Meet our surrogate!

It was in January of 2021 when we had to agonisingly part ways with our initial surrogate who we lovingly referred to as Monstera. We posted about her and that experience at the end of that same month with some well-trodden fatalism around things happening for a reason…and just maybe they do? We would have of course loved for things to have worked out with Monstera, but if it weren’t for that struggle, we may not have found our way to Erin.

Erin is a rare breed. Like most surrogates, she loves being pregnant and loves everything about births (she is a Doula by trade). If there were more Erin’s in the world, the path to parenthood for same-sex couples who lack some important body parts might be a lot straighter (pun most definitely intended). Erin wasn’t our first re-match post Monstera.

There were a couple of frustratingly fleeting re-matches that were initially promising, but then very soon after, ended in disappointment. Again, we’re not the strongest of believers, but it’s hard not to concede that the stars were just taking their time to align, because once we met Erin in September last year, we kinda just knew.

This is not Erin’s first rodeo. She has a beautiful 12-year-old of her own, Ryder, and has been a surrogate twice before (all of this before the age of 30, might we add). Whilst in our initial chat we did delve into hopes/desires/prospective timelines etc., it was probably our mutual love of Ru Paul’s Drag Race that solidified this match.

From that moment on it’s been go go go. These things take time, but we feel closer to our end goal now than at any other point in the 3 years we’ve been working on this. That’s a really good place to be.

A bit more on Erin: she’s socially conscious (another very apparent trend amongst surrogates), also a mum to three cats, an avid Tik Tok scroller and sharer and a lover of a nap or two! Corniness aside, given how quickly our relationship with Erin has blossomed, it’s hard to imagine a time without her in our lives. This feels like the mark of a solid team that is super ready to conquer this project and overcome any obstacle in our way.

Although there will be some big oceans and a significant number of kilometres between us, our hearts feel so full when we envisage sharing pictures and memories of our future bub with Erin, and forever sharing with them how instrumental she will have been in their creation. Her level of calm and ‘we got this’ attitude has helped hugely as we work to navigate the MANY steps involved in making this happen.

So, whilst it’s important to be downbeat and frustrated and upset when the bumps on this road are at their bumpiest, it’s equally important to be grateful and appreciative when there’s a smooth patch

Erin, shantay you absolutely stay. We got this.