Latest update (with pictures!)

We got another great update yesterday from Mumbai:

Both babies are doing really well according to all the reports - organs, limbs, etc all look great, and they have good cardiac activity and general growth. Naturally this big test (done around 20 weeks) is a worry for expectant parents so we're thrilled with the news.

Below are two shots of our little ones - both sucking their thumbs, seemingly peaceful and comfortable!

Many of you have asked about gender. Unfortunately, Indian law prevents us finding that out during the pregnancy. As much as we would have wanted to know, we are fully aware that we have many surprises in store for us so this will just make two more :)

The surrogate will continue to be monitored by Dr. Tandon every few weeks, but for now we can breathe a sigh of relief with this great news.

Checking Things Off The List!

This Wednesday will be 18 weeks for us - so hard to believe how quickly the time is flying by. We've been hard at work getting things organized and starting to make all our lists... December will be here before we know it.

A major to-do that is almost checked off our list is that we've found a new place to live! A spacious, modern townhouse in Brookhaven, a fun area about 5 miles from where we are right now. It even has a nice fenced-in yard for Edward.  We should have everything signed in the next day or two, and then move prep begins in earnest. We are moving on Friday, August 31st, which gives us about 6 weeks to pack and say goodbye to Midtown. Here is a photo of the front (ours is the one on the left):

We also made great progress yesterday and ordered our baby furniture! Went to a great place called Georgia Baby (www.georgiababy.com) and got two cribs and a nice big dresser:

Other than that, we've been busy with some pre-parenting classes (CPR and Baby Essentials classes will come soon), making appointments to update legal stuff, and generally getting ourselves ready, mentally and otherwise.



Our surrogate is doing very well. She had a check up last week and is feeling great, and the doctor is very happy with her (good weight gain, normal blood pressure, etc). The next big ultrasound will be towards the end of next week, so we'll be sure to post then!  





14 Week Surprise!

The doctor did another ultrasound scan this week (14 weeks), and everything is looking good!  According to our "What to Expect" app, the babies are each about the size of a navel orange now (4.5 inches), and weigh about 2-3 ounces.  We also got an unexpected surprise - two great photos of our surrogate (Zarina), displaying a noticeable baby bump!  Since we didn't meet Zarina when we were in India in April, this was our first time getting to see what she looks like.  This definitely has added a whole new level of 'realness' to this experience...we are actually able to SEE the progress of our babies!  More than anything, it struck us how kind Zarina looks, and that makes us feel so comfortable and confident that the babies are being taken care of by the 'right' person. 

We are actively in house-hunting mode now - we went to see two places this week that didn't meet the mark, so we are going to see a few more places this afternoon with Benjy (Alan's dad).  We'll be sure to keep you posted.  In the meantime, here are the photos of Zarina from this week:

First Trimester Ultrasound Results

We received another very positive report from Mumbai early this morning.  The surrogate had her comprehensive "end of the first trimester" ultrasound, and everything is looking great!  Both babies are the perfect size (5.7 and 5.6cm, respectively) and have strong heartbeats (156 and 150 bpm).  This ultrasound also included screenings for Down's and other scary conditions - we're very pleased to report that both babies are at an extremely low risk for everything.  

The next scan will be in about two months' time, at which point we will (hopefully) be able to determine the genders.  Between now and then, Alan and I are launching into full-scale baby prep mode - luckily for me, Alan is the master of organization and has already started making lists!  We purchased our first baby book yesterday (Baby 411), and I am already diving into it.  We've also sent notice to our current landlord that we'll be moving out at the end of August (small condos in a high rise are not ideal for a large family!), so we've already been calling on the services of Atlanta's most preeminent realtor to help us find a new place.  Let the games begin!

Here is a current snapshot of our two babies resting comfortably after their first trimester exam:

Seeing Double!

(Guest blogger alert - Alan here)

Sorry for the long silence on our end... we've certainly had a very busy few weeks but wanted to wait for the all important 12 week mark to give our faithful followers a very, very exciting update on our journey....

WE ARE HAVING TWINS!!!

Even though we've known for quite a few weeks, every time we say it we still can't believe it! We got the call from India about 6 weeks ago that our surrogate was carrying two embryos, and it took us about a full day to recover from the shock. We knew all along the odds of multiples was a little higher but for some reason it never dawned on us that it would actually happen!

Our excitement was tempered knowing we were still in the risky time of the first trimester, so we limited the big news to our family. We have continued to receive updates from India (they are great about keeping us updated with reports and ultrasounds), and last Saturday we got a great report that both fetuses are growing and looking good!

This Saturday will be our 12 week mark, with an expected due date of December 23rd. However with twins we know that will probably move up a few weeks so we'll need to get ready long before. You can imagine what we've been thinking about... we need to move (our 2 bedroom Midtown condo can't handle us, two babies, and Eddie); we'll need some help (nanny or au-pair probably); and just the latest revelation - will a double stroller fit in our car trunks?!

We have lots to plan, discuss, and organize, but we intentionally wanted to wait for the 12 week mark which is now here. We have one more big test next weekend (dual marker test) which will hopefully be all good, and then we'll kick everything into high gear.

For now, we leave you with a picture of the soon-to-be reason for doubling our household:

Thank you all for the continued love and support!

Quick Update!

