Episode 83 – Warwick – gay dad

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Thanks for watching!

00:14
Welcome back or if this is your first time thank you so much for taking the time to listen to Surrogacy Australia’s podcast series with me your host Anna McKay. My guest on this episode was a co-host on the regular webinar series that I run. Those one-hour webinars are free and will take you through the surrogacy process in Australia. You will hear from a surrogate or parent and there are opportunities to type in your questions and we will try to answer them. You can find upcoming dates on our website at surrogacyaustralia.org

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This episode is one from the archives and it was recorded in March 2022 featuring Warwick. You can hear from his surrogate Mel in the next episode number 84. Warwick and Jason from Sydney became parents to their son Jetson in January 2022. Jetson was carried by their surrogate Mel who already had a connection before surrogacy as a friend of Warwick’s sister. They navigated a journey with some distance, Sydney to Wollongong,

01:09
and were able to stay near and with Mel in the weeks before and after birth. This team has become friends of mine over the years, and it was an absolute joy to take a trip down memory lane to edit this episode. And since this episode, they have gone on to have another son, Jasper, who was born in May, 2024. Mel was their surrogate again and birthed at home for the second time. At the beginning of webinars, I chat with the co-hosts while we’re waiting for the attendees to arrive. I usually cut that chat out of the recording.

01:38
but this time I left part of it in, mainly so you can hear the banter between myself and Warwick, and so it’s there for me to listen back to and have a laugh myself. In this episode, Warwick talks about a home birth and how all of the family of the surrogate are heavily involved in the journey. We talk about the value of friendships within the community, having other IPs, intended parents, and surrogates who are your friends, like Warwick and I were for each other. Warwick was one of the key people who helped me through my postnatal depression after surrogacy.

02:07
You can read more about that in my blog called Surrogacy Safari with the post called Postnatal Depression. I’ll put a link for that in the show notes. I hope you enjoy this episode. What’s that thing behind you that’s colourful on your right? Paper turtles. Paper turtles? It’s daces. It’s a

02:25
My friend who’s an artist from school or university I think actually made him hundreds of, yeah definitely hundreds of these. Can you pick one up and show me? They look like paper cranes. Oh! No it’s like a paper crane but it’s a turtle. Oh my god. They are too! That’s very mindful. Yeah he’s very mindful. Wow. Do they get dusty? They do but only the top layer because they don’t take layer off and the rest of them they get dusty. And when the water was coming in you’re like save the turtle. Actually well.

02:54
The turtles are in the office and the office is quite well waterproof. Good. The turtles were fine. Here comes the wine. We started now. And Jetson. So there you go. People that have joined us now. Very bright. Sorry, buddy. Oh, it’s alright. Hello. Oh. Your turn. Yes, but don’t feed the baby wine. Oh, is that in the rule book? That’s the rule 101. Oh, 101. Can you feed the surrogate wine?

03:22
Yes, at a certain point. Well, every team needs to talk about that. Prior to transfers and that.

03:31
like midway between, no not midway between feeds. When they’re expressing I believe it’s the best time if you wish to have a blast. That’s true because it takes the longest time to get through the system. So Warwick, here we go. We’re starting to see what your happily ever after looks like. And we’ve got our first photo here which is clearly when young Jetson was born. Quite a lot to get up to this point. As we said you know off camera before we’ll do it in reverse order. So talk us through getting up to this photo that when he was born and then how is this fits in.

04:00
Born on the 3rd of January this year, such an amazing home birth experience. Amazing, congratulations. So we have to say thanks for COVID for one thing. We wanted to go originally with the hospitals and end up deciding, well, Mel ended up deciding because the hospital would not confirm that the four of us would be allowed to attend, that she wanted to do it as a home birth and then we found a private midwife, which isn’t the easiest when you’re down the track a little bit. So if you are considering a home birth,

04:30
midwife. So yeah, we ended up doing that. We had it at Mel’s house. She’s got a granny flat out the back. There were a few complications along the way in the aspect of her son just turned 18, went up to Byron Bay for schoolies two weeks prior to the due date and got isolated as his friend was her.

