Episode 149 – Flick – mum

00:14
Welcome to our podcast series with Surrogacy Australia. Thank you so much for taking the time to listen and in turn for helping us spread awareness and appreciation for surrogacy. I’m your host Anna McKie and these recordings are from a regular webinar series that I run. You can find upcoming dates on our website at surrogacyaustralia.org. During the one hour webinars, I will walk you through the surrogacy process in Australia and you can type in questions for us to answer.

00:41
My co-hosts have all done surrogacy in Australia and they alternate between surrogates, gay dads and straight mums. This episode featuring mum through surrogacy flick is one from the archives and was recorded in April 2022. Felicity from Canberra became mum to Jackson in June 2017 and then Harper in April 2020. They were carried by their now lifelong friend Christy via gestational surrogacy arrangements in the USA. Felicity suffered from infertility,

01:10
miscarriage and the loss of her baby daughter Lily before eventually needing surrogacy. Flick, as many of us know her by, has been active in the Australian surrogacy community for many years, including being an admin for the Facebook group ASC for many years. She is all about friendship first for surrogacy, be that in Australia or overseas, and she shares her insights into how to connect with people in Australia.

01:35
As you’ll hear, the attendees to the webinar were typing in questions, which is great when people feel comfortable to ask. Flick was busy typing replies to people who asked about specific questions, things about surrogacy in the US, and I was able to answer some about SAS, which is Surrogacy Australia’s support service. There are a few classic sayings around the surrogacy community, and I’ve loved it when some of the elders of the community, people like Flick,

02:00
organically mentioned one in our webinar because I can then use it as the title for the episode. Flick shared the saying, a surrogate can’t find you if she can’t see you. And she talks about how important it is to be active and it’s like dipping your toes into the water, like moving to a new neighborhood and getting to know your neighbors. Like any friendship in life, there are times where you’re in contact a lot and other times where it’s more sporadic. So for me, being able to revisit this webinar with Flick

02:27
felt like a lovely trip down memory lane and it was lovely hearing the banter that we have together and how easy it was to talk to her. I hope you enjoy this episode. What’s happening in this photo flick? This was the first time I held Jackson and you can see I’m crying and I did a very good job not tripping over any cords and I think my husband took it. I think I can’t remember because I was just in awe of this is this is my baby this is the baby I’ve been waiting to meet and that I love before his heart even started to beat and that’s him in my arms.

02:54
Yes. You were fresh off the plane too from memory. I don’t think I was fresh off the plane but I definitely had a really bad cough at the time. Praying to get the end it. Yeah. Yes. Wow. So then we’ve got another photo here. Surrogacy the left there. That’s right. That’s Kristy on the left with Jackson having a little bit of a sook and here’s Wabanub which is the dummy. It will be in all of my babies photos. It’s a particular dummy from the US which Kristy made sure our babies got and that’s my husband at the time, Peter. Unfortunately we’re divorced now and Jackson a little bit weirded

03:24
with all the camera flashes going off on the right. As people heard so Flick and Pete have separated and that happened shortly after the birth of Harper. Yeah, happy to answer questions if that’s necessary but it’s really just completely separate from the surrogacy. yeah. It is. They did surrogacy together and so living in Canberra at the time and so obviously this is Jackson here and you’re all over for there so who else is in this photo? The man on the left is Jared, Christie’s husband and they’re holding their foster baby at the time that’s little Stacey.

03:53
So Christy is a registered nurse and she’s also a foster mum. All her kids are over 18 and she’s been fostering for about 15 years now. I think Stacey was about her 14th foster. She only fosters newborns up until around about five years old. She’s just focused on babies and loves babies and she loves being pregnant. So we were her fourth, sorry, not third, fourth, sorry to see you with Jackson.

04:14
And that’s Jackson that I’m holding and my ex-husband Pete there as well. We’re in nice neutral colors except for Stacey who had to be super bright. And so clearly a giving person is Kristy. Very, very much. Absolutely giving of everything. One of the most selfless people I’ll ever know. I’m sure you would agree that yes, although surrogates in America are paid, their motivations for being surrogates are no different to mine and other surrogates in Australia. Would you agree with that? I would say of course you’ll get that the few, the few apples

04:44
that might have the seed of reputation for commercial surrogacy, but all in all surrogates who are doing surrogacy and in it for the right reasons, they’re doing it because they want to help make a family. They want to bring what they’ve enjoyed in life to couples and singles who don’t otherwise have the opportunity to do so.

