Category Archives: India; surrogacy

Return from India

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I haven’t posted anything in my blog for almost 8 months. I just couldn’t. There were too many arrangements to be made, too many efforts that failed; there has been too much emotion and heartache to work through on a personal level, so the idea of writing about it and then sharing it felt like a burden on top of a burden.

And as I’ve written before, even Atlas shrugged.

At one point, maybe it was after the frozen embryos didn’t thaw well while I was in India or when the first, second, and third surrogate didn’t get pregnant in India, my husband told me he didn’t want anyone to know. He didn’t want us to have to live our disappointment out loud anymore.

While I have taken on a vocal stance about our struggles with fertility, not just so others don’t feel so alone but also so that I don’t feel so alone, and while this blog has created a community that has brought us incredible support, and even offers from one woman to be our surrogate and another to donate her own eggs, I needed to take a reprieve from sharing here.

Further, while writing can sometimes be cathartic, other times it is too painful.

And finally, I need to publish this story as a book eventually, so have to divide what I do write between being on here and being in another form and forum.

But for now, I would like to return to that week of when I returned from India…..

Ironically, my father was dying exactly where I had been hospitalized with my incompetent cervix in 2009.  He was in the same hospital where I had given birth, exactly.  He was in the same hospital where there had been that NICU, dimly lit from the peripheral vision of my right, as I was led (first time on a gurney and second and final time in a wheel chair) to the NICU Room, that had brighter lights than at a Pink Floyd show, where I held my infant son for the first and only time – 4 years earlier.

The same fucking hospital. And on the anniversaries of my son’s birth and death.

Sure, I was now in the cancer ward instead of maternity wing. (Interesting that the words that seemed natural for me to use were ‘ward’ – which has a sense of doom to it – and ‘wing’ – which denotes a light and airy feeling.)

I had been wheeled in and out of that exact same hospital from a different entrance than the one where I was now walking in and out of every day, including the day I got back from traveling from India; that Thanksgiving, when I took a cab home after over 30 hours of travel time, grabbed a 5 minute shower, and then raced to the hospital.

The same hospital. Directly across the street from my OBGYN who had brought my baby into the world, who every time I drove to for my annual Pap Smear for the 3 years since Finley’s death I swore I would change doctors, as the entire surroundings of where I would park or where that deli was or where the door was to where I was wheeled in and 2 weeks later out were landmines of traumatic memories.

I was in the same hospital where I was carted out from the maternity ward on a rainy Monday, empty handed, save for some sympathy orchids that some best friends had sent me and some miscellaneous stuff that Craig had brought to the hospital to make what turned into my 2-week stay comfortable (comfortable being a loose term, obviously), and the precious keepsake book that had Finley’s picture, foot prints, and some literature about what bereaved parents like us should do.

Those days – the 3rd and 4th of December, were sacred days, meant for me to feel the emotional tumult that inevitably poured out every year.  But this year I went to the hospital both days, what I know now was a true privilege, making sure the doctors never left the room before we had every answer they could give us; making sure my dad’s lips were not too crinkly from dehydration; playing him music; reciting him poems he’d written; holding his hands; praying.

The Friday after I got back from India my mom and sister and I were there, all 3 of us, together.  As the two of them left, my dad motioned for me to stay, even though there were nurses in the room, waiting to check his pulses and change his pillows.  This was unlike him; before this time, he would always interrupt any one of us in his family to learn what the staff needed to do; he seemed to respect their time, but something had shifted for him: perhaps he realized he had so little time left, and that it was indeed his to do with what he wanted.

“Do you have a name for your baby?” he asked me.  His blue eyes that I’d inherited as bright as they’d ever been.  “Yes,” I answered without a moment’s notice, “and one of them will start with an H.”  (In the Jewish religion, babies are not named after the deceased, but usually the first letter of someone’s name is used as a tribute, so to speak. Finley, in fact, was named for my grandfather Felix. My dad’s name was Herbert.)

He smiled, as it was the exact answer he’d wanted.  I told him our daughter’s name.  And then I told him our son’s name.  Those blue eyes and welled up and he smiled at me, with a gaze so strong I can visualize it now.  He nodded. “That’s beautiful.”

I couldn’t bear to tell him that we weren’t pregnant yet.  And further, that we hadn’t even been able to do the embryo transfer because our 2 embryos had thawed badly.

