Oooh...my first blog

I swore I would never do this. I never really understood the point of blogging. But this experience is going to be exciting and stressful and scary so maybe writing about it will help me cope with it. That plus maybe I'll get a book/movie deal out of it like "Julie and Julia." It's a long shot...but you never know. And maybe this will help others going through the process in the future. I'll have to look online to see if anyone else is doing this before me. Maybe I'll learn from him.

So February 11th was the day of the deposit. I went to the surrogate agency and talked about the process with one of the women who runs the agency. I had met her about a year earlier and wasn't quite ready to put down my money, but I'm feeling like it's the right time now. While I was at the meeting I was fine for about 15 minutes. Then something hit me out of the blue and I just bawled for a while. All my fears just came out. I remember saying it was weird to feel so scared and so at peace at the same time.

She told me that she has some other single men going through the process and asked if I would be interested in talking with them. Yes! I need to email her about that to see if she has found anyone willing to share their experiences with me. That would be a great resource.

I got set up with an account to look at the egg donors. Last Saturday I went into the registry and took a quick peek at what was there. I have to admit, it's a little weird thinking about the fact that I will have a child with a woman I will never meet. I'll meet the surrogate of course, but probably not the egg donor. From what I understand it's anonymous. The egg donors put up pictures of themselves, family histories, a little something about themselves, etc.

Soon after that I got an email from a friend of mine saying she would consider donating her egg. She is now the second friend who has considered donating her egg. There are a lot of pros and cons to knowing the donor. I have to think about it a lot more. But just knowing two of my friends would even consider donating their eggs makes me feel really, really special. I think the women involved in this process - both the egg donor and the surrogate - are doing something amazing for me and they might never fully know how much they will change my life. That's a powerful thing.

I'm meeting with the psychologist on Monday. The psychologist meeting isn't to decide if I'm fit to be a parent. It's just to discuss what I want/expect during the process. There are lots of decisions to be made like "What if it's twins?" and "Do I want to go to all the appointments with the surrogate?" I think it will be good for me to talk on Monday and learn more about the process. It may make me freak out more or feel more confident about this process.

Oh, and I've already called my friends James and Anne to help me calm down when I stress out. You two should think about who should play you in the movie. :-)