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tested positive that they were staying in the same room. So when they actually came back, he actually had to go to the granny flat and we had to move the birthing suite that was all prepared into his room and he got better. Baby was delayed. So baby was due actually on Christmas day, Jetson, was due on Christmas day, but was a little bit late. So we actually got time to move the birthing suite back out to the granny flat. So yeah, so that whole experience. If you need to, any tips on like birthing suites and how to set up birthing, just let me know.

05:21
in life you didn’t know you had or needed but now you’ve got. That’s exactly right and to be honest I can’t really take all the credit for that. Mel’s husband Steve was absolutely amazing and yeah helps us through this whole journey. They all come along for the ride don’t they the family? Oh they’re there at the start and they’re there it’s not even the end but they’re there at the major milestones throughout the relationship that we’ve built and you’re just as much as their family.

05:45
become your family. It’s amazing actually. A very special connection there. And so I think we’ll go through these photos as we’re chatting here. You left home and went near Mill, how many weeks before birth and how many after? Okay, so two weeks before birth and three weeks after. We had booked an Airbnb. We booked that very early on. That’s pretty much probably three to four months into the pregnancy. We do an accommodation and we knew we wanted to be down there for a decent period of time.

06:15
Mel’s previous kids who are 13 and 18 were all born late. So we kind of expected we could be a little bit late with this one. So we just made sure we had an ample time at the site, but also I kept that open communication going. If Mel needs more time with us down there, that we’re more than willing to stay down there for longer. We did that. This is actually at the apartment. This is actually the first time I think Jason got pooed on. I think you sent me that photo.

06:42
This is about a week old actually, which was we actually stayed at Mel and Steve’s house for the first four days. Mel directly fed through that time and then progressively dropped down. We obviously were maintaining more than daily contacts. We were staying together. Yeah, yeah, we were sitting together a lot there. Definitely. And again,

07:01
Hats off to Steve, like Steve was providing us with like meals and the kids were great as well, like the kids were doing the cleaning and all of that and they were listening to Jetson Scream at 1am and then 3am and then 5am. Yes. Yeah, so. It’s a really unique thing to do together, to be that close. Definitely, it’s amazing. This is.

07:23
prior to me getting a haircut, obviously. I was just gonna say, longer locks there. When you look at these photos, it’s like the years to get to this point and there you are holding your son. We’ll go through the history of the timeline in a minute. It’s an amazing feeling. Like to be there at the, we haven’t provided any birth photos, unfortunately, but to be there at the birth and to actually experience that, to be in the environment where Mel is relaxed and considering all things going on. Yeah.

07:53
I was blown away. I got nothing else to say. I was absolutely blown away. It’s emotional time and it’s just, it’s so cute. He is right. He is. And so then here you had some post-birth photos with a photographer. Is that what was happening here? Yes, that’s what’s happening here. So we didn’t even have this on our radar. It was actually Mel’s suggestion to get this done. She had them on.

08:15
her walls and she pointed them out, say, oh, so when are you guys getting your birth photos done? And we, yeah, frantically Googled and can I say, everyone must do this. This, we had some really awesome pictures coming out of this. Um, and some memories that like will last a lifetime. Some weird looks and like he’s got, he’s the man of a thousand faces as Steve would say. Yeah. And the photographer just captures, captures that. Beautiful. I think I’ve got another one of Mel coming up later from this photo shoot. So, and it’s such a beautiful memory for Jetson to have too,

08:45
brought him into this world. Totally and totally and like Mel and Steve and the kids were there for the nine months ultimately plus 10 days as I keep on reminding myself because yeah so 10 days over and then we’ve got look at that smiley.