Two days later, that Sunday, now December 1st, he was having a rough day. They had wheeled him out of the hospital at the crack of dawn to go to Westwood UCLA, and then not been able to perform the procedure that they had planned to do, thus leaving the severe pain in his throat without any chance of relief.

He could no longer swallow and wasn’t allowed any fluids. He asked me that day to help him die.  He looked at me with the intensity you’d find in some old detective movie, where people plot and plan in closed quarters; wearing hats; smoking cigarettes.  “We’re smart. We can do this.  We’ve got to get me out of here.”  He remarked that in Oregon they have physician assisted dying.  “But we’re not in Oregon,” I remarked sadly – feeling defeated that I couldn’t help him; crushed that the conversation had turned so drastic; so inevitable.

There were some pictures of my nieces, his granddaughters, next to his phone, that my sister had brought.  “Do you want me to get some tape and put up these pictures?” I asked.  “NO.  NO, I don’t want to see their pictures. I don’t want to hear about India. I don’t want to hear about your baby.”  Then he stopped himself from this rant and turned to me, with tears in his eyes, “but I want you to know that baby is so important to me.  That baby is so important.  Your baby is going to be so important to everyone.”

FUCK.  Even as I type this I think of the look on his face, and how totally fucking awful it was to realize how much my dad already loved my future babies, his grandchildren, who he would never hold.

“Well you’re going to meet Finley when you go, you know.” I said.  “I don’t believe in that,” he responded.  “It doesn’t matter, Dad, because I know it to be true.”

We left it at that.

And then I returned December 2nd, and he was still lucid and he made funny jokes. That is the day they put him into hospice, the medical world’s way of throwing up their hands and saying there is nothing more to be done, but to make this man as “comfortable” as possible, as he dies.

So I was there that day. And the next, and the following.  To make sure that he was comfortable. To bring treats or a thank you to the staff.  To negotiate with the fucking idiotic hospice administrative lady who treated my father as if he was a file number in a fucking Amazon.com warehouse.

My eldest sister and I would trade shifts, often overlapping, always making sure we repeated every thing we’d heard to each other – perhaps thinking that in doing so we would solve this problem of our father dying – then to my mom, with one of us trying to keep our other sister in the loop.

All this without time to recover from jetlag, to honor Finley’s birthday and the anniversary of his death, and all of this with the devastating knowledge that I had no embryos left.

My father died, Friday, December 6th, 2013 – 4 years and 2 days after my own son had died, in the very same hospital.

I like to imagine that Finley’s soul returned to those same corridors, and led my father to peace.

And while it is now late July of the following year, and I have undergone 8 months of fertility related plotting, planning and failures, to get to the next step in our mission (which is imminent and gives me great hope), it seems like a good time to go back in time, so to speak, and pick up on December 3rd, 2009, the day that everything changed.

To be continued…

Chasing Butterflies with Finley in India Part 1: journal entry2

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I’ve been back from India since Thanksgiving, but with everything that has happened, have been unable to complete this posting until now.  If the tenses change, forgive me, as much of it was written while there and then the rest once I got home….

Meeting the surrogate was surreal. I didn’t know what to expect, even though we’d already seen her picture. She was little, maybe 5″3’.  She was pretty, mostly because of her deep, wise, brown eyes.  She looked timid, like a deer caught in headlights, and sort of stared at me, the American woman gushing niceties to her, as she awaited the translation.

I wished her well and let her know we’d be praying for a pregnancy, and hoped that she felt well.

As she walked out of the room, at the polite dismissal of one of the many administrators at the Center, tears welled up in my eyes. The caring but not emotionally invested woman said, “It’s OK.  Lots of people cry.”  Little does she know I sometimes cry multiple times a day.  I explained that it wasn’t ‘just’ meeting the surrogate, whose name hadn’t etched into my memory, but the idea that this is the next step in my husband’s and my journey.

You see, it is one thing to apply for the process, prepare the paperwork, pay the fees at different stages in the process via wire transfer in a country that has what is called ‘slow pay’.

It took me sending 4 FedEx packages to the consulate in San Francisco because the paperwork confused me – even though I oversee million dollar estimates and contracts on a daily basis professionally.  I had 3 different sets of passport-size photos taken before I understood that I could not wear glasses and had to have my ear placed behind my ears.

