Two dads and a dream

It’s been a week.

We’re back from holiday mode (think resort swim-up bars, cheap but strong cocktails, frolicking with elephants, and casually ignoring emails) and smack bang into the reality of alarms, laundry, and not having someone hand us a cold drink at 11am. (Rude.)

Our photo:

Us with cocktails, celebrating a recent birthday overseas, definitely not contemplating life and fatherhood, but definitely contemplating whether swim-up bars can be installed at home.

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And for the first time, I (Sam) am making an appearance in the writing! Gary’s still here fact-checking, adding emojis, and pointing out the Oxford comma, but the next few bits come to you straight from my brain…!

What on earth are we doing?

You think you know what you’re getting into with IVF and surrogacy.

You read forums, listening to people talk, and chat to people who have been through the process. You think that the end goal is far, impossible, and out of reach. The saying “Two steps forward, one step back” pretty much explains this entire process. But to us, multiply it by 5, its extreme. You keep asking yourself, is there an end goal? Will we ever have a child? Why are we spending so much money where people can go to a nightclub laneway and do the deed right there and 9 months later… DING its ready!

People we’ve spoken to – from our donor support crew, through to the fertility specialists, lawyers, psychologists, and even our egg bank – all say, “Oh, it’s a rollercoaster!”. What they mean is that it’s a 17-loop death coaster, powered by invoices and cortisol.

There’s no avoiding it: the logistics of creating a family as two men is wildly different. But despite the cost, the paperwork, and the occasional 1am breakdown about eggs not being available for the 5th time or stressing about the money flowing out of a bank account that just manages to keep up, we wouldn’t change it.

When Gary and I first met, kids came up early. Like, we talked about children before we talked about splitting Netflix. We both wanted them. We both wanted to be parents. There were many wine-fuelled conversations (surprise, surprise), and each one circled back to the same thing: we both wanted to be dads. We both dreamed of having a family. And as our relationship grew, so did that dream. Marriage made us feel like a team. A unit. A foundation.

But let’s be honest… we still joke about the money.
“Oh, we could’ve done a 6-month world trip with this IVF budget.”
“Yeah, but Baby Johnson gets to fly free until they’re two, so we’ll make it work.”
“Also, if this doesn’t work out, we’re taking the embryo tank on a honeymoon.”

Are We Actually Ready?

This is a question I have been asking myself over and over again, but I always come back to the same conclusion. YES. But I also have to remind myself, is anyone every ready to become parents? I feel like nothing can ever prepare you to become a parent.

How do you know when to feed a baby that can’t talk?
How do you know if they’re happy?
How do you know you’re doing a good job?

You don’t. You just do it. And somehow, it just comes. Aeons of evolution I suppose.

We’re going to learn a lot. We’re going to fumble and cry and probably feed the baby at the wrong time (then Google it at 2am). But we’re also going to love the heck out of this little human. We’ll make mistakes, we won’t sleep, and at least one of us will become deeply attached to a particular brand of wipes. But Baby Johnson will be so loved and not just by us, but by many.

Dear Baby Johnson…

You were a challenge to get you where you were. But we got you. So much preparation went into your arrival, and the fanfare was there when you came into this world. Your Dads love you so much and so happy that we went through the ups and downs just to have you in our life.

So where are we at?

And just like that, I’m back. It’s Gary here, retaking the mic (or keyboard) after Sam’s beautifully heartfelt (and now grammatically correct) debut.

If you’ve been following along, you’ll know we’ve spent a few posts digging deep into how we got here: emotionally, legally, genetically, and occasionally with the help of late-night wine-fuelled spreadsheets. We’ve tried to strike a balance between sharing our personal experience and demystifying this beautifully chaotic process for others.

And because of where we’re at, I wouldn’t be me if I didn’t include a status update. So here it is. Where we’re actually at.

We started this blog well into the journey. Truth be told, this whole process has already been three, nearly four years in the making. From the first quiet conversations with our incredible surrogates to the back-to-back counselling sessions, budget spreadsheets, and genetic deep dives, it’s been… a lot.

We’ve brought you in now because it’s starting to feel real. Or at the very least, possible. Tangible. Close enough to start dreaming out loud. And because my love language is dot points, here’s a very Gary-certified checklist of what we’ve done so far:

✅ Had the “do we actually want to do this?” chats with our surrogates
✅ Attended conferences, got educated (and overwhelmed)
✅ Met with our fertility clinic (IVF Australia) and Prof Gavin Sacks
✅ Completed intended parents counselling
✅ Provided and tested sperm (Sam’s MVP moment)
✅ Froze said sperm (it’s chilling)
✅ Surrogates completed their counselling
✅ Engaged intended parent and surrogate lawyers
✅ Made wills (nothing says romance like estate planning)
✅ Engaged psychologists for both parties
✅ Selected and screened donor eggs
✅ Ran donor + sperm combo through genetic testing (and got the all clear!)
✅ Had eggs shipped from the US (hello customs declaration for ova)
✅ Finalised the surrogacy agreement (note: not legally binding in Australia, but still critical)
✅ Completed joint psych sessions
✅ Got the green light from the clinic’s Management & Ethics Committee
✅ Surrogate started her preparation: bloods, meds, the works
✅ Currently awaiting bloodwork to time the trigger shot and start the transfer cycle
🟨 Embryo creation starts after the trigger
🟨 Embryo transfer around Day 5 or 6 (pending readiness)
🟨 Pregnancy confirmation ~Day 12 or 13 post-transfer
🟨 Fingers, toes, and everything else crossed for a pregnancy that sticks
🟨 Grow, grow, grow baby bean… all the way to 39 weeks
🟨 DELIVERY (cue joyful screaming and nervous pacing)

If you’ve made it this far into this post, and really our blog, you’re basically an honorary member of the Two Dads & A Dream Club™.

That’s where we’re at. Hopeful. Tired. Grateful. And still determined to make our way through this big, weird, beautiful journey. There actually is so much more to say, and so much more to explain and teach, but at the risk of boring you now, I’ll close it off here and make that a future Gary problem.

We’ve chosen our egg.
We’ve chosen our sperm.
We’ve got a team.
We’ve got a village.
We’ve got a corgi who’s about to be promoted to emotional support sibling.

And now? We wait.

Two of us wrote the post. One of us edited it. But both are emotionally fragile (one maybe slightly more than the other 😆😜) and waiting for a callback from the fertility clinic.

Signing off for now,

Love,
Sam & Gary 💬🍼🌈