09:02
I love these photos. And it looks like Mel’s having a good laugh. Was there something funny happening there? It’s got me being stupid with each other. No, you being stupid with people? There wasn’t a glass of red wine on this one. But um… A daytime show. We were having a great time actually. And there was a pool explosion at the end too, wasn’t there? There was. And I don’t think I sent you that photo either. Yes you did. You did. And I nearly put it in but I’m like no, that’s not fair for the viewers. Just in case they weren’t ready. Yes, so that…

09:30
The actual photography shoot was great. The lady comes to our apartment with all the props and did everything. And pretty much when Jason got up there doing the handhold position, he just let it fly. And unfortunately she didn’t catch the flying through because that would have been awesome. But the aftermath with it all down Jason’s jeans was just, yeah, that was great. Good.

09:54
That’s gonna be the one I’m gonna remind him about. Yeah, definitely. As Jetson gets older, he’ll certainly be reminded of that. Mel’s house here? Yeah, this is the morning of the birth. That’s Mel’s daughter, Xanthia. Is that the birth card that the midwives filled out of his detail? Yes, yeah, that is the birth card. So this is probably time just merges into one- Few hours. Morning of the day, yeah, a few hours after birth. Having some skin to skin there or skin to hair? Skin to hair, it’s gonna be his first main meal. Ha ha ha ha!

10:22
This is a special moment. Like when you get to hold him for the first time, it just does, yeah, it makes you feel really emotional as well. Little warm bodies. And I just point out, like looking at Mel, how fresh she looks for it, and that’s the power of home birth too often, not heavily sedated and sort of things. You wouldn’t know that she’s just given birth. She looks so happy and fresh. Mel’s words, it was quick and intense. I don’t know what the average is. You’re probably better to explain this one or how long the birth, or your birth went for.

10:52
Mel started approximately midnight, a little bit after we got contacted about 2.30 in the morning. We were there by about 3.30 and by 5.10 baby Jetson was born. It took about 10 minutes in the birthing pool. Yeah right, it takes longer to fill the pool up and inflate it than you’re in it. So there’s a funny story. So Mel…

11:13
had going through labor, she was having showers, inadvertently having showers used all the hot water. And we, Jason was inside the main house with three pots and pans going and the kettle. And I was in the granny flat with the pots and pans going, filling up the birthing pool to get it up to a temperature until the midwife was going, no, too cold, too cold. Okay, that’s warm enough now. 37 degrees body temperature in your get. That’s just like, oh, yeah, call the midwife, get some towels, get some warm water. There you go. And my lads too were

11:43
pool temperature and filling it up and being involved like that really makes you feel a part of the night doesn’t it and the day. It does.

11:50
if you’re not just standing there waiting to receive a baby, you’re involved and you feel like you were, well you were, you were support people in that. Yeah, you feel like you’re actually contributing to, like Mel’s obviously doing all the hard lifting here, like she’s had some babies and a miracle what you ladies do, we’re just the little bit of support that we can provide at that time. Good, excellent, lovely to have you involved. And I think this is our last photo here, and so this is your team because that’s your egg donor there, is that right? That’s correct, no egg donor, our egg donor.

12:20
Marisha and her husband David. She has actually just given birth to her son Lawson. So Jetson will have a genetic half sibling that’s six weeks younger than him. So it’s another amazing thing that’s happened throughout this journey. And did she?

12:37
have kids prior to this Lawson, the first one? No. So she was your donor first. And how did you know your donor and your surrogate? So this probably takes us back on the timeline a fair bit. So Jason and I met 10 years in October and very early on.

12:53
once we were serious, talked about both wanting to have kids. It’s always been a topic of our conversations throughout our relationship. January 19 is when we seriously started looking into it. We bought our apartments and settled down a bit. We actually did a Facebook post to our friends and family. That was in May 19. Basically the context was about, we need two amazing women, one that’ll provide eggs and one that will be humble enough to carry a baby for nine months plus 10 days.

13:23
We got about five offers of egg donors from friends. Like that blew us away. A couple of those were taken out of the picture, just due to their age. And then we had an egg donor offer and we were excited and keen and unfortunately that didn’t progress, but these things do happen. And then Marisha, we know her, we know her family. So once she offered, we’re like, oh my God, that’s absolutely amazing. Yeah, so we did the counseling and the paperwork that we needed to around it.