05:00
And that she just happens to live in a country that does commercial and has agencies and structure in place. And Australia in comparison is infant in comparison. So maybe SASS is the beginning of an agency. Well, that’s right. Flick, we, gosh, a couple of years, oh, three and half, four years ago, we were in the planning stages for SASS during when we met in Sydney that time. Yeah, I do. And I also had a terrible cough.

05:21
Oh, I remember that. So that’s, there we go. So that’s some of the history here. And so actually it’s had some sort of newborn, beautiful photography here that you use with both kids. This is actually Harper on the left and Jackson on the right. My makeup was a lot nicer, I think, for Harper’s photos, because yeah, it just was nicer. So I can tell with the lips, that’s little baby Harper and Jackson and yeah, they look so similar because technically they’re twins.

05:47
So just tell us, for those listening, you said technically they’re twins. Explain that from an IVF point of view. Exactly. So I’ve started a IVF cycle in Australia with intending to pick up the eggs once I got to LA. Only did one pickup because they do everything much better in the US when it comes to IVF generally. They’re both from the same batch, if you will, they’re brother and sister, complete brother and sister, but they’re also from the same sperm and same egg release. So twins.

06:14
Yes right, born a few years apart. twiblings. twiblings, there we go. And this photo I think from my knowledge of your friendship with Kristy, this summarises you very well. Yeah exactly, so the one on the left, I forget what was there but she made a great face, and the one on the right I’m actually squeezing her bum.

06:31
And so I think this, perhaps you’re, I don’t know if I want to say unusual, but maybe seriously done really well over there is you actually stayed with Christie. Is that right? Absolutely. So for both journeys, Pete and I, first time in 2017 and myself in 2020 because COVID, we lived with Christie and her family. And so the first time it was around about a month. And for the second time I was there for four and a half months thereabouts.

06:54
Spend every day with Christy, hang out every day. She’s my best friend. Absolutely adore her. For those listening who are at the very beginning of their journey, you know, here’s an example of what Suresi could look like overseas or here. And I hope people listening are forming their opinions and you don’t have to agree. You might feel, no, that’s not for me. Or you go, yeah, I love the sound of that, but it’s okay to form your opinions and be different, but to see examples.

07:16
and I think that’s what we’re here to provide. cute here isn’t she? Yeah this is Harper, so on the left trying to get that that one passport photo that the office will accept where they’re looking straight ahead and you can see every feature on their face.

07:30
And on the right, she’s wearing the exact, this is, you can see her little COVID quarantine band. So this was our last day in quarantine in Sydney when we came home and she’s wearing the same outfit that Jackson wore on the day we got home to Australia as well. So for Harper returning from Sydney to Canberra after quarantine with COVID and for Jackson coming into Canberra coming home, same outfit for the two of them. So a real full circle moment.

07:53
Absolutely. It is about now, right? Yeah, so there’s Jackson on the left, Harper on the right. Jackson will be turning five in June and he’s cheeky as anything and you can see all this, I think it’s chocolate from Easter all over his chin there and Harper is two, just turned two on Thursday last week and she is all, forgive the pun, she’s all sass and on the left she’s jumping on Jackson and they’re jumping on the bed together.

08:16
And on the right, this was taken at my ex-husband’s house and they’ve just come off the trampoline together and having a time of their lives. Beautiful. And so I’m sure for people listening going, right, that, you know, this is what we’re here for. We’re here tonight to bring you hope. Cause Flick, you were in that position many years ago, you know, and will this ever happen? That sort of thing. It’s like yesterday. I can imagine. Should we go back to what?

