Belly pictures!

Well I humbly requested belly pictures of our surrogate, and I got them!!! It gave me a huge jolt of excitement, and it made things feel very real.  It is what I needed. I'm like a kid at Christmas and can't sleep! The pics included her face, but for her confidentiality I cut them out for this blog.

The pic seems to have stretched wide a bit somehow when I saved it. Overall she looks very healthy. It seems that the women there never smile for pictures, but that may be a cultural thing having to do with appearing demure. We are only at 26 weeks, so I can't imagine how much bigger she'll be full term! I feel so much more connected to her now after seeing her, and my thoughts turn more to her health and welfare as this has made her existence more concrete to me.

I attended a different La Leche League meeting yesterday, and they were very supportive and I liked it much better than the first one. I'm still not in full agreement on LLL perspective on some issues, but it was a good place for support and information. When I'm no longer working evenings starting Sept, I will switch to the evening meetings and will probably find more working women who I can identify with more than the stay at home gals. I feel more educated on mastitis, and have decided I need to fork over the money to rent a hospital pump because it truly is much more efficient and well worth the money. It will hopefully pay for itself by us not having to buy formula hardly at all.  There was some intense discussion on how a woman slipping out her nips in public without a cover is normal and natural and should be accepted without discomfort and staring. I get it, but can't see myself being a breastfeeding crusader that is going to whip them out no matter who is watching. Plus, I have to do both at once and that makes being discreet a lot more difficult. I wish LLL had a list of places to rent breast pumps and a price list from having called around, so that everyone didn't have to do all their own research. I also wish they had a list of places to buy nursing bras. However I think I found two of the best places thanks to some dedicated time Googling.

The invitations for the baby shower are out, and this morning I will transfer money to India for them to host a baby shower for Manju. The text of Dr. Patel's email is as below:

I want to ask you if you would like to do a baby shower ceremony over here. We do it at the surrogate house in the 7th months.

 

The whole event costs about 125 USD.

 

This is done according to Hindu ritual, where in a priest performs the ceremony & prays for the safe baby delivery for mother & child both. The inmates of Surrogate house will have a nice lunch & Manju & other surrogates receive gifts. This whole can be done in total 125 USD  if you agree to it let me know.

I did add a polite P.S. to the bottom of my response letting them know that "inmate" was not the best term to use, because it gives Americans the wrong idea. I don't want people criticizing Dr. Patel with the false assumption that the surrogates are like prisoners and have no freedom, because I know that is not the case.

Now a nap, then off to buy a nursing bra!