13:53
two egg collections. One egg collection was up at Queensland, I think Life Fertility. And then the other one was down in Newcastle with IVFA. So it’s COVID reasons. Okay, I was going to say that. Yeah, COVID. And so then how many embryos have you, did you end up with and how many embryo transfers did Jetson take? From both collections, there were 12 eggs, coming down three embryos in total. So unfortunately not a very high success rate in the embryo creation, but these things happen. And then

14:23
We did a transfer, I think that was, I shouldn’t think that, I should know that, in February 21. Then the successful transfer was on the 7th of April 2021. Gotcha. First one failed. So does that mean you have one embryo left in the freezer? It does mean we have one embryo left in the freezer. That’s the math teacher in me, did you like that? It’s well done by the way. Thank you. Does that mean potential sibling project in the future? Everything’s open. Like Jason and I, we talk about sibling for Jetson. Yeah. And if it doesn’t happen, for whatever reason, obviously static.

14:53
that we’ve got Jetson and we’ll probably start looking into fostering. Yeah right, so different options there. And then backtracking, how is Mel connected in your life? So again, from this Facebook post, so Mel actually contacted me about six, I maybe eight months after the post, going I saw your posts.

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when you posted it, but I’ve been thinking about it ever since and now I’m reaching out to you because I can’t get it out of my head. That’s how that happened. So backstory there, my sister actually lived with Mel out of high school. So I’ve actually known Mel for a long period of time, about 20 years, but realistically I really have only known her for…

15:31
a couple of years when she was living with my sister, and then massive break, and then now ultimately. And then you created your own deeper friendship with Mel and her food. Yes, so we had a met Steve. So we went out for dinner with Mel. Mel came out with us, met Jason for the first time. She likes Jason, I assume, because she already knew me. So, and then she’s like, oh, you guys, then. You’re assuming she likes you then? She reached out, okay. She wanted to be a surrogate, you needed a surrogate. You’re just doing her a favor.

15:59
So we’ve met Steve and the family and the Logan’s auntie are their lifelong friends. The times that we’ve shared, Steve loves cooking, both Jason and I love cooking, so we’ve done some massive cook-ups. We share time together and it’s fun. And that’s important too that as the IPs, you’re not just bond with the surrogate, you’re bond with the surrogate’s partner too. Correct. Because they’re the unsung heroes in this quite often. Oh, without a doubt. His support was like, yeah, next to none. It was amazing.

16:27
Also saying that the partner of the egg donor as well, you get the whole package. Yeah, absolutely, everybody along. We can probably segue to this first question that’s come in and good work Anonymous asking and feel free others to jump in with any, your own questions or about Warwick’s journey there. I know the answer to this, but you answer it. If it’s not too rude to ask, what’s the age of your surrogate Warwick? Mel is 45. Yes, now I’ll add in there. So by my data gathering of surrogates, there’s a surrogate-only Facebook group and when I was in there for four years collected data,

16:57
birth is about 37. So therefore, you know, you’ve got half that are in their 40s or late 30s when they birth. I’m 39 now, but I was 37 at birth, I think I was average, then some younger too. But I think the eldest was 54 just a month or so ago in Tasmania, a woman that birthed her grandson anyway, getting off topic there. But so anonymous, I hope that helps to answer that. Quite a range of surrogates. They’ve often had healthy pregnancies, surrogates. So provided their GP would say, yep, they’re fit enough to have another pregnancy if they wanted to another keeper.

17:27
and their own family. That’s probably a good first indication. So there we go, we’ve answered that question there. So where else do we need to go to here? We’ve done sort of how you met. I’m gonna add, so as we’re talking again before, we’ve probably only met three times in person but we have quite a deep friendship I would say. But we met, was that conference 2017 or 2018? Actually it was June 19 believe it or not. No. Unless Jace’s dates are wrong. I’m trying to think. 2017 was Melbourne. I reckon it was 18. 18?