08:37
We’ve been asked in the questions, let’s go through them first. So Joanne asks, how long did it take you to find a surrogate in the US? Do think it takes longer to find a surrogate match as a heterosexual couple? I think in the US it doesn’t really bear so much of a difference between a single to a couple, heterosexual or homosexual. It’s all the same because generally the…

08:56
market as you put it in the US is that there are thousands of surrogates through a range of different agencies and things by comparison to Australia. It’s just generally that there are far more people looking for different types of qualities in people and types of people that they want to match with. So there’s no difference of where you’re coming from in your background. For myself, it was a really quick process. As I said, stars aligning. So we signed up with an agency in February and then by March, I was doing the IVF cycle in Sydney and by end

09:25
April was finishing up that cycle and going to the States and we received profiles in March. By May, we had said we want to have a chat to Christy and I think it was two days before my birthday in May, Christy said, yeah, I love you guys and you’re Australian, which makes it even better. She was really, really cool, excited to have Australian IPs. So it was super quick and we got very lucky with the first transfer.

09:49
pregnant on first and along came Jackson soon afterwards. So yeah. So that is quick. And so I suppose that can be the case with the American agencies, can’t it? That, you know, the goth surrogates lined up and that’s what you pay for. That’s right. That’s right. I’ve become quite friendly with various people in different agencies in the US.

10:05
And for our particular journey, the stars did align somewhat in that everything just snapped in. It was like our fate, the kismet, that it all came to pass as quickly as it did. If there’s a threshold, we’re slightly on the upper end of matching and getting everything done so quickly. And the lower end might be a year, but we were super quick,

10:23
Yes. Well, I’m going to pop in with some questions along the way there. I hope you don’t mind me talking dirty here, Flick. Money. Oh, money. Yeah. America costs a lot. It does. I have a ballpark of if you, not just the agency’s fees, but if you include the flights, particularly if you go for a visit, if you went over for one of the scans, accommodation, staying for a while at the end. I’ve got a $200, $250,000 number in my head. Yeah, I remember that, unfortunately.

10:48
Factoring everything in, my ex-husband and I, we did go over it 20 weeks for Jackson’s pregnancy as well because we wanted to meet Christie and her family face to face. She wanted to meet us and it was our opportunity to also just go to the States as a couple as well and have a bit of explore around. So big walking dead fan here had to go to July and do some things.

11:06
But yeah, it did come to around about the $220, $250K mark for each service. We were very lucky in that we had the ability to go back on our equity in the house and to borrow from parents. That’s not going to be for everyone, is it? No.

11:20
Unfortunately it isn’t, but that being said, there is a lot of opportunities to shop around because there’s so much available in the U S and in Canada at least. Those are the two areas that I can speak on most informatively. There’s so much that you can pick and choose in, what you want from an agency or even if you want to do an independent journey in the U S that’s, that’s totally available to you as well. It’s about.

11:42
research and knowing your stuff before you get into it. So you can minimize that cost quite effectively and keep it close to 150 maybe with the exchange rates and things. You can blow it out completely if you want to be completely hands off, but you can let it go all the way out. So I’ll give people a guide in Australia. by my data gathering, an average is about 55 to 60,000. So Baker costs 60,000 for the dads cause there was two egg collection pickups. took about three embryo transfers. The teams that do it for about 35 are those that live locally to each

12:12
other, perhaps they already had embryos or it worked first go that sort of thing and no major loss of wages or travel and up at the 80-90,000 it’s the teams with interstate travel and took a few embryo transfers there. that’s our question about your timings there. So Flick, just take us back a bit then. You wrote there, so March 2016 is when you went overseas. Oh no, when I started the IVF. IVF for then, right. So when I know how it started, I think you went to a growing families seminar and your parents came too? I went to two. So it was back when it was families through surrogacy.

12:41
They’ve changed their name to Growing Families Now. So I went to my first seminar in Melbourne where I was really exposing myself to the community and getting an idea and that sort of planted the seed of, look into Canada, which we started to do. We liked the idea of Canada because it was altruistic, just like it was in Australia. My husband at the time was quite concerned about the illegality of us being, we were technically New South Wales residents at the time, but just over the border to the ACC, but pretty much.

