I managed to get a full night’s sleep this time, and when I woke up I went for breakfast with Danni. I couldn’t wait to hear from the clinic whether the embryos had developed well during their fifth day and decided to call to speak to the doctor in the early afternoon. The news I had been waiting and longing for over the last five days – which felt like years – was that all four embryos had progressed to blastocysts. Grace had reached the clinic and would be ready as soon as I arrived. I ran to tell Danni I was off to the clinic and to give her the update that we had a good choice of embryos to implant. I felt exhilarated. I showered, quickly wrote Grace a thank-you card, jumped in a taxi and, full of anticipation, arrived at the clinic. I saw Grace as soon as I walked in and was relieved to see that she was smiling. She told me she was excited about the transfer too. I showed her the photograph of all four of my embryos, and I couldn’t believe how different but perfect two of them looked. The doctor took me through the various grades and we decided which two to implant and which two to freeze for possible future use. I went to show Grace and told her which two I had chosen. I was feeling very nervous now, but Grace smiled the whole time and looked really happy, which calmed me down. I was mindful that it was she who was having the procedure, yet I was the one who was most nervous in case the procedure might be painful for her or that it might not work.
Grace was escorted to the implantation theatre first and then I was taken along afterwards. I was asked to put on my cap and gown, and then I entered the theatre. I was shaking and my palms were sweating. I was rigid with fear. I was scared I would trip up and knock something over and the whole process would have to stop. Grace lay on the table in stirrups, and the doctor and nurses were already there. I just could not believe how surreal a situation I was in. The doctor then announced that the two embryos we had chosen would be visible on the screen, which was in the adjacent room. As soon as he said that, their magnified images appeared live on a large TV monitor. He showed us which embryo was which and said that the second one I had chosen now looked even better and might have moved up the grading scale. I was ecstatic.
The first embryo was taken into the catheter and brought into the room by the nurse. The doctor talked Grace through everything as he implanted the first embryo. On another screen we could see the ultrasound of her clear womb. I sat holding her arm as I saw the white flash of light travel out of the end of the catheter, and the first embryo was implanted into the womb. It was clearer on the screen than I could have imagined, and I couldn’t blink in case I missed a millisecond of it.
Grace was comfortable so the doctor asked for the second embryo to be brought into the room. The same procedure was repeated and I saw the second flash of light as the implantation took place. I held back tears of joy: I had just witnessed something so amazing. Watching those two little embryos, a combination of my DNA and that of my egg donor, the very first instances of life, placed there in her tummy, was unbelievable to me, a sight I could never have imagined taking place either naturally or surgically. I felt honoured to be there. As the nurse moved Grace’s belly around I could see that the embryos were attached in position to the wall of her womb and not able to be detached. The doctor printed an ultrasound photo for me and began to complete the rest of his work. Seeing the photo made me feel even more secure about the procedure, and I did my best to comfort Grace. I then left the room to let the nurse help her to the next room to lie still for a while, and I changed out of my gown.
I sat for a while in the waiting room to gather my thoughts and could not believe how wonderful it was to witness what I had just seen. My mind was racing and I wanted and wished for the procedure to be successful. I instantly felt overly protective. It was a gut instinct and I wanted to carry Grace off the procedure table and lay her down comfortably and protect her. I was so surprised at my thoughts: if this was how I felt after a few minutes, how would life be for the next nine months? Grace seemed to be in very little discomfort – which put me at ease – and I took a copy of the scan to give to her, along with a couple of gifts I had brought her from the UK. I asked permission from the doctor to go back and see her, and then I gave her the gifts and thanked her for what she had done. She thanked me too and told me she would look after my baby. My heart was brimming over with joy and hope. I greeted her with a wai, a traditional Thai greeting in which you bring your hands together in front of your face as if in prayer. Then I left the room. I wanted to stay. I wanted to go where she would go. I wanted to stay close to her. I felt a huge sense of separation that tugged at my heart as I left. I was thinking about other couples who have IVF – what their conversation would be straight afterwards, talking about how life might be with the baby they were planning, and one partner helping and protecting the other. Grace was my surrogate and we would not have those conversations. I felt disappointed about that. I wanted to sit and sip some tea and chat about, and hope for, a baby to be coming. I felt a little lonely and my feet were heavy walking away. It was confusing and I had not expected that.