17:57
I have to correct Jason then. Anyway, cause then when we had dinner together in Sydney, oh, I think it’s a blur for me now too, but it’s just years. Obviously the amount of alcohol I made you consume that night. So, I mean, you guys out there, like we, Anna and I just connected for some reason. And by the end of the night for this way, we were running down the street and she just runs up and bear hugs me, latches her legs around me to the point where I’m nearly falling over.

18:22
But what can you do? It was an absolutely, it was a great night and from that day, Anna and I have been friends since. And to be honest, if I didn’t go to that conference, I wouldn’t have met.

18:32
and Anna wouldn’t have provided us with the support of just knowledge or information or probably the comfort that she is actually a surrogate and if I’ve got a question I can ask her a question knowing that she’s not my surrogate and she should be had to be impartial with answering it. So that’s um thank you for the friendship it’s it’s been an amazing ride. Well my turn to repay that while everyone’s listening there but

18:57
And I think that that is one of the valuable things that we have to pass on to others. Here is an example of a friendship where I wasn’t going to be your surrogate. Mind you, if you did live locally, I’m sure I would have offered because they’re interstate.

19:09
So we knew we were not going to be that for each other, but I think every surrogate needs IPs that are friends that are not her IPs and every IP needs a surrogate or more that are their friends but it’s not their surrogate so that we could ask questions to each other and share. And so for myself, you know, as you know, Warwick, that, you know, in my postnatal depression struggles, but in the point of working that out, that I had that there was some pretty dark times. And so Warwick was a person that was on the other end of messenger and phone calls. And when I’m

19:39
and you’re like don’t hit send.

19:41
Let’s just draft it together first and to help me see things in a different way. So I think that’s been what’s so valuable about our friendship. So it’s funny because I was just saying husband Glen and I, the debt that I felt to you for helping me through that time, I feel it’s been nice to pay it back. Cause I’ve now helped you in some ways go here. Your surrogate might be going through some of these things, have them on your radar. And it’s not that your surrogate nagging you. It’s like, Oh, well, Anna said, maybe this is a suggestion. And it might’ve been, she might be going, few good. I’m glad.

20:11
We could chat like that. So definitely it was it if the French is great. Thank you. That’s Another thing I would definitely say get involved in is your local catch-up groups I’m the admin for the Sydney catch-ups, but I have a bit I’ve been pretty slack lately and one of the actual members had to organize the last one which I take my hat off to him So if Lee if you’re out there well done and congratulations that was I heard it was a really great catch-up

20:40
Surrogates come to these events, but it’s also being able to speak to other IPs at different stages in the actual journey to find out or to lean on for information as then I’ve suggested earlier, the information’s out there. SASS provides pretty much a holistic one-stop shop if you want to choose that option. Otherwise, you need to commit your time. And it’s really about time and you’ll meet some great friends along the way. And you should be prepared.

21:07
to make friends, don’t just go in narrow, I just need a surrogate. Come in prepared to learn from those other people at those catch-ups. And even don’t be disappointed if you go to a catch-up and there’s no new surrogate looking for IPs. Is it use it as a time to learn from the others and the other experienced surrogates? Is that what you found helpful? The feeling that it will and can happen. So prior to actually having Mel contact us, we were obviously going to these catch-ups and let’s be honest, like your goal in your head of going to these catch-ups

21:37
hopefully to meet a surrogate. That’s what you’re going there. You’re trying to meet someone, and a lot of the times, there may not even be a surrogate show up, but you have someone sitting next to you that has a cube either on the way.

21:49
or has been successful through the journey and they just give you that support, the feeling that the goal is not out of reach, it’s there and you may or unfortunately may not but generally if you put in the time you’ll get there. Absolutely and and that gives you hope to go wow this person here has done it, they’re another ordinary person just like me, if they’ve done it we can do this, this can happen here in Australia. Yeah because I remember you being around in the community for

22:19
if somebody steps forward because you’re still learning but you’ve got as you say you’ve got to it’s time you’ve got to be prepared to come and learn and you just the tricky thing I find is if somebody could say okay it will take you 18 months till a surrogate’s going to offer then you know okay I’ll be patient and I’ll come and I’ll pace out my energy but it can be really hard to keep coming when you’re not sure what’s going to happen.

