How to Connect to Your Baby While It’s Being Carried by Your Surrogate
If you’re someone who is struggling with infertility, then you likely may be thinking about searching “surrogacy near me” in order to find a surrogate.
Using a California surrogate agency can be a great way for intended parents struggling with their fertility to have a baby of their own. Yet one reason that some couples are hesitant about using surrogacy is fear over not being able to connect with their baby during the pregnancy.
This is a fear that is often misguided though understandable to have. All parents can connect with their baby even if it is being carried by another person.
Here are a few tips on how you can connect with the baby and nurture your bond.
#1 – Physical Touch
While it’s always a good idea to ask the surrogate if you can touch her belly first, more often than not, the surrogate will say yes. Humans thrive with physical touch.
As social creatures, they maintain a sense of closeness and intimacy with those they touch. While the surrogate may be carrying your baby, you’re still able to touch and feel the baby inside of her belly.
Once the baby starts to grow and kick, you’ll want to take every opportunity that you can to touch their belly.
Especially during moments when the baby is active and moving, you can experience the thrill of feeling your baby. Physically touching them can help you feel connected to them. It reminds you that the baby is yours, that they’re healthy, and that they’re growing up as quickly as they can, so they can meet you.
#2 – Talking
One activity that many people choose to perform during pregnancy is reading a book to their baby.
With nine months to get through, you’re going to have a lot of time to read books to your baby. One good idea is to set up a weekly meet-up with your surrogate, and if you have not found a surrogate near you, you may have the ability to FaceTime or Skype the surrogate mother on a regular basis.. A period of time can be devoted to your reading to the baby.
This allows the baby to become used to the sound of your voice. They’ll recognize the sound of it. As for yourself, it allows you to share an activity with them. It doesn’t matter if the baby is housed in your own belly or not. Reading to your baby is a great activity that can nurture your bond.
Besides reading, you can also sing or even just talk to the baby.
You can tell the baby about your week, about all of the things that you’re going to do together as a family, or even just something as banal as the latest TV show you watched. The point is to talk to them.
#3 – Shopping
Another thing that intended parents can do to feel connected to their baby is shopping.
Making a nursery is one of the most exciting times in any parent’s life. When you start shopping for your nursery, you might want to include the surrogate with you. The process of surrogacy can be a long one. By this point, you might even be close friends with your surrogate mother.
They’re sure to enjoy a small shopping trip with you. Since surrogacy requires the surrogate to have had at least one successful birth and a healthy pregnancy before, they’re sure to have some tips on what you should get for the nursery.
By having the surrogate there, you also have the baby there.
Together, you’re able to have a small family outing while you find things that you want for the nursery. By performing this activity with your baby near, the experience connects all of you and helps to keep you involved in the baby’s life as it grows.
#4 – Throw a Baby Shower
Even if you’re not carrying the baby due to infertility, you should still throw a baby shower. After all, it is your baby that’s being grown and developed. Not someone else’s. That’s cause for celebration! Invite the surrogate, your friends, family, and anyone else you want to the party.
It can act as a gender reveal party or just as a simple baby shower. Throwing a baby shower can help reinforce in your mind that you’re having a baby. The point of the party is to celebrate the approaching baby.
Even if you’re using surrogacy to have a healthy pregnancy, you still deserve to have a baby shower. By celebrating your baby, you can feel connected to it and the process of surrogacy as a whole.
#5 – Attend Ultrasounds or Appointments
Another way to connect to your baby is to go with your surrogate during their ultrasound appointments. Our surrogate agency or the fertility clinic will help you stay informed as to all of your surrogate’s medical appointments. One of those appointments should be for the ultrasound.
The first ultrasound is one of the most thrilling moments in any parents’ life. It allows them to see their baby for the first time. Later on, it can also help them determine the biological sex of their child.
When you sit down with your surrogate for the ultrasound, you can watch as your baby is revealed. Together with your spouse, you can marvel at how small it is and how healthy it is growing.
Ultrasounds can be an extremely emotional moment during pregnancy. You shouldn’t miss out on it just because you’re not carrying the baby. Instead, seeing your baby is a great way to feel connected to them.
#6 – Take Part in Healthy Pregnancy Activities
Is your surrogate someone who likes to engage in pregnant yoga? Or maybe she does other activities that are designed to help bolster the baby’s health and keep her calm.
If that’s the case, then you should join her or share in her joy of these activities. Any activity or practice is done to help the baby should be something that you think about doing, too.
You can help her with some of her yoga poses or even do yoga with her. If your surrogate wants to swim or paint or do something else in the interest of the baby, then you should also do that. By doing it together, you can feel as though you’re doing it for the baby.
Your involvement doesn’t have to end after the embryo transfer. You can be as involved as you want to be. The more involved that you are, the closer you will feel to the baby.
#7 – Talking About Them
A final way to feel connected to your baby is simply by talking about them.
Once you know their sex, you can pick out a name, and then you can start calling them by that name. By talking about them, it makes them a part of your life. No longer are they simply growing inside of the surrogate’s belly. Instead, they’re with you.
The more that you talk about your baby, the more connected to it you’ll feel because they’re part of your life already.
#8 – Have a Gender Reveal Party
One of the most fun about having a child is finding out who it is that is being born.
By finding out the gender of the baby, you will inevitably be more connected with them. Feel free to share it with family and whoever is at the party – it will help you love this new person coming into the world, even though you are not the carrier.
To get started with your surrogacy journey, and finding a surrogate, please contact us. We strive to make the experience simple, easy, and as stress-free as possible for our surrogates and parents.
