Sunday, May 5, 2013

Making Announcements - Getting Personal

The time is getting close where we will start making our announcements to friends and family that aren't already in the know. I think...

http://mashable.com/2012/04/18/social-media-and-the-news/

We keep putting it off. At first we wanted to wait until after the first trimester when the risk of miscarriage was still quite high. Week 13 rounded the corner and we decided to wait until we saw the specialist. Once that occurred we were introduced to all the bad things that could happen and decided to wait until after the initial tests. Then we wanted to wait for more tests (ie, the amnio). We still haven't gotten the results from that yet, but we expect them and another ultrasound this week. If all goes well, we will start widening our circle of who we tell.

But when do we make the announcement to our big group of friends??? Is that something you do on facebook? That would seem weird, but it would be equally weird to deal with people who want to know WHY we didn't let them know, when they start (hopefully) seeing baby pictures. Perhaps even more so. My worrying mind can just imagine people thinking "didn't we just see her at so-and-so's drinking wine, flat belly and all?" (Ok "flat belly" may be an exaggeration, because after 3 IVF treatments in 1 year my belly is no longer flat, but I am working on it.)

Ahhhhhh and all the questions we will get from so many people. I don't mind them from our-close friends and family - heck most of them already know my SIL is our surrogate or at least know that we have been trying with surrogacy - but what about the regular friends? We have A LOT. The idea of people publicly posting awkward questions or privately emailing me in droves, and then imagining people gossiping behind my back, is quite horrifying. Even if they don't. Which they will, because it's human nature.

Plus - I really don't like people knowing my business unless it's on my terms. The idea explaining I had cryoablation surgery many years ago (and many other things) makes me cringe. Not explaining it means people will ask if we adopted, or worse, will think my husband cheated. (Not that there is something wrong with adoption,but it is a particularly hard discussion for me because of my own history with it. For the record, I think adoption can be wonderful.) From what I can tell, very few people know the ins-and-outs of IVF and even less know about surrogacy. I'm sure some people would even privately wonder "did she just not want to get pregnant?" as I see written over and over in comment sections of India surrogacy articles.

On the other hand, I think it's important to share my story; if not just to help others. Recently I had a male friend get married and I realized that they would want to have kids. The wife just turned 40 and I could tell that they didn't have the faintest idea what AMA was. Even a friend whose wife went through IUI a few years ago (took on the first try, but they had several miscarriages prior to that) seemed blissfully unaware of the difference between a woman getting pregnant at 38 and one getting pregnant at 41. They were talking about putting off the second child for another year or two. Of course both of these friends I gave the 5 minute run-down, but forcing your experience down someone else's throat is quite different than someone else reading your story because they want to. In fact, I distinctly remember being MAJORLY offended when various women told us that we better get it in gear if we wanted kids. (Ahhhhh - how naive we were back then!)

Oddly enough, I happily shared my story with the lady at the bank the other day who was genuinely interested. It started out simple enough when I was getting our house re-fi papers notarized and the bank lady asked if we were planning on having any children.  Not having told many others I was ready to burst with the news to SOMEONE that we have twins on the way. Still, I didn't want to startle the woman so I eased into it with the ole ego-boosting  "well I have I 21-year old" that always gives me the shock face I adore (wasn't always the case).

From there, the conversation naturally slipped into "we have twins on the way" which led to surrogacy, then our India adventure, and then explaining the entire IVF process. She was a young lady (26) and apologized for being nosy, but she was so sweet and thoughtful in her questions. She explained her aunt was in her late 30's and seemed sad that she may never have kids. She also explained that some women in her family were pressuring her to have more kids now, while she could, even though she wasn't ready. In the end, she told me I should be on Lifetime to help other women. (Her manager had been on Lifetime for something else - lol.) That conversation was so easy and the young lady made me feel great, but I know that isn't always the case in these situations.

The easy answer to addressing friends' questions would be to point them to this blog, but I really don't feel comfortable with that. At all. I've been brutally honest here and I don't need casual acquaintances knowing things of my past or people scouring through to see if they are mentioned. That's a can of worms that I really don't need on any level. I have very close friends that I have never mentioned here and at least one that I have spoken unfavorably about. This is a blog of my experience, the good and the bad, and rather than worry about what I write in the future or sanitizing things I have written in the past, I'd prefer to keep it that way.

So what do you think? How do I tell the masses? We are fortunate enough to have quite a large social circle, mostly because of my husband, but that certainly leads to uncomfortable situations about things such as this. What to do what to do? What would you do (or what did you do)? Any advice is surely appreciated. 

20 comments:

  1. I did a FB post to announce to the people that didn't know already.. It was kind of long but I basically said those who know us know we have been trying for a long time and we are having a baby via gestational surrogacy and our wonderful SIL is our surrogate (I had gotten her permission to tag her so I did and she announced on her page too) we didn't get too many nosy nellies emailing or questioning, mostly we got congrats and amazement :) I know some people do a bcc email as well to explain.. I did FB because even though most didn't know we were still trying some people did and a lot of people knew that we had tried previously.. Best of luck whatever you decide!!