22:39
But if you’re coming at the pretext of going to catch up with some friends, the first time okay will be a little bit daunting. We’re all normal people, we just have a cup of coffee or if it’s a pub meal maybe, depends where it’s located. After the first five minutes we’re just either talking realistically or you’ve actually got some questions to ask and you’ve got people around that are more than willing to answer them.

23:00
It’s just awkward when you first come in and you’re looking around for the people or the table and you’re like, I’m here for Warwick’s catch-up You know, but and so again, I would that’s my little plug again for these zoom catch-ups that you know If you’re a bit nervous to do it in person start with a zoom one next Friday night and come along and meet those people And yeah start to develop some connections. So we’ve got a couple of questions here. Allison asks How did you navigate appointments with multiple people and covert obstetricians and scans? We face with some restrictions. Yes their egg donor

23:30
with timing so we had it already booked in for the Queensland one and lockdown was the week after so we made it up there and back so that was lucky. By the second collection the borders were closed so we knew we had to do it in New South Wales. We were relatively free in New South Wales so that wasn’t an issue at all but the surrogacy we ended up making it to all but one midwife appointment and all of the scans and everything else that we had to go to.

23:57
we feel like missed out on for time was being how to socially visit Mel and Steve throughout the journey. So they live about an hour and a half. So we’re in Tarahumara in Sydney and they’re down in Wollongong. They’re not that far away but saying that if you can’t leave your local LGA you can’t leave your LGA. So it’s a lot of FaceTime and chats and hanging out like date nights so to speak just where you’re cooked together and get take away and just chill. Sometimes talk surrogacy but sometimes just talk.

24:24
To be honest, like at the start, you talk a lot about CYR-REVC and then it goes from what, how you’ve connected to, okay, that’s happening. Cause we’re kind of tatted about that. And then we’re talking about friends up, we’re talking about life and.

24:37
ups and downs and everything like that and then there’ll be a question that pops into someone’s head and they go down that rabbit warren and then go from there. So yeah, so the thing that we were lucky with is in New South Wales Health actually gave us exemptions to attend all the medical appointments. So if they didn’t give us that we would have been very unfortunate being not able to see them for a decent period of time. Yeah, so hopefully Alison, as you know restrictions ease over time, hopefully you know for your own journey at some point,

25:07
For mine, 2020, first year of COVID, we thought it was gonna be the only year of COVID, but it wasn’t. There was one appointment where the boys FaceTimed in, but they were able to visit other things. And that was the beauty of having a, through the midwife program, is that often our appointments were at home. The midwife came here to me, and then the boys could come, so we weren’t faced with restrictions in that sense. Into Andrew’s question, thanking us for sharing our stories, and some questions regarding egg donors, asking, is traditional surrogacy permitted in Australia and old jurisdictions? And this is where I’ve slowly learned all these things over time. I’m pretty sure, yes,

25:37
except the ACT, for some reason it’s not, and the Northern Territory yet don’t have any laws in place which means you can’t do surrogacy or not do it really at this point in time. So traditional yes, there’s other restrictions like if a surrogate hasn’t birthed her own child but she wants to carry for you, doesn’t matter where she lives, but the IPs have to live in either New South Wales, Queensland or South Australia. So there’s all these little technicalities. But if you’ve got a specific question, we can try and answer that. Or if a known donor can’t be found, is the World Egg Bank Donor Bank available? Yes, it is available. We’ve had some IPs use that.