I chatted with the doctor afterwards and immediately left to go back to the hotel. On the journey back I couldn’t stop thinking about the possibilities the future now held. I put to one side my feelings of separation and excitedly sent texts to my mother and Emma. I prepared a photo of the embryos, together with the scan of them in position, and sent that home, before getting ready to go out to dinner and enjoy the evening. I could not stop thinking about Grace for one second.
Grace messaged me in the evening to tell me she was home. I was waiting to hear from her and I was relieved she was OK. I was feeling more and more protective of her; I wanted to know she was safe and happy. An hour or so later she sent me a message which said: ‘I will take care of your baby the best’. Although slightly lost in translation, the meaning of those words warmed my heart beyond anything I had felt before. After a wonderful dinner I went to sleep, happy in the knowledge that the transfer couldn’t have gone any better.
Chapter 7
Disappointments: Bumps and No Bumps
Grace was quick to give me updates on what she was eating and how she was feeling. She sent me a food diary that she had agreed to communicate to me, and we discussed how we would like to converse together, which proved easier by text as she was still using the translator application on her smartphone. I went out that morning to buy all the vitamin supplements she should have so that I could give them to her, and she invited me to the temple for a blessing with the monk. Filled with pleasure and apprehension, I accepted. We hailed a taxi, sped off to the other side of the river in Bangkok and arrived at the temple. I had no idea how the temple blessing would work. I just stayed open and tried to be as respectful and well-mannered as I could. We lit a candle and offered a posy of orchids to the Buddha and rubbed gold leaf onto his statue. I was enjoying spending time with Grace; in this environment, she obviously felt comfortable, and we were able to chat together and learn about each other. We then moved on to the blessing with the monk in the main temple and, after a prayer that they both said in unison, we were sprinkled with water and took part in a water ceremony. I was surprised at how at ease I felt, as normally I would have been out of my comfort zone, but I was enjoying the experience and maintained my respectful demeanour throughout – even though I didn’t understand much. I felt honoured to have been asked to go along with Grace, and in my heart of hearts I knew I had picked the right person to be my surrogate.
The two-week wait is something that is referred to a lot when reading IVF blogs or stories. It refers to the time you have to wait before taking a pregnancy test after IVF embryo implantation or other forms of clinically assisted pregnancy. It was something I was expecting, but from the moment it started I was petrified and completely oblivious to anything else in the outside world. I couldn’t sleep or eat well, and I was awake very early so I could hear how Grace felt when she woke in the morning. She was fine and resting and taking things easy in order to give the IVF the bes
t chance.
I was encased in this wait, and as the hours dragged on I hung on to Grace’s every word. Each minute and even second that ticked by I constantly looked at my phone.
Next day it was time to go back to London, and Grace and I planned to keep in touch via Messenger. Although the journey passed quickly, I really felt aware of the distance and time as soon as I arrived home. Every mile of the journey felt so far away from Grace. I switched my phone on as soon as we landed to see if she had written to me. Nothing else mattered. I wasn’t interested in reading my emails or catching up with friends or family. All I could think about was Grace and whether or not she was pregnant. I could only relax when she finally messaged me that she was going to bed and had given me an update on how she was feeling. I realised that the two weeks of waiting would feel like forever, as only a couple of days had passed and I already wanted to know if she was pregnant. I would keep an ear out at all times to see if she had messaged me, and I’d read about every twinge or bout of nausea with fear or excitement, depending on how the message had been written.