I concocted a chart early on in the process to keep things organized, so that when I awoke (insomnia sure can come in handy) to return correspondence from the Center in India between 12 AM and 4 AM for many nights over many weeks – since they vary between 12.5 and 13.5 hours ahead of Los Angeles – I would be able to cross reference where we were in the process of our paperwork which entailed dozens of agreements to be approved; for the releasing and shipping embryos; for the surrogacy contract draft to be agreed upon; for recommendations on hotels; for 2 separate designated parties to agree to take care of the eventual baby/babies, in case something happened to us, and the list goes on and on and on.

It takes things to an entirely new level when being there, in India, and seeing the facilities and all of the women lining the halls on the benches who want to be surrogates or who are mid cycle and the Australian couple who without a beat’s hesitation got ‘it’ and the butterfly on the doctor’s desk, and EVERYthing…

And so the tears were earned, and I had nobody to comfort me.  While it was smart for Craig to stay in LA while I took this trip on my own, the intensity of all of this felt exponentially heightened because there I was, processing all of this, all by myself.

After this, all I wanted to do is crawl into a ball and cry, but of course food became the priority.  Even finding a place that I wanted to eat in this loud, over crowded, horn honking, poverty stricken but highly fascinating city was difficult, but my driver took me to an area called M Block – a nice semi-upscale area – and I searched and eventually found a restaurant who very fortunately understood the concept “to go”.

That night back at the hotel, only my second night in the city, I once again was comforted with Curb Your Enthusiasm DVDs, Skype calls with Craig (who had food poisoning or a touch of the flu) and Maybelline – and then eventually periods of sleep for about an hour at a time.

Tuesday was to be a huge sight seeing day, and now that I had accelerated my schedule with plans to leave at 3 AM Thursday instead of Friday, I intended to really maximize my time!

I had scrambled eggs and toast for breakfast.  It took some arranging and waiting, but I washed that down with a luke warm Diet Coke.

Fueled by caffeine and lack of sleep and raw emotions that made me feel like naked, I headed off to the Red Fort, which is an architectural complex that was built hundreds of years ago.  My driver parked and in stilted English explained that I should have a rickshaw bicycle driver take me into this area of Old Delhi.

We chose one of many guys who approached the fan, who gave me a quote of 400 rupees, and so off we went.  He took me to the outside of the fort and we agreed to meet back there in a bit.  I entered on foot and was stared at by throngs of people. The uniformed school children seemed absolutely fascinated with me – and little boys would come up to me and say “HELLO!” while their friends would watch curiously. I would respond with a smile, “Hello.”  Girls looked at me and then whispered and then looked back and would whisper some more.

After walking through the Fort, which was the residence of a Mughal emporer, I returned to my rickshaw bicycle driver – thank G-d he shouted out to me through the crowds – and we continued on a journey. We went through the streets of Chanki Chowk, an area that is so congested that cars can’t drive here.  I giggled nervously as the bicyclist strongly pedaled and maneuvered, always keeping my left foot firmly placed as was suggested.

We went on to India’s largest mosque.  There were stairs to climb, at which point several people accosted me with what I must do to enter: Remove shoes and pay price for slippers.  Pay cost to enter.  Wear a praying ‘wrap’ or dress (even though I was pretty well covered already), of course for a cost.  I confirmed there was no separate cost to take pictures with my phone, though if I understood correctly, had I brought an actual camera, there would be a nominal fee.

Hard to feel spiritual after that sort of finagling, which kind of reminded me with the fees and merchandise in Vatican City, in retrospect, and on a way smaller scale, but I made my way into the mosque and watched how others were praying.  Many were kneeling in front of the walls, and others were touching the walls with their heads bowed in prayer.  Not much for kneeling, having been brought up half Jewish and told by my father early on not to, I opted to graze my hand upon the cool stone of the walls until I found a place to pray.  And quickly enough, I was connected to the moment, to myself, and stood in prayer at this wall, where hundreds of thousands of Indians and others (probably more) have prayed over the years.  I prayed for our babies to come.  I prayed for Finley’s well being. I prayed for my father’s health.

Then I took some pictures, got my tennis shoes back from the person (and then of course had to tip him even though I’d already paid his friend for the slippers), returned to my rickshaw, who brought me back to my driver – and off we went to continue our sight seeing.