26:07
donations so that the child has access to their genetic history and you’ve got a connection there. Again, Andrew, that’s a fair question to ask when you’re at the beginning because you just want to weigh up all your options. Start chatting to other IPs, you know, if you’re with SASS you can get a mentor and then somebody like Warwick to hear what they did and hear how they shared their story and maybe start to spread the word there and you never know, people might step forward. Women are more likely to step forward to be an egg donor than they are a surrogate, I would say, hence you got five. Even though there’s a lifelong genetic connection, it’s a shorter period of time is that part of the

26:36
So yeah, hopefully that helps a little bit there, Andrew. Did you want to add anything to that, Warrick? Just about the egg collection and contact. We had the option of going overseas to do our surrogacy, but we again spoke about it very early on that we want Jetson now to know who their genetic history comes from or where it comes from, and also their birth mum or their own mum. We’ve had a conscious decision wanting him to be able to find out or be able to know who brought him into this world. And be connected, not just know of them, but connect.

27:06
Yeah, and so I suppose that part in my presentation earlier when I was helping people hopefully way up Australia or overseas I’m hoping that that was about a fair questions to pose to people because you’ve got to make your decision yourself about the model That’s the right fit definitely and if you are time poor and you’d know deep inside that you cannot commit to to the time Because the time isn’t just Finding a surrogate that relationship building is if you don’t if you don’t build it and you don’t build it properly It’ll probably come unstuck

27:36
it a lot of time. So if you don’t have that time, you may need to go with an agency overseas. There’s a quick one. So from the time they were offered to when you got ready for that first embryo transfer, how long was that?

27:47
January 2020, Mel first got in contact with us. And the first transfer was February 21st, so a full year. Good, and that’s what we did too. So sort of six months really discussing what it was and then the paperwork, the counseling and the rules. And then, assuming it sort of works. So it was sort of a two years from Mel first contact to Bert actually. Correct. What Robert said. You are definitely past a kindergarten teacher. Past kindergarten, thank you. Degree in pure maths and Latin, totally useless, right? Anyway, Alison,

28:17
got here for us. Our surrogate has quite young kids. How did you find communicating work best? So perhaps not so much for Warwick’s team, but you would know from plenty of other teams, techs, et cetera, we’ll obviously need to support our surrogate with childcare. Yeah, yeah, everybody’s different with communication in terms of the mode and the frequency, if they’re texters, if they’re callers, if they’re FaceTime as messengers and all of that. My kids just understood it. You know, once you’re pregnant, kids are fine. It’s adults that struggle sometimes. It’s like we’re growing this baby for Matt and Brendan and it’s going to live in their house

28:47
hands on with us, we live locally. I’m not sure if you live locally. Alison, with your surrogate. And so in the last 10 weeks, each weekend either came and did a batch cook for us of recipes that I gave them because find out what the surrogates kids eat. Don’t just cook what you like.

29:01
It needs to feed her family, so it was pumpkin soup, date balls and things for the lunchboxes. And then they, or taking the kids out to the park or the movies. So you’ve got to build that trust up there to be able to take people’s kids out and spend time with them, maybe with car seats, you know, they’ve got to trust you to drive their car with their children in it. And then they did my grocery shopping the last five weeks and came home and unpacked it. Warwick, any advice for you there for people with young kids? Yeah, it doesn’t just stay with young kids. It goes like…

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18 and 13. So Logan’s on his L’s. We actually spent time taking him for a couple of drives. And then we also as a Christmas present got him the Learn to Drive, which is an RMA package that they’re doing here, which actually gets you hours off your logbook. Did something more useful for what they wanted to do. So Logan was probably wanting to be less involved in his 18. He got his friends, got his girlfriend. So less involved in the actual intricacies

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was very involved. She was actually at the birth as well, which was amazing. It’s just about being there and having the conversations, taking them, like spending time with them. You’re not spending time with just your surrogate. It is literally you’re spending time with the family. And so it doesn’t feel so transactional then that we’re just using this woman to grow and birth as a baby. It’s no, we are investing time in growing a family. And sorry, what I was looking for a second ago, which I can’t find at the moment, just looking around.

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wrote a book for us about Jetson’s two dads and it was just a beautiful normalization of the whole scenario. What we did from egg donor, she included the egg donor right through to the birth and then going further to go into the parks and the pool. Just make sure you have time for them as well as your surrogate.