We were getting to know each other better, and as each message passed back and forth, I could feel an unbelievable bond with Grace. She’d send messages saying that she was looking after the babies, and my heart would beat faster every time I read them. When she first used the word ‘baby’, I cried with happiness and I couldn’t quite believe she was pregnant, even though I was wishing and willing her with every ounce of my body to be so. Although it was too early to do a pregnancy test, I wondered if she had and already knew the result. I read the message over and over, knowing she was looking after herself, but each time I read ‘baby’ my heart wanted to burst. When she woke with morning sickness on day five after the implantation, I needed no more convincing that she was pregnant. As each day passed, I would check on the internet to see which stage the pregnancy would be at, and whether her symptoms were typical of other women at this very early stage. Everything I read confirmed to me that she was pregnant. All I could do was sit, wait, read, and wonder.
My feet hardly touched the ground. I could concentrate on nothing else, and as the two weeks passed I began to start planning the future in my head. Each day nearer day fourteen seemed longer and harder. All of the messages and photos back and forth were so positive, and I could tell Grace wanted this pregnancy for me so much. Every day I let her know how much what she was doing meant to me. As the date approached when she would have a blood test to confirm whether the embryo transfer had been successful, she asked me if she could self-test at home. I was worried that the reading would be false because of the drugs she was taking to help the pregnancy, so I told her not to test and be as patient as she could until the appointment at the clinic. I secretly hoped, though, that she had tested herself, and was not only feeling pregnant but had evidence too. I wanted to wait until the blood test for the reading of the hCG hormone, hoping not only for a positive result but also a high reading to indicate a pregnancy.
However, on the day before the official test I wanted to tell her to take a test herself. After a short conversation on Skype, I was completely convinced by all her symptoms – and from what she had told me were similarities to her first pregnancy – that she was indeed pregnant. I knew in my heart of hearts, though, that we needed to wait. She told me the clinic had called her and asked her to come in at 8am for the test, and I told her I would be awake, waiting for her to give me the results. I had also assumed that the clinic would email me the news later. I was exhausted but wanted to stay up the whole night. I hadn’t rested properly since I had arrived back from Bangkok, and the jet lag hadn’t helped at all. I wanted to go back to Bangkok to hear the results for myself, but I knew I just had to sit and wait. It seemed impossible – I had never experienced such feelings of anxiety and excitement before.
I woke at 1am to hear that Grace was getting ready to go to the clinic, and I sat in bed trying to distract myself by watching the news and scanning my Messenger screen. I could hear my own heartbeat. I was thinking about her making her way to the clinic, and imagining her every move. I wanted her to be rushing to the clinic, protecting her tummy, as fast as her legs could carry her. I wanted her to be first in the door as the clinic opened. I wished I could have been there so we could have arrived hours before and I could have heard the results first hand.
When she got to the clinic, she sent me a photograph of herself with her little bandage from the blood test. The doctors had told her the result would take an hour. I sat bolt upright in bed and knew I was moments away from finding out if she were indeed pregnant. My heart was slamming against my chest, and I can honestly say I had never been more nervous and agonised in my life. I could hear it thumping; the blood was pumping so fast I could feel it in my ears. The last two weeks had taken forever to pass. I was planning whom I was going to tell. The hour dragged past and Grace started to write to me on Messenger. I couldn’t breathe.
Finally, the message came through – the doctor had asked her to take another blood test. I felt crushed. The first test had had a very low reading so they wanted to test again. However, the second test came back the same. Grace was not pregnant. I was devastated. She was devastated. She was sorry for me. I can’t remember crying. I was so hurt that I think if I had started I wouldn’t have stopped. All I could do was slump back into my bed with the sheets over my head. I was feeling physical pain. The adrenalin had been rushing around in me for days, peaking while waiting for the results, and now everything had gone. My head was pounding. I was howling and crying inside, but the tears and sounds couldn’t come out. I felt wounded and winded, and I couldn’t move. I thought I would lie still in that position forever. I didn’t want to get up. I had to stay still, completely still, in my bed until the results had finally sunk in. I knew I had to message Grace, but I had to console myself too. I was grieving. I had believed that she was pregnant, and now she wasn’t. I felt a deep and lonely loss. I could hear the ticking of the clock now as my heart had stopped pounding, and I wanted to sleep. I was mourning the loss of the baby I had imagined.
