A Choice Not To Compromise

First: I’m sorry I’ve sort of disappeared.  In short it’s due to many things and here it is in 5 words with more to come later…maybe…probably (school, layoffs, infinity, sleep, friends).   Now to the real point.

I’ve been told by the surrogacy agency that I will be difficult to match.  They aren’t telling me this to be negative and in no way is it based on my body’s ability to produce a healthy baby.  Instead it’s related to the fact that I do not consider termination/reduction an option.  Let me elaborate on what I mean by that since I did not understand what that was going into this.

Reduction:  Taking 1 or more fetuses (fetusi?) from the womb to reduce the number of babies.  A family who does not want twins or if say the surrogate ends up with triplets and it would be dangerous to carry that many for the baby’s or surrogate’s sake.

Termination: This can be for MANY reasons from the baby being an undesired gender to finding out the baby has a fatal disease/deformity that will mean a short and/or painful life.  It could also be because the Surrogate’s health/life is in danger.

I don’t think it’s a secret (it’s not intended to be) that to me a life is a life.  From the moment of conception the thing growing in that mother is not a “thing” it’s a human being.  It’s a life.  I am adamantly against abortion and this is not intended to my way of telling you why.  The why right now is not the point.  The point is I have decided that it is not ok with me.  It is something I will not do.  And for that reason I am hard to “match”.

I get it.  I get that these families are paying $100,000+ to have a baby (that is not my compensation by the way it’s the cost for EVERYthing).   I get that if you are paying that much for a baby you want a perfect healthy baby.  But that doesn’t change the fact that even an unhealthy baby, or a girl instead of a boy, or a baby with a disability to me is still a life.  A life that deserves the chance to be lived. 

So when I got an email this morning about another couple interested in allowing me to be their surrogate I was reluctant.  Because unlike the couples I have met before, this family thinks Reduction/Termination is an option.  And for me it is not.  For me it is not a compromise I am willing to make.

That being said I still plan on meeting them.  Maybe I can express myself and my opinion in a way that will make them reconsider.  Not because I want them to “choose me” over somebody else, but because I want them to understand why to me it is not negotiable.  To me that life, despite its “flaws”, is not for me to choose to end.  That it is not a choice I will make.

Anyway, despite all of that I have a medical screening tomorrow morning to get the “ok” from a fertility doctor.  I ask for prayer that this goes well and that if it is God’s will that I carry a baby for somebody that he brings the right family along.

And to end it, one of my favorite pictures of all time.  The girls talking to Elijah just before we left for the hospital to bring home baby bruder.