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Absolutely, yes. I don’t know if you’d go equal, but it’s that sort of, each time you’re planning a catch up with a surrogate, thinking about how you can spend time with her kids, getting to know them, what they like, so that you can take them off her hands, perhaps at some point, like for driving lessons or for a play at the park. So yeah, all good questions there. Well, we’ve got through our list of questions. So let me just ask you two sort of last things to sum us up here. During this whole journey that you’ve gone on, particularly with Jason, your husband, what have you learned about yourself?

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I like everyone. The form of torture. Everyone tells you that you were going to be tired. And I have to say, Jetson is a pretty good sleeper. It’s a new experience, I have to say. And now probably the darker side, you do get short with each other.

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Like we’ve got a pretty good relationship, we don’t fight generally. Yes. And getting short with each other has definitely happened in the first eight weeks. And it could be over nothing, like literally like nothing to club. So yeah, just make sure that you take a breath and you just compose yourself. You’re tied, it’s all good. Everyone gets tied.

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And what about during the Sourish ship and the pregnancy and the planning as a team there Did you have different strengths of the two of you in terms of navigating that Sourish ship? Totally. Jason is a detail oriented person and he has lists and Everything else so pretty much he’s been the rock that has actually Project managed it the whole way through without it without him. I don’t think would be it in this situation So what did you bring to it? I don’t know

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I supported him through it. Is that a good enough answer? Yeah, like… You do more of the people, the warm fuzzies, how everyone’s going emotionally in it. Is that what you did? So Jason’s also more of an introvert. So I’m definitely a little bit, little bit more out there. So I definitely was that person that would maintain contact with people, organise these surrogacy catch-ups for the Sydney group. Yeah, we both have our strengths, both have our weaknesses. And actually, that’s probably the biggest takeaway from the whole… That was my next advice. What advice for people?

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is number one and you make sure you speak to your partner or your loved one about whatever you need to speak to them. Like speak to them about everything. If you’re feeling down about something, you make sure you let them know there’s so much going on, especially if you get to the end of the journey of the pregnancy and you now have a new baby to look after, you might need someone to lean on, but also throughout the whole thing, make sure you’re communicating with your surrogate and their family, by the way. The surrogate’s partner is definitely someone who.

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will provide you information to let you know how you can help a scenario that may not be going as you expect it to go. So just make sure you open up the communications and don’t be afraid that what they’re going to say is going to be something you don’t expect. It’s about a two way street and if something’s going wrong with how they’re feeling or in their life, let them vent, let them have a chat with you. It’s just that ear is probably doing more good to them than you actually know.

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up for this, this is hard. Or it could just be their ups and downs with work and their kids and extended families and all of those sorts of things. It might have nothing to do with work. And a lot of the time you do speak about nothing to do with surrogacy. Yes, so you’ve got to have that friendship. So Alison, I was just thinking of an extra one there. So yeah, invest the time in the surrogate’s kids and her partner. And if she doesn’t have a partner, she’s probably got a support network in some way, connect with them because this time investment that you’re going to do in the early days is going to pay off down the track because you can then just pick up the

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with the people around her, can’t you? And then just carry on.

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You said earlier on that gifts need to be given, not asked for. Totally agree with that in the context of surrogacy. But once you have a kid, if someone asks you, what do you want? Make sure you tell them what you need. Because if you say nothing, they will buy you whatever they think is going to help you. And a lot of people think the same thing. They need something, or if you have enough clothes, say of a newborn clothes, ask them to buy you a double zero clothes or something further down the track. It’s probably more comfortable than asking them for the…

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suit that you’ve got to take it back. And that’s a bit like surrogacy, like if talking about money or saying what you need can get awkward and uncomfortable. So trying to be on the forefront there for people and anticipate thoughts is, that’s good advice too. Good. Well, I think we’ll sum it up there. Thanks, Anna. Thanks, Warwick. Thank you so much for joining me. On our YouTube channel, you will find many other episodes as well as the images mentioned in this webinar.

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