13:08
same laws between the two. So he was quite nervous about that illegality from

13:13
New South Wales doing commercial surrogacy. So we liked the look of Canada, but we didn’t like the feedback we were getting from agencies. There was something that didn’t quite hit the right note for us. We felt a little bit out to sea. And when we went to another seminar in Sydney, there was an agency presenting from California and we really liked that it was the tried and tested method. They’ve been doing this for 30 years. There were no doubts. And where we had all these emails going back and forth with Canada, not feeling like we’re getting our emails.

13:42
answered and questions answered I should say. The US it was really easy just to go question, answer, question, answer. Face to face right there and it made a big difference that my husband was there and my mum was there and they were just like yeah.

13:53
This makes so much sense. Why wouldn’t we? So it just, the stars aligned and kissmint fell into place that way. So I might do a little plug there. for that group, it’s called growing families. Now they do an annual conference. I’m going to be there. Flick might be there. I hope to be there. It depends whether there are children in tow because life gets so much busier when you’ve got kids. Yeah, absolutely. We can come without them, but it depends on weekends, of course, shared parenting there. And that’s a great way because the Saturdays talks about domestic and there’s panels we hear from surrogates and parents and lots of lawyers and

14:23
doctors in Australia and then the Sunday is focused on overseas options and there’s presenters, some are coming, some are via Zoom and agencies and hearing all about that. So if you’re still at this beginning and you want a bit more of a crash course, I recommend looking into that growing families group there. Flick, I might get you to type in to Joanne there. She’s asked about a bit more of the American stuff. So I won’t dwell too much on that in this webinar. And so I’m going to answer a couple of SASS questions. Filipina’s asked,

14:48
How much does it roughly cost in Australia? Well, hopefully I have answered that one before I even saw your question there. an average of say aim for 60. You don’t have to have that all saved at the beginning. I’d suggest having.

14:59
10,000, maybe 20,000 saved to start with. And bear in mind, my journey was over two and a half years. So mean, the dads could paste that out. And also how do we obtain a form to sign up with SAS? It’s online. So head to our Surrogacy Australia website. There’s a tab called SASS and then read through that and you head to the intended parent section and join there. One of the anonymous ones about Canada, would you say there was a similar cost in Canada as I think the process is altruistic there? You’re right. Canada does altruistic. They do have agencies over there though. SAS, we

15:29
We have modelled ourselves off an agency called Surrogacy UK, which abbreviate to Suck S-U-K, which I think is quite funny. We came up with SASS and we were happier with that one.

15:37
But we’ve modeled ourselves off some of these agencies and they shared their resources and time with us. They are more generous in their allowances and compensation for the surrogate, not compensation is not the word, but what she’s allowed to claim for is more generous and realistic in some ways. So Canada, I’ve got this 90,000 sits in my head. I think it would be closer to say the 100,000. Flick, you’ve heard that from the community? In terms of Australian matchup and Canadian dollars to Australia is pretty much on par. yeah, 90 to 100, they’re about.

16:05
So suppose if you like the altruistic model, but like the idea of a more established agency and perhaps a quicker turnaround time with matching with the surrogate, Canada would be the next country.

16:13
I would recommend looking into. However, there’s been peaks over time where lots of Aussies go looking to Canada and they don’t have enough surrogates to fulfill demand. So still be patient. Somebody else asks, a hetero couple in mid 40s with failed IVF, are we allowed to continue trying naturally? Ah, good question. While concurrently engaging an anonymous egg donor and surrogate. So we asked this question in our SASS application about, you continue to try? We don’t encourage it. A surrogate isn’t looking to carry for you if you’re going to get pregnant too. Some surrogates might.

16:43
but an unknown one is unlikely. Perhaps somebody that you already know. We don’t do anonymous surrogacy here in Australia. It’s about relationships. That’s what I’m doing it for as a surrogate. I want a continued friendship with you and your family and that little child. If you’re looking for a little bit more separation, then overseas commercial surrogacy would be an option for you. And there’s other countries, not just the US, Ukraine. I can’t really mention Ukraine anymore now. They used to be the ones for a hetero couple, more like an $80,000 package there. I don’t know how they

17:13
working now come to the seminar. Just out of safety I’d say don’t look at you crying for that, it’s really not an option.

