Tightrope Walking

I'm having an avocado for my baby?

Hello, Friends!

It has been almost two months since my last post.  Although a lot of "choices" and "emotions" have occurred during this time, there hasn't been that many significant events to describe.  

Okay.  Fine.  Lets be honest...A lot of things I don't feel comfortable talking about in a public blog has happened.  There's been difficult decisions made and there's been frustrations.  Like I said, I won't explain them here.  But it hasn't totally been easy.  However, everything is great with the baby as of now and our surrogate is still pregnant and due August 8th!  I guess that's all that truly matters!

The girls enjoying some laughs in a greenhouse.

Our surrogate and I have been texting a bit.  I usually text her on Sundays to get an update on how everything's going.  She's been having some morning sickness and an extremely strong sense of smell.  In fact, she said she had her worst case of nausea the other morning.  Normally I'd feel bad if someone had told me they felt sick.  I'd ask "Are you okay?" and say "Get well soon!" but in this case I'm overjoyed to know that she's getting morning sickness.  LoL.  It shows that a normal pregnancy is happening and that our little blessing is already causing people stress.  Yay!  Haha.  

Trying our best to enjoy this winter weather.

Albeit I do feel kinda shitty cause I'm not there with her actually having to deal with that morning sickness.  I do not have to truly encounter her physical and mental roller coaster.  So that's something I feel guilty about.  I always try my best to really get inside her mind and understand what she's going through and feel compassion for every single bit.  Adan and I are obviously indebted to her and we'll never be able to express that thankfulness enough or even put it into appropriate words.

The Lady Lions in a bubble.

I've also sent her a few "thank you" gifts like a Crochet Magazine subscription (she loves crocheting) and some fancy crochet yarn.  I also sent her a 1st Trimester Bump Box from Amazon with lotions and bath bombs and stuff like that.  In addition to the $3,000 per month we've been paying her, it's been fun and makes me feel good to send her some extra, personalized gifts.

The somewhat tricky part of these texts and gifts though is that I'm trying to keep our friendship balanced and light and fluffy.  We don't want this relationship getting too deep and thorny.  I know that sounds terrible, to not want to have a significant relationship with the woman having our baby, but it's something we discussed with her since the beginning...She just wants to have our baby and walk away and have it be unconditionally ours.  And that's what we want too.  Neither of us feel the need to be involved in each other's lives once the baby is born.  

Sue and I are on frosty terms right now.

Of course I'll respect my child's desires if he/she wants to meet her someday and have a friendship.  We can and will allow that.  But remember that this woman is technically not the mother...She's just the surrogate.  Our egg was from an anonymous egg donor in California.  But I still want our surrogate to be happy and feel loved and appreciated...Because she is.  I just don't want her to feel so loved that she asks to come to our child's every birthday or school concert or have weekend visits, or ask for pictures every month, etc.  It's a somewhat delicate dance between her and I and I'm always trying to listen to my heart to what my true intentions are before I send a text or gift.  She's an amazing woman for doing what she's doing and I want to thank her for that and ensure our baby is in a happy belly. But I don't want to create an obsession or something, like The Hand That Rocks The Cradle, if you know what I mean.

ALL of the kids :-)

Speaking of psychological thrillers, I've spent a few sleepless nights lately.  I've found myself waking up in the middle of the night after something nightmarish will cross my mind.  My heart will start pounding through my chest and my head throbs with bad thoughts and I can't fall back to sleep.  This has been mostly caused by a situation that we had with our surrogate.  I won't get into it here but I essentially have had a couple mini panic attacks thinking about our surrogate and how she literally has our baby completely and utterly in her hands.  She has all of our lives in her grasp.  I think about random things...Like...What if she makes a poor decision and drinks or smokes or even just eats some unhealthy foods?  What if she puts our baby's life in danger somehow?  Decides to go on a weekend trip skiing and takes a tumble?  What if she gets COVID from being unsafe?  Heck, what if she gets depressed and those despondent emotions seeps into our child's brain and soul?  I think about EVERYTHING!  LoL.  She has all the power in regards to our dream and it's sometimes very stressful to think about how she could ruin all of this for us. Or even mess it up a little bit.  I know that our contract would allow us to sue her if she did something to breach that contract.  But by then the damage would be done.  We'd have an altered, perhaps deformed, infant. It'd be too late.  It's crazy humbling how much trust we're putting into a complete stranger.  And knowing that I have no control or power can suddenly wake me up at night and rob me of rest.  I'm trying my best to just trust that all will be fine and no matter what happens we'll deal with it and know that it was meant to be.

Okay. I need your advice!  Our surrogate has sent us one picture...A sonogram or whatever those things are called (the pic above.)  But she hasn't sent any "baby bump" pictures.  I know pregnant females feel kinda uncomfortable in their bodies.  And it might be especially weird for a man to be asking her for these kinds of photos.  But I wouldn't mind seeing them...Or even having these pictures for our baby someday.  Would it be weird if I asked her for photos of her baby bump?  She's barely two months pregnant...I'm guessing the bump is pretty damn small.  But yeah.  Thoughts?

Selena, Hazel, and Jakey go sledding!

Alright friends. That's it for today. Thanks for caring and wondering!

Joe's out!

P.S.  Don't forget to check out my website to purchase my books The Closeted Life of Claude Hartel and Jose Leyenda and the Wailing Woman.  Thanks to all that got the books and spent time out of your busy lives to read them!  Please continue to spread the word about them. Every cent helps us with this dream of ours!

https://joeneman.com/

Teaching's been crazy lately!  A whole other blog!