Family. When we hear that word we often picture two people happily in love and maybe a child or two. For me, it was around the age of 25 when I knew I’d like to start a family but there was a problem. I hadn’t found “the one” yet, but I had this deep desire to become a dad. 

I started looking into surrogacy and thought maybe this was an option for me. I did wonder however, who was going to pick a single man to carry a baby for. I thought maybe I would be judged for my decision to pursue parenthood alone. Thankfully, I was wrong. 

During my pursuit to parenthood, I also looked into international and domestic adoption and was met with even more red tape. While I had passed the home studies and was approved for adoption, there was a problem. I wasn’t considered the ideal family. In the eyes of a birth parent and only two counties allowed a single person to adopt. For eight excruciating years my journey to Nanette involved many ups and downs, failed transfers, embryos not surviving the thaw before transfer, a miscarriage and sadly a stillbirth. 

I was so close to having the baby I always dreamed of and yet in one phone call, my heart broke and my dreams were shattered. My heart also went out to my surrogate who was also grieving the loss of this baby. I wanted to support her in whatever way I possibly could. Even though my heart was in pieces, I still had a deep desire to help others achieve their family dreams even if I couldn’t. 

After years of heartbreak and disappointment, I decided to give it one more try and found the right fit with my sixth gestational carrier (I like to call her our tummy-mommy), Crystal.  In August 2018, Crystal headed to the fertility clinic and had a successful embryo transfer. While I did remain extremely guarded and cautious, there was part of me that had a glimmer of hope that this would be it. 

Two weeks after the transfer, my fertility clinic called me to send me congratulations and tell me that Crystal’s bloodwork came back positive and indeed she was pregnant! I admit that I was cautiously optimistic. At 20 weeks, I attended ultrasound and my surrogate planned the most exciting gender reveal, one of which I will never forget as I learned I’d be having a little girl! When Crystal reached viability (24 weeks pregnant) that’s when it started to become more real to me. I started collecting more baby clothes and getting things ready to bring my daughter home. 

In May 2018, 4 weeks ahead of her due date, I got a phone call from my surrogate’s sister letting me know Crystal’s water broke and that she was headed to the hospital. I drove as fast as I possibly could to the airport to get on the soonest available flight. Come to find out, because it was so late at night there were no remaining flights out and I would have to wait until morning. You can probably bet that I didn’t sleep that night. 

Then the phone call came. “She’s here, she’s ok.”

Walking into that hospital for the first time, I was so nervous and felt like I was living a dream. Was this really my baby? Was I allowed to touch her? Am I really taking her home? OMG, I’m a dad! 

I picked her up out of her little bassinet and immediately put her skin on skin with me. It was the most surreal moment of my life. I look into my daughter’s eyes and see what true happiness looks like. What I feel for those two women – our egg donor and surrogate, I cannot convey in a simple paragraph. These women have given me a purpose to wake up every day, made me feel whole and allowed me to discover all the joys of dad life. How do you say thank you to someone for something like that? Holding Nanette for the first time, I realized, this beautiful little soul would not be here today without the help of her incredible egg donor and surrogate mother. The love I feel for these two women is indescribable. They made me a dad! I get overcome with emotions every time I talk about it and I definitely plan to tell Nanette about how she came to be with the help of these ladies.