17:20
Georgia in Europe is still an option and I think some people are looking into some other South American countries but I can’t remember off the top of my head. I have feeling it’s Colombia. Colombia maybe they’re coming back. I Colombia or Venezuela but don’t quote me on that. No don’t quote me on that Head to Growing Families website or engage in the community and come and ask groups there so that’s a really good one. I’d actually say go to the community first and ask because you’ll find out a lot more quickly as well as not costing a dime in that.

17:50
sense to get people’s real feedback on things and finding out where your gut sits on. Oh this one actually interests me more. I’ll ask specific questions about that to the people that know all of the details if you want to approach someone for specific advice.

18:05
That’s good advice. So unfortunately, the communities are in Facebook. So if you’re not a Facebook user, that’s tricky. And then there are individual, there’s the big main group ASC and Flick and I both used to be admins together for that. And then within that are subgroups for the different countries that do surrogacy. So then you might join those. Martha’s asked, do many others find a surrogate through their network? As you said, statistically have a better chance and primarily use SASS as an educational training service. Great question, Martha. A bit of both. You know, I get about four to six, well, as you can see from the monthly reports,

18:35
surrogate enrollments per month. And sometimes what happens is they then join the community themselves and become active, attend catch-ups, and they meet their own IPs. Sometimes those IPs are in SASS. And then what happens is they make their match together because they’ve already met. And then sometimes they choose to stay with SASS and become one of the teams. And then sometimes they might choose to navigate it alone and have you SASS to help them get started. So that’s why some of those numbers don’t look like we’ve done the pure introductions because I see SAS, yes, that’s part of our job to do

19:05
introductions but I also see it as we’re to educate surrogates and IPs how to help you help yourself and provide you with some resources to help with that, hence the portal and having an intranet of things provided there. Some don’t make it through, some surrogates decide it’s not quite the right fit for them or at the right time. So Martha I think I’ve answered that but if I haven’t…

19:22
quite answered it. Feel free to type in something more. There we go. have. what about the number of surrogates looking is still low? up perhaps. Just sign up is still low. Well, I guess the numbers in Australia are low in comparison. The number of surrogates is done across the whole of Australia. So backed by my data gathering, for example, 2018, we have some core data on. There is no national database that says how many surrogate births are done in Australia each year. The only information we have is those reported by the IVF clinics per state.

19:52
And that doesn’t include the traditional surrogate ones that do it for home inseminations. But through Sarah Jeffords and I’s data gathering, in 2018, there was about 100 births in Australia. And I could keep track of most of those that were new connections, because we’re assuming any new connection in Australia came from that Facebook group at the time. So we were saying there was 20. So that means 80 out of that 100 previously knew each other. There were only 20 in the whole of Australia that were strangers beforehand. So if you look at the SASS numbers as say two a year, in comparison to that 20 per

20:22
year. That’s not too bad considering we’re new versus the Facebook group that’s been going for a long time. I would love it to be faster of course. I’m not sure how to make that happen. You keep trying. Surrogates still keep coming. When a surrogate thinks about being a surrogate, she types in surrogacy in Australia and finds us and she comes along. And so some of the surrogates will stay on in SASS but then

20:40
Remember some of those surrogates that sign up with SASS meet IPs from the community. So we need you to be active. We need you to either attend things in person catch-ups, come to our Surrogates Australia Zoom sessions, and some of those SASS surrogates might meet you there. And so when the surrogates get access to the profiles, they get access to everybody in Australia. I recommend.

20:58
myself and their mentor recommend some that might be the right fit for them if they’re looking for hetero or gay, if they’ve had a kid before or not, if they’re local or long distance. And then so we make some recommendations. There is a recorded webinar about all of that process if you’re interested in that too. So Martha, I hope that’s answered some of those questions there. Should we go back to any of the other ones that have been asked? I’ll read one out loud. I won’t dwell on the overseas stuff, but Martha has asked, what do you mean to be active in Facebook? So either read what you’ve got there or give us a summary.