Next we went to the zoo.  I paid for my driver to join me, and we found a little cart that likely could have fit 12 people – and negotiated that it would only be the driver of the cart, my driver and me – so that we could stop where we want and take the tour I had imagined.  We saw a lion, a giraffe, and some beautiful birds. I could not help but think of the tape I had watched with my father in his office days before I left, of his own trip to India several years ago, and the wild life journey he had taken on an elephant’s back into the jungle and the white tiger he had been so proud of seeing.

I had thought the zoo was a conservatory, which I suppose it was in some terms, but about half way through the 1-hour private tour, I saw an elephant that was bound with chains to his area.  Of course I understand that animals can’t run wild, but I guess I thought I was going to more of a ‘living desert’ type zoo, where the animals are all in their natural surroundings. I cut the tour short, and off we went to the Museum of Modern Art.

At the museum, there were no pictures allowed, and none of the paintings grabbed me as much as the saying on this one:
How can one perceive light without the shadow?
- painting by M Mamtani “Centrovision” 1980

I thought of all of the things I had experienced in order to get to this exact moment, in India, having met my surrogate the day before. I thought of the fact that the embryo transfer would be the next day.  How much pain and disappointment Craig and I had experienced on this journey, and how incredible the joy will eventually feel.  The painting spoke to me, as only art can, and showed me I was exactly where I was supposed to be.

And as exhausted as I was and as filthy as I felt from a day of down & dirty sight seeing, I told the driver that the final stop for the day would be the Baha’i Temple, The Lotus Temple, as that was recommended as a sunset visit.

We parked with seemingly hundreds of other people who were trying to get there on foot, via car, rickshaw, or who were coming out of the dozens of tour buses.  We walked for a while and then entered the gate, single-file, at which point I saw a plaque that described the religion of this temple. Here is the first half of what is on the plaque:

The Baha’i Faith recognizes the unity of God and of his prophets, upholds the principle of an unfettered search after truth, condemns all forms of superstition and prejudice, teaches that the fundamental purpose of religion is to promote concord and harmony, that it must go hand in hand with science, and that it constitutes the sole and ultimate basis of a peaceful, an ordered and progressive society.

I didn’t really know at that moment how exactly I believe in exactly that, but obviously my faith is combined with my reverence for science, and so I was very much, once again, exactly where I was supposed to be.

We took the long walk towards the lotus shaped temple.  There were so many people.  The driver dropped off our shoes – and nobody asked for a tip of any kind.  We continued on barefoot.  We made it up the stairs and I was mesmerized by the architecture.  A beautiful pond surrounded the bottom, but we kept our focus on getting into the temple, where everyone seemed to be heading.

Once outside first in Indian and then in English we were told to turn phones off, to not take any photos, and to not speak at all once inside.  A group exited, and we entered.

I looked up and all around and I don’t remember anything of the architecture or art, but I remember the feeling exactly.  It was calm.  Peaceful.  I felt a warm energy gush over me at the perfect temperature.  My driver sat in an aisle.  I sat in the aisle in front of him – took a deep breath, put my hands on the back of the aisle in front of me, looked up and closed my eyes.

I didn’t know at the time whether I had done this for 20 seconds or 10 minutes, before the most vivid image came to me.  It was me, standing with Craig, with our Finley, with our two little children (who we’ve yet to meet), and with our doctors, with our surrogate, our families, our friends, you, and what started as a small circle of just me, my husband, our son and our future babies, kept growing in a circular fashion. We were at the core, but this community of people from all over the world surrounded us, holding hands, keeping us safe; enveloped us.

I awoke or came to or completed the meditation or prayer or whatever it was, and there were tears streaming, no – gushing, down my face.   I rose and walked to the exit, at which point a young Indian man looked at me and said, “You’re crying!”  Not sad at all, I confirmed that yes, I was.

My driver joined me a few moments later and smiled at me, I suspect surprised at my wet face and likely radiant spirit.  It was an intoxicating experience, and I knew that out of everything I had seen so far, this was the one place I must return to when Craig and I returned next year.

Finally back at my hotel, I ordered their chicken curry.  It was surprisingly delicious – considering I thought I didn’t like curry.  I plotted out my next day, watched more Curb episodes, and waited to Skype with Craig.  I emailed my eldest sister reminding her to give me an update after that day’s chemo appointment.  It would be my father’s 2nd session and I had sent a list of questions for the doctor – who my Dad would be seeing prior to the chemo.