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    1. Thanks! That's pretty much what we did as well. The questions only came when we saw people in person and they were respectful. I found in person I was quite happy to share the details.

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  2. That is such a hard decision to make. Perhaps you can find a website that explains the ins and outs of surrogacy and link it in your announcement post? I think either way you do it, announcing now or waiting till they are here, you are going to have to deal with some nosy nellies.

    This is something I've really been thinking about a lot lately. If our embryo donation is successful, it won't be readily apparent that it's not our biologically child conceived the old fashioned way. While we might not need to explain anything, I feel like I should because I want others to know this is a possibility.

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    1. It was much easier than I expected. Maybe we have just chosen our friends well, but just getting the basics out there helped me down the road with "wondering" what people were thinking.

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  3. Oh, this is so so hard. As Sweden is a country where surrogacy is not even allowed (allthough it's not illegal to travel abroad and do surrogacy), this was rather delicate for us. Most of our more peripheral "friends", still don't know either about my cancer nor how our second child was born. We just don't think it's relevant for them to know about - especially now when everything is behind us. But people who really needed to know where my colleagues http://tandooribaby.blogspot.se/2011/10/we-are-25-weeks-and.html
    Only our closest family knows.
    But well, about people questioning "why did you not tell me earlier etc., this is something that you should not even need to explain. Having trouble with getting pregnant, IVF and surrogacy is something very private and as things get complicated, many people want to keep quiet until they have some kind of secure feeling that this is going to work.
    Today FB is a natural way of telling your friends and maybe it would be a great way since you can choose how to answer each and everyones reactions. Whatever you choose, I wish you the very very best and hope that your friends reactions will be joyful!

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    1. Sorry for my bad spelling. Little Viking started to cry so I posted without reading through :(

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    2. LOL. I didn't even notice the bad spelling.

      The response ended up great. My husband is so social (thus me being in constant social situations) that I didn't want to deal with me thinking about what people were thinking. Basically, I didn't want to be the center of gossip and guesses. Announcing it on facebook helped elevate that for me, but I think it really depends on each individual.

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  4. I have been dealing with the same question lately. We have told all our family and close friends and now it's time to let the rest of our friends and acquaintances know. i am assuming I will do this on FB but keep delaying because I don't know what to say. I don't want to get into specifics about our IF, but I would like to acknowledge that we had a struggle and these twins are not some random fluke of nature. Keep us posted on what you decide.

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    1. Hey Jen - sorry for the delay. I wrote another post on this after we decided. My worry was all for naught.

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  5. I like what babydreams2011 did, just saying that you are having twins via surrogacy thanks to your wonderful SIL. I doubt people will ask on your wall, if they do, I would delete or ignore. If someone emails you privately you can always say the truth, the reason why you couldn't carry and how wonderful your SIL is. I think people will be happy for both of you, and who cares about the gossip, no way to control that. A week later the gossip will turn to something else :)

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    1. I totally agree with you. Well said!

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    2. This is so true. I don't know why I worry about stuff like that. I'm going to go out on a limb and say it probably bothers me because I was bullied as a kid by other kids. I was very socially awkward. I also tend to be very private with a lot of things, which isn't always conducive when you are part of a large social circle. LOL.

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  6. Hey! Thanks for commenting -- just followed it back to your blog here and wow, what an exciting time to be joining your adventure! I'm certainly not the person to ask when it comes to making the big reveal to the extended circle. I basically plan on never making a Facebook announcement at all. But I do think you will be pleasantly surprised by the support you receive over the surrogacy sitch; more people are taking this route now than ever and it's less of a scary mystery.

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  7. I haven't been following your blog long, so pardon my ignorance. How about a FB post like:
    "We are thrilled to announce our pregnancy through surrogacy and the pending arrival of twins"
    The questions:
    Q: Why are you using a surrogate?
    A: It's been a really long journey, and we are so fortunate that my SIL has agreed to carry our children for us.
    Q: Were you just afraid of getting fat?
    A: If only it were that easy, but it was a long journey and we are so fortunate that my SIL agreed...blah blah blah
    Q: So did your hubby sleep with her?
    A: Surrogacy is such a beautiful gift that does not involve sex, and we are so fortunate....again, blah blah blah.

    You get the idea. Keep the focus on the wonderful blessing that your SIL is and how the journey was difficult but you cannot wait to meet your children!

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  8. I am the poster who is currently doing DEIVF in Atlanta with a gestational carrier and we just had our first failed cycle at RBA with donor eggs and I was wondering if I could email you off line ? I don't see an email address and I completely understand if you'd prefer followes not to connect with you though a personal email.

    I hope all is well and your babies are doig well !

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    1. Sure. Email addy is just my name/title here - all as one word. I use google for email.

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  9. I think kharini said it best. I'm not sure you would get a ton of questions on FB, more congrats and best wishes. Although, I'm sure there are some insensitive people out there. I agree with you about keeping your blog anonymous. It's nice to have a place to write/connect without a filter. I only have 2 irl people that know about my blog and I think I'll keep it that way.

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    1. That's exactly what happened.
      And yes, I love that I made the decision early on to make my blog private.

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