21:28
active on Facebook is basically dipping your toes into the pool and seeing who’s hanging out at the pool. Someone brings something to barbecue, is someone throwing around a beach ball, did you bring a beach ball? It’s sort of coming to like the neighborhood party and you’re newly involved in the neighborhood, you’ve just moved in and you’re getting to know your neighbors. You can either be a really over-the-top, ambitious

21:50
to know everyone and be like the Brie van der Kamps, sorry Jesper Housewives fans, the Brie van der Kamps of your neighborhood and need to know everyone and be involved and the lead for everything or you might just want to hang back and get to know a little bit here and there and more things out. There’s a great quote that’s circulated within the surrogacy community for a long time which was, you can’t find a surrogate unless she can see you. I don’t think I had that right way around but it’s so- So if you can’t find you if she can’t see you. That’s right. She can find you if she can’t see you. Yeah. And it’s basically saying that you

22:20
can be in this crowd room full of people and a potential surrogate or potential egg donor may not see you until you put your hand up and say something and it might be a joke, it might be a really great meme, it might be offering someone words of support and understanding in their time of need that shows them that you’ve been there and you can…

22:41
really identify with what they feel and you can help shine the light for them forward. It may not be something about where you are in your journey, but it could just be signaling who you are and the type of person you are, which sparks that little flame, that ignition of this is someone I want to get to know. And maybe you’ll find a surrogate organically in that connection or an egg donor in that way. Maybe not so, but I can guarantee hands on heart that you will find people who

23:06
are your team, they’re your people. I made wonderful connections when I was first doing research back in 2015 and it just happened to be that the first person I connected with was someone in Australia who has the same genetic blood disease that I have. And I’ve never met anyone who has the same thing as me and she was going through the same things. And to be able to describe to her how I was feeling after losing babies and for her to say, I can see where you’re coming from, I haven’t been there, but I understand because of everything we go through with our disease. It was huge to have that support of someone who understood what it

23:36
to now face surrogacy as your only option to have. was Marion? Maybe, see it, was, yeah, that’s right. And it was so much to establish that connection and even though the majority of connections I made in that first year online were not necessarily surrogates who could potentially offer to be our surrogate, they established lifelong friendships of people that I count as my tribe in this world. yeah. That was my question to you then, you know, eventually you decided on the overseas path.

24:02
Why did you then bother making connections within the Aussie community? Or even once you then started your overseas journey, why did you continue to be active? Maybe it’s just who I am. Maybe it’s because I could see I was really in a painful place when I knew I had to look at surrogacy. Really quick background, I had lost my daughter that I carried at 23 weeks. She was stillborn at 23 weeks and I…

24:24
had help syndrome and nearly died. So it was a really emotional time for our family and to be pregnant and trying to be pregnant for so long and then nothing like the lights are turned out and you’re in the dark. It was, was panic, absolute panic. Didn’t know what to do. And I found, as I said, connections with people, men and women, singles and couples, surrogates, IPs, already. I found that connection. gave me hope.

24:46
And made me feel me again. And I would feel really terrible if I had turned out the light for other people. And yeah, if I suddenly left the world and didn’t want to communicate and be part of the community anymore, then how was I helping grow that community back? I needed to give back all different tangents. that would seem transactional then, wouldn’t it? If you had just come in to suck it dry instead of giving something back. And it’s your way of giving back that when other people have given to you. And in a capacity at a time that we can all manage sometimes

25:16
We’ve got energy and sometimes we don’t have time for that too. So you’ve got to know your boundaries. That’s very valuable. Let me take the listeners to then sort of the middle part. you had Jackson and come back to Joanne’s question in a second. We may or may not get time to answer all through that Joanne. You might need to come back at another webinar or join the community. Just some different options there. But Flick, so you had Jackson and then at some point in time, you and Pete, who were still together at the time, just said, yes, we would like a sibling. Pete already had a daughter from another marriage. Relationship, not married, but yeah.

25:46
and you went, yeah no, we would like a sibling. Then I think there was some time where you’re like, do we stay in Australia and look? Or if we’ve got the ability to go overseas? Was that how your thought process went? It was. So we were toing and froing, do we, don’t we, do we, don’t we? And I was like, yeah, let’s do it, let’s do it, let’s do it. And Christie in the background was, you guys make up your own mind. So you had Christie. Of course, we would never stop talking to Christie. She’s always there. She’s little Siamese twin. She’s right here.