In the middle of the night – again, because of the 13.5 hour time difference, I connected with my sister, who explained that my father would not be able to have the chemo.  He was dehydrated, had lost more weight, and so they were hospitalizing him for a ‘re-charge’.  Nervous more than words can explain, and feeling so powerless as it was the first important appointment that I had not been at with him in these last seven weeks of appointments, I asked to speak with my Dad. He sounded weak and the conversation was short.  I did not sleep that night at all, in between giving Craig the news, checking in with my mother once she got home, and thinking about how scared my Dad must be.

The next morning sucked.  I was exhausted from lack of sleep and my emotions ran high, but I was committed to more sight seeing before I boarded another set of planes for 24+ hours of travel.  The driver picked me up and we went to Lodhi Gardens.  I walked around, enjoying the ancient architecture that appeared pretty randomly in this park, where there was a the lovely pond and lots of morning people doing their exercise.  I searched for the butterfly conservatory that I believed was there – but it turned out that the Internet posting about this conservatory, where butterflies were bred and caged, was years old.  I saw way too many stray and mangy looking dogs, and I made the mistake of using my ‘Maybelline voice’ on a group of dogs as I walked by, and one of them came towards me – as if he was going to attack.  How incredibly sad that the dogs there are not used to being acknowledged or treated with love by any humans that their first instinct is to attack.  It’s heart breaking.

After another round of chicken curry, a pretend nap at the hotel, and finishing up packing, the driver and I headed out to get me a henna tattoo, and then off to the Surrogacy Center to get my copy of the signed paperwork, which I would need to bring home, have Craig sign, and then immediately return to the Center.

I ran into my Australian couple friends at the Center, and wished them well.  I was told the doctor wanted to see me.  I assumed she would simply tell me how the donor’s lining was, and anticipated she might tell me that the 2nd embryo, the one that was Grade B, slightly deteriorated, may not have thawed well. I absolutely did not expect her and the embryologist to meet me, and tell me the following.

Neither of the embryos made the thawing process.  It was impossible to say what exactly had gone wrong, but there was no embryo to transfer.  No embryo to transfer into the surrogate meant no chances of pregnancy.  No embryo to transfer meant that I had to fly all the way back to Los Angeles with this info in mind.  No embryo to transfer and no husband to hold while crying.  No embryo to transfer which would mean that Finley’s birthday and anniversary of his death would come, and we would not be expecting good news, any news.  No embryo to transfer. Unfuckingbelievable.

And from there I had the driver take me to a park where I smoked a half clove half cigarette. It wasn’t strong enough to hurt my throat and distract me from the emotional pain.  And from there I had the driver take me to this stupid mall, as that was on my list of things to see / do.  It could not have been a more Americanized upscale mall. What the hell did I need to buy at Nike in India that I could not get 3 miles from home?  I saw a tattoo shop, and decided to get a real tattoo.  I had anticipated getting a tattoo while there (in fact had gotten a Hep B shot when I was getting the normal vaccinations just in case), but wasn’t sure until I saw this shop that I was going to do this, and what the image would be. Distraught, confused, exhausted, but committed to the memory of that visual meditation I had at the temple the day before, I had the artist create that image.  It hurt physically, which was a nice relief from the emotional pain and shock that I was experiencing.

I had the driver take me to the airport hours ahead of my 3 AM departure, as I wanted to get on Skype if possible and couldn’t fathom the thought of any more sight seeing. I sat there for about 6 hours, with my left wrist in crazy pain, as I wrote, listened to music, cried unabashedly, and waited for my flight.  I experienced Thanksgiving in 3 time zones, made it to Los Angeles, took a cab home, hugged Maybelline, took a shower, and drove to see my father in the hospital.

My nightmare was continuing, and it was escalating beyond my belief.

Chasing Butterflies with Finley in India, part 1

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Today I am flying to London, where I will arrive during their Saturday, at which time I will get on another flight, that will take me to New Delhi, India, where I shall arrive Sunday morning.

