My DH and I have been married five years and have a gorgeous DD who is almost two. I suffered a rare pelvic complication during pregnancy that has left me with mobility issues. Luckily, it hasn't stopped me being a hands-on mummy and we have lots of family support plus a fantastic mother's help. So things are fine, but deep down we're grieving because DH and I are both nurturing people. Having a messy, happy family has always our dream. Now, we're having to face the reality of a life without siblings for DD.
Surrogacy with egg donation seems like our only hope for another child, since we've been advised that egg retrieval would be too invasive. We've looked seriously at adoption as we'd hoped to do that anyway, but have been advised that I'd be unlikely to be approved, especially with a young child already.
I can't see either COTS or Surrogacy UK working out for a number of reasons.
- UK is based on friendship with big meet-ups every so often where surrogates and IPs have a chance to meet each other. Coming from Northern Ireland, in a wheelchair, unable to casually network between meetings, I can't see how we'd ever progress. In addition to that, I'm rather shy and would rather crawl under a rock than put myself out there on a regular basis. DH would cope better.
- Disability creates extra hurdles to joining either COTS or SURROGACY, including going before an ethics committee and getting a GP report regarding fitness to parent (GP would not be keen to do this). We've been through such a painful time convincing others I can parent my DD - I can't face all the incredulity and 'can't think how you cope' conversations starting all over again, even though DD is thriving and the questions are often kindly meant.
- It's been explained to us that even if we got this far, we could wait for a very long time without being chosen because of the disability.
- While I realise some people have very positive experiences are both COTS and Surrogacy UK, we've spoken to others who have felt rushed and pressurised.
- As much as I realise that counselling and mutual support etc is important and organisations require finances to work, we'd rather put the hefty membership fee/travelling costs towards a surrogate's expenses and organise the counselling and paperwork ourselves.
Would anyone be kind enough to give me an opinion, please?