:27
I just think it’s not just about surrogacy for me. Like I’ve taught my kids this, I’ve taught my family this, I’ve taught it’s just, this is normal for my children. And you know, I would love to see who knows what will happen in the future as to, it’s just creating the new normal for us. Absolutely, it’s creating that new normal. Just a side note here, Jess’s nieces from the sister that she’s mentioned are at the same school as my kids, often in the same class as my daughter. Those two girls have watched their auntie be a surrogate.

25:54
My kids have watched their mum be a surrogate, and this is just two people in the same school. I can’t wait for that to just grow. And that in every school, there’s somebody’s been a surrogate, or they know of somebody. Yeah. Just a little side point, my youngest, she’s actually seven at the moment. And when I was pregnant, she went to school and told everyone I was pregnant. And they were like, yes, you’re gonna have a little sister. And she’s like, no, no. She’s like, they’re like, oh, no, I think it will be. And she’s like, not in our family. She’s like, that’s a cousin, and that’s how it’s done in our family.

26:23
And then so you get all these people coming up to you like, you’re giving away at that. Like what is, and I’m just like, she’ll tell you, ask her, she’ll tell you all about it. And so your girls have their own language and can explain surrogacy in their own way. Yeah. And is that the language they use, is other girls a cousin essentially? Yeah. Beautiful. You always get that awkward like when you hold, oh, she looks just like you and you think, God, I hope not. Not my egg. Yeah, just cousins.

26:47
Thank you for sharing your time with me for this episode. If you’re finding these episodes helpful, please share them with friends. If you’d like to see the images mentioned, head to our YouTube channel for all of the recordings. If you’re looking for more individualized support, consider joining SASS, Surrogacy Australia’s support service, so you can be connected with a mentor and also with me to help guide you on a journey. You might think of me as your Siri for surrogacy. Until next time, welcome to the village.