What a whirlwind few weeks we've had - lots going on workwise and an excessive amount of travel for both of us - and then there's that whole baby thing  :)  We continue to receive updates from India on a regular basis.  There has been good evidence of strong cardiac activity, which is great (and another milestone achieved).  The surrogate is doing well and we are happy that the clinic is continuing to watch over her closely.  The next few weeks will be a very important time from a development standpoint - and as you can imagine, that's keeping us on edge a bit.  We will continue to post updates whenever there is something concrete to report, but they might be a bit slower in coming until we come out of the first trimester and can breathe a bit easier!  As always, your love, support, wishes, and prayers continue to be so appreciated by the both of us - thank you!

Big News!

The long awaited news is finally here... We received a call early this morning from our agency coordinator in India: they ran a blood test on our surrogate last night, and we have a confirmed pregnancy!! We are totally over the moon, and could not be more thrilled. As many of you know, this was a big milestone that has been weighing on us for the past few days, so we are beyond excited to get such fantastic news. Obviously we are still very early in the process - she is now just 3 weeks along - but still such a relief to know that at least one of our little embryos is firmly tucked in. The clinic will probably run another blood test some time next week (to make sure that the hormone levels continue to to rise as they should), and the first sonography will be completed in about two weeks. At that point, we should be able to tell how many embryos we are talking about, and with any luck we will see the heartbeat(s) shortly thereafter! What an amazing day so far...we are totally overwhelmed, but in the most amazing way. We are on our way to Costa Rica as we speak, and are looking forward to a wonderful and relaxing trip. We promise to update the blog as soon as we have something new to share. As always, we couldn't be more grateful for all of your amazing support!

Waiting...and More Waiting

Hard to believe that we've been back from India for more than a week.  In some ways, this past week was 'normal' - we got back into our routine, went back to work, etc - but in other ways, it was the longest week ever! 

We had some email exchanges with our doctor in Mumbai - she let us know that she's planning on doing the pregnancy test on Friday or Saturday of this week, meaning that we still have almost another week to wait for some (hopefully good) news.  We're trying not to think about it constantly, but I've found myself looking at fertility blogs and other IVF discussion forums at least 3-4 times in the past week.  Even though there's no way to calculate odds of success (since there are so many different variables at play), I am encouraged when I read about the experiences of other couples who had our same 'embryo scenario' and got pregnant with at least one baby!  However, we also need to be cautious about managing our own expectations appropriately - we'll obviously be disappointed if it doesn't work this time around, but we know it will happen when it is meant to happen.

We're leaving for Costa Rica on Saturday morning, so we're really hoping that we can get the results before we head out of the country (again).  Depending on when we get the results, we will update the blog as soon as we can!  Thank you again for all of your love and supoprt. 

A & A Back Home, and Transfer Completed!

Good morning from Atlanta!  We arrived home yesterday afternoon at around 2:50pm, after another long couple of flights from Mumbai and Amsterdam.  Once again, Alan slept for the majority of both flights, and I was thrilled to the gills that I managed about three hours of sleep on flight #1.  I'm sorry that we couldn't spend a day or two in Amsterdam on the way home, but since Delta wanted to charge us each $700+ to change our tickets, that most definitely wasn't happening!

We got some very good news from the clinic once we arrived home - all three of our viable embryos have been continuing to experience good cell division (as of last night, two of them had 8 cells and one of them had 6 cells, which is exactly where they should be on 'Day 3' of the process).  The doctor determined that all three are of good quality - again, a very positive sign - and she completed the transfer of all three embryos into the surrogate late last night Atlanta time.  Here is an image of the three embryos pre-transfer - you can definitely identify the two embryos with 8 cells and the one with 6 cells:

Now we begin the dreaded "two week wait" before we can get confirmation about if any of the embryos have taken.  I'm sure that those of you who have kids remember this waiting period well...we're only 12 hours in, and we can already tell it's going to take everything in our power not to fixate on this for the next 14 days! 

I'm not sure if we will be getting any additional reports from the clinic for the next couple of weeks, so the blog may go on a bit of a short-term hiatus.  However, we promise to update all of you as soon as we have something to share.  Alan has just posted some additional photos of our trip on Facebook, so feel free to take a look.  As always, we are so grateful for all of your positive thoughts and best wishes. We had an incredible few days in Mumbai and are very happy with how our trip went - one we'll remember forever!

Thursday Update

We just received a call from the doctor to tell us that at least three of our four eggs were successfully fertilized, which is great!  The jury is still out on egg number 4 - the embryologist couldn't tell yet if fertilization had occurred - but we should know for sure by tomorrow.  In any event, we are VERY relieved that at least three of the embryos seem to be on a good track.  Now they will continue to mature in the lab for the next couple of days, and the embryologist will grade them tomorrow (using an A, B, C scale) based on the amount of cell division present in each one.  Based on the grades, we'll make the determination about which embryos to implant into the surrogate, which is tentatively scheduled for Saturday evening.

So...in a nutshell, we are feeling good - one big hurdle behind us, but a few more to go.  Thanks for all of the good wishes you've been sending our way - please keep them coming!

Since the egg retrieval went off as scheduled yesterday, we've decided to come back to Atlanta a couple of days early - there's nothing else for us to do here on this trip as far as the surrogacy goes, and we feel that we've had a chance to see most of Mumbai's big tourist draws.  Also, since my parents and Alan's brother & family are in Atlanta, we don't want to miss out an opportunity to spend some more time with them.  We'll be leaving Mumbai early tomorrow morning (1:00am local time!), flying back through Amsterdam, and will be back in Atlanta by Friday mid-afternoon.  With a little bit of luck, we're only saying goodbye to Mumbai for nine months or so!  I promise to update the blog as soon as we have any news to share.  Thanks for all of your love and support!