Candace and Chris: Our Misconception

How exciting that we can share our story with Dawn on The ABC’s of Surrogacy! Thank you Dawn for helping spread awareness of family building options and mostly for helping create families.

Our first misconception was having a baby would be easy peasy. The real stress would come 9 months later after the baby arrives right? Like many couples that face life’s challenges we were very much blind sighted as to what was in store for us. Shortly after Chris and I said our vows, we were thrown into a challenge we never thought we would have to face. He had a brain tumor. One that was very sneaky and great at hiding from the neurosurgeons. We even named it Phil, why Phil? No clue but none the less we fought him and won the battle two craniotomies later. Life events like that change perspectives; they alter your priorities and way of thinking. After staring down the risk of losing each other, the need to start a family sharpened in our focus. We both knew and understood all too well that life is a gift we receive every new morning we awake.

We have an all too familiar infertile rap sheet though. I’ll spare the history but it involved 7 years of procedures, surgeries, sharp pointy needles, an empty bank account and a trash can filled with disappointment from negative pregnancy tests. It wasn’t until 3 years ago we came out to our families and really to the world about our broken plumbing. I started a blog and shared our story from both perspectives, his and hers. That is when a MTV casting producer came across our story. They followed us for almost a year. They captured our 6th failed IVF round, followed us through our adoption pursuits and then ended the show where we met our surrogate.  Surrogacy was on our neva-gonna-happen list. Another misconception we had. We whole heartedly thought that it was only for the rich and powerful or for those who have someone willing to do it free of charge.

We are neither rich nor powerful and our surrogacy is for the most part commercial. Personally, I hate that term (commercial surrogacy) because I truly believe that it takes someone with an altruistic heart and intention to carry for a childless couple. So we took a risk and put all of our eggs in one basket. Literally, because I had been seeing an oncologist over the years. My risk for uterine cancer was so great that I needed to have a hysterectomy shortly after we transferred our remaining two embryos to our surrogate. I had no womb and heart filled with hope. We fundraised and did everything possible to make it happen. That hope, risk, craziness, drive or whatever you want to call it paid off. We are now expecting a little girl in June via gestational carrier. Surrogacy has given us the chance at parenthood. That one selfless act will change our lives forever.

Candace and Chris from MTV’s True Life documentary, “I’m Desperate to Have a Baby” and Our Misconception Blog