26:16
She was always there and saying, at whatever you guys work out. If you think of it, just give me a yell. We’ll see what we can do. And, and OSAD made really great relationships in Australia. And we started to think about, well, there’s a lot of cost involved and time and legals and everything else. Maybe going domestically would be better within Australia, maybe overseas again. And the way things crunched out, it just ended up being that Christie said, look, to make the cost easier, let’s go sans surrogacy, sans agency and do it independently, which,

26:46
And that busted out 65,000 straight off the bat in terms of that. And that made it a lot more appealing to my then husband. But at the same time, and this is just the way the cookie crumbled, once I’d said to my friends in the community, oh, we’re going with Christy again, we’re so excited, woo hoo, woo hoo. Then two of my friends said, oh, I wish you’d told me yesterday, because I was totally going to call you this weekend and offer. it was like, oh, wow. Yes. Yeah. That’s just, it was crazy.

27:14
But that’s just the way it is. But that being said, I’m still very, very close friends with these surrogates who have offered to me. And maybe in the future, who knows? But I’m not friends with them for that reason. No. not friends with them because they’re my women. They’re my girls. Yes.

27:29
And I think that’s a great example of you didn’t know that that was coming. They had secretly been thinking about it, but I think that’s a great example of coming into these communities, build friendships, knowing that they’re just friends. Don’t build them going secretly. hope they’re going to help me down the track because that’s not genuine. Is it? can’t keep up that face forever. No, no, it’s, putting on a mask. It’s, it’s pretending to be someone else and someone I think it’s a long-going quote. If you don’t lie in the sense that you’re putting on a mask and pretending to be a certain person and aiming for certain things.

27:59
you don’t have to remember all the stories. That’s true. Just makes sense. Yeah, just be who you are. That’s really good advice there. I’ll quickly just mention, don’t know if Joanna is still here, but in terms of a fund manager for overseas, I wouldn’t necessarily recommend that you get one. Just grab a spreadsheet and

28:15
write it down yourself because that’s just extra money spent that you shouldn’t need to spend that. Where you can try and save costs with having an Australian lawyer for an overseas journey. I wouldn’t personally because it’s another $10,000 that you don’t need to spend. it’s all of that tricky stuff knowing what do I have to

28:31
I’m allowed to say no to that can be tricky, can’t it? Yeah, we sort of covered all of those sorts of things. Any sort of advice then, Flick, that you would like to part to, you know, people here at the beginning about being active or weighing up your options. Take your time. Yeah. You may feel like the clock is ticking and everything’s running against you with age, with funds, with desperation and being knocked back in a variety of different ways. Take your time and really, really think on the questions and go with your gut in the end. Trust your gut. Don’t just follow.

29:01
the herd, trust your gut. Really trust your gut because if you’re not ultimately comfortable with something that’s happening then you won’t be comfortable with it later on. That’s the best way I can put it. I’ve always felt like in my gut if something’s still feeling like I need to sit on the toilet for a while then don’t go with it.

29:19
You’ve got to really trust it. it could either be sit with it for a while and see if it resolves or act on it. It can be really hard though if perhaps you’re in a conversation with somebody who could be a potential surrogate and something doesn’t feel right, but there’s this part of you that goes, but I need, really want this to happen. It can be really hard to back out though, can’t it? You must, if you have any of those feelings, you must, because what could be just a little indication of a red flag early on could be massive bombs later on in the future.

29:47
We get crazy surrogates and crazy IPs. Or no, just crazy people. I don’t think it’s necessary just to categorise the different people involved. It’s just crazy people are crazy people. There’s good crazy and there’s bad crazy.

29:58
As an in-between step though, before you just call it off, what advice to do while you’re in that uncomfortable? Where could you seek ideas or support? From the community. Ideally you’d be connecting with people within the community, people who you can trust and speak to. I think of surrogacy no different to any other intimate or close relationship in that when you get to a point of frustration and communication and something’s not working out, you know what your strategies are to pull back and

30:26
gather your thoughts and come back in. Maybe it’s taking a bit of space. Maybe it’s writing down what you want to say, all the really hard things and condensing the finite thing of what you want to say to this person. Maybe it’s seeking counseling from someone, a specific surrogacy counselor in this sense. There’s a lot of different avenues to do it, but it’s important if there is something like a bug bear, something that’s a worry, a lump in the throat, it’s important to address it instead of just…

30:49
keeping it in the background and forgetting it until it’s this giant elephant in the room and a bomb goes off. And I think sometimes, even surrogates we feel this too, but as IP sometimes it’s like, oh, I should just keep my mouth quiet.