We exchanged a few messages, but I was so sad I could barely type back to her. I wanted to sleep, which I knew would be impossible, but I had been awake the whole night and we had ended up with a negative pregnancy result. The various stories from the forums were running through my mind, and this was the one that I had never wanted to think would happen to me. It had. No pregnancy. The devastation was enormous.
Later that morning, I called the clinic to confirm the situation and they said that they had also been sure that she was pregnant, and that’s why they tested her again. I couldn’t believe it – I wondered if she had been pregnant at all. The clinic said Grace would stop the drugs that day and when her period came naturally I could consider another implant in a couple of weeks. I wondered what had gone wrong. I wanted to know why the pregnancy hadn’t continued, and whether it had started at all, since we’d had a very low reading from the blood pregnancy test.
I started to text Emma and a couple of other people who knew I was waiting for the result, and then called my mum to tell her the sad news. I had to dust myself off and think about facing work, but inside I was crying over the loss of these two embryos. I so wanted Grace to be pregnant and to be making plans for the future. Instead, it felt as if we were back to square one and had to start all over again. I wasn’t sure if I could ever go through a two-week wait again, so I wanted to consider carefully whether I was taking the right path. That fortnight had sapped my energy completely. I was so excited one minute and so worried the next; I would need to be super-prepared to jump into the excruciating wait again.
After a couple of days, I started to think about a second attempt at an implantation with Grace and the remaining two embryos, and I emailed the doctor to ask for more details about what would be entailed along with the costs involved in a second implantation. I couldn’t help but think of the amount of people who had become preg
nant from their first attempt at IVF. My mind kept returning to the same question over and over: why didn’t it work? I had a young, healthy egg donor, a young and healthy surrogate, who had had her own child successfully and naturally, and to top it all my own fertility was high. With all three people together, I was so devastated that it hadn’t worked and sat countless times trying to work out why nature had taken this course. Obviously, I wasn’t going to get answers and tried to console myself that I was very lucky indeed to be able to afford a second round with Grace very soon, as I had two more embryos frozen at the clinic. This gave me a slight glimmer of hope. I started to assess whether I could afford to go back for the implantation, both emotionally and financially. Due to the overwhelming disappointment I felt, I wanted to think about Plan C, should the second implantation not work. I wasn’t feeling hopeful. I was mourning a loss I had never expected to mourn.
Over the next couple of weeks, I was in contact with Grace every day to see how she was doing. Her period came quickly and she started the drugs again. I was much more hesitant this time and didn’t feel excited at all at the beginning. I was eager to know the dates, though, and quickly paid for the second implantation. I decided I wanted to go back again to be there. I know how I felt the first time and I really wanted to see the second lot of embryos implanted. I knew that nothing would be different, but somehow I felt that if I didn’t go back I would wish that I had. I wanted to see those embryos safely inside Grace’s womb. So I booked my flights, and we were all systems go for the beginning of May.
I kept thinking about the second set of embryos that had been frozen. I was worried about the quality, as we had implanted the two higher-grade embryos and frozen the lower-grade ones. After all, the first two hadn’t taken and that had been a fresh transfer. The second transfer would be a frozen one, and I knew that made the chances of success slightly lower, if the thawing process even allowed us two viable embryos after they were defrosted. So, although I had booked to be at the clinic for the second implantation, I decided I wanted to see more egg donors. I believed at this point that the pregnancy hadn’t taken due to the quality of the original eggs and the number that were harvested.
Surrogacy Page 4