A driver will await me. Having been warned by my mother that in order to anticipate India, I should imagine the most crowded place I’ve ever been, and then multiply it exponentially, and being that I’ve opted not to have my cell phone on while there, because Jesus Christ do I need to unplug right now and my phone carrier doesn’t service India – anyway, I told the person who arranged the driver to look for an overweight American woman, wearing all black sweat outfit, looking incredibly happy to be there.

I am not happy at this moment, as I am scared to leave home.  I hate leaving Craig.  We’ve always been super codependent, but after losing Finley, time and again the idea of being apart makes me have to remind myself to breathe.

And leaving Maybelline is going to be hideous, because having her in my life is the first joy and happiness I have felt since I was pregnant with Finley.  She is not just my puppy.  She is my best friend.  My little daughter.  My heart.  My baby.  My Maybe. (And so I am bringing a stuffed animal to hug at night instead of her.  Yes, seriously.)

I am also scared that my father will not be alive when I get back.  I have had the privilege of the most beautiful and important conversations with him these past several months, and while the doctor has given us no warning that things could happen that quickly, I am with him regularly, and just plain scared of the unthinkable.

But when I get to India, darn it, I will be the person I described for the driver to find. I will be happy, because we have our surrogate. We saw a picture of her just this morning.  She and several other women vied for the position of being our surrogate, but as of this morning, her uterine lining looked perfect for her to start her Progesterone medication, to prepare for the Transfer of our two beautiful, glorious, loved and wanted embryos – next Wednesday.  One is Grade A, the other one is Grade B, slightly deteriorated.  They were shipped from Encino to New Delhi, and will be thawed the morning of the transfer.  I pray that they thaw well!

I didn’t have some warm and fuzzy feeling when I saw our surrogate’s photo, but I know that once I am at the Surrogacy Center in India and I’ve met with the doctor and all of her associates with whom I’ve been emailing and speaking these past several weeks, and once I meet with the lawyer, and once I am surrounded by people whose business it is to make OTHER people parents, I imagine I will feel overwhelmed with gratitude.

I will also be conflicted. Not because I have not come to terms with this need; I am a producer for a living, and live in a solutions based world.  A goal has been set, and since directions A, B and C (1 through 13) didn’t work, it is time to move on to direction D, so to speak.

I had the intimate experience of knowing Finley while he was growing inside of me, and it almost makes him EVEN more special that he will have been the only son to whom I gave birth, before his life was ripped from our clutching hands.

I will be conflicted because the same day that I will be meeting the doctor and the associates and touring the clinic and (likely) meeting my surrogate, is the same day 4-years ago that I was hospitalized ‘to term’.  I was 23.5 weeks pregnant, with clothes on my bed at home strewn and waiting to be packed away for our next day’s trip to Florida for Thanksgiving to visit Craig’s Dad and Stepmom, and within the simple sentence uttered by my Israeli gynecologist, “You’re not going anywhere”, mine and my husband’s entire lives shifted.

And the days prior to that, including today, 4 years ago exactly (the Friday before Thanksgiving that is), when I was keeled over with what I thought were Braxton Hicks cramps (which they weren’t), preparing menu ideas for the celebration dinner for my best friend who was in remission for cancer (who died 15 months later), have actual sound design to them:  Tick.  Tock. Tick.  Tock.  My heart beats in tune with the sadness that comes over me when I think about what was about to happen, and how that all felt.

But it is 4-years later.  I’ve accepted Finley’s death.  I’ve no fault in the death of our infant son.  I did everything I could then, and have honored him since, by talking about him, and by acknowledging the hurt that I have experienced.

I see people on Facebook comment on the lack of quiet time they get because of their children.  Others post articles about how their social lives have changed.  Or that they don’t get to sleep more than 2-hours at a time.

And it is not envy I feel, but a conclusive feeling that they will never, ever get how lucky they are.  They will never understand what it is like to have aching arms, a hole in their hearts, and be climbing uphill on a marathon for every single day, for almost 4 years.

Are they lucky?  Well, yeah, of course, but I have to believe that the journey that I am on with the best husband I could imagine and the most loving community I could hope for is going to bring us the riches we deserve.

I have finished packing.  The framed photo of Finley is safely tucked away, so that I can light up his beautiful face every night with the candles I have brought.  I am wearing 4 pieces of jewelry only, including the necklace that states Finley.

And now I am off, with my husband’s support and blessings, to go chase butterflies with Finley, in India.

 

Thank you for wishing us well.