30:59
clothes because I don’t want to rock the boat, don’t want to ruin any potential chances or I don’t want to show my true self in these groups. But we’re going to love people for all their nerdiness and weirdness. If you like 80s music or Collingwood supporter. just say NRL supporter generally. That’s right. if you’re not an AFL supporter, who are you? It will be somebody to love you all exactly the way you are.

31:21
And so I think, so you’ve either got people like myself and Flick who, know, connections you might make through the communities. There are often state-based groups in our SASS portal. We’ve got a link to all of those, but you could easily search or ask in groups for those in SAS. We’ve got a mentor program, so you’d get that one-on-one. So it’s important to make connections with others so that if something is going wrong, you’ve got other people to ask other than just that one person that you’re talking to. So I’m hoping the message people are taking away from this is yes, you might be here to find a surrogate, but you also need to build a cheer squad.

31:51
Absolutely. A cheer squad, a team, a circle of friends who you can just fall in a lump with sometimes and just say, I’m having no luck today. Everything is just turning to, am I allowed to swear? Yes. Everything is just turning to shit. And I just want to cry. Finding people that you can do that with, even if it’s just on Zoom or even if it’s just a message, just pixels on a screen. It’s finding solidarity in that that really matters. Because sometimes you don’t want to burden your partner with it. Sometimes you don’t want to burden your sister.

32:21
or your brother or your best friend. And it’s just really nice to have that outlet. Absolutely. Yeah, to see real people who just get it and you can.

32:28
have that vent. Another plug then for those zoom catch-ups, second Friday of each month, a good place to come and have that. And sometimes they do little breakout rooms too, where you can just be in with a couple of people and who get you. So to sum up then Flick, what about yourself? What’s one thing you’ve learned about yourself through going through these enormous journeys? What I’ve learned is that I’m a lot more resilient than I thought I was. Far more resilient. I’ve learned that that striking thought of always wanting to be a mum, that is actually true. I’ve always wanted to be a mum and whether that was

32:58
as an aunt to my nieces or whether that’s actually mum to my kids. That’s still something of me and even if I didn’t have Jackson and Harper, doesn’t change that about me. um I think even though I’ve had successful surrogacy journeys and have really really been blessed to form fantastic relationships with people within Australia and with Kristy and her family, even if none of that happened, what I’ve learned is that I’m resilient and that my desire to be a mum is always going to be part of me and I’m proud of that.

33:24
So absolutely and now it’s your day-to-day life. Yeah it is. So that question totally hit me like out of left field I was like oh geez what have I learned about myself. I right. I like to do that.

33:36
I’ve seen you grow in strength too, because obviously you went into this journey with Pete and that hasn’t continued and you’ve learned a lot about yourself and I see the happiness that you found in the future now with the new partner. It’s helped you work out what it is you want in life too, not just as a mother, as a person. As an individual and how as an individual I need to take care of myself first so I can be the best mum I can to my kids. And as the way things were, I wouldn’t have been as great a mum as I am today if I was still married, but that’s a separate issue altogether.

34:06
It’s about looking after yourself. I was blessed to have the connections with all of you ladies in Australia. Those overseas with with her when everything’s falling apart, but it all came together. yeah. And so I think for any, you know, the new is listening. It’s a marathon, not a sprint. want to say like welcome to the roller coaster. It’s going to be a wild ride, but welcome. I think that’s what we sum it up. Thank you for listening to this episode. To see the beautiful images mentioned, head to our YouTube channel to watch the webinar recording.

34:36
If you’re looking for more support and potentially connecting with a surrogate or intended parents, head to our website surrogacyaustralia.org to check out the resources and to learn more about SASS. Please subscribe to this podcast if you found it valuable and share it with someone so they too can benefit from this conversation. Until next time, welcome to the village.