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Surrogacy Book

Looking for a Surrogate Mother or an egg donor?

This book is a moving real-life account of one woman's struggle with infertility and her journey through surrogacy to have the family she desperately wanted.

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Meet the Glickman twins, Alexa and Ryan, happily cuddling in their parents' laps.

Now meet their dad, a genial Boca Raton dentist.

And their mom, who's crazy about kids.

And their surrogate mom, her husband and their two kids, who've just arrived from their home in Ohio for a visit.

At the moment, you can meet the whole brood as a reunion takes place at the Glickman home, west of Boca Raton. And all because their relationship didn't end when the twins were born just over three years ago.

Surrogacy, once associated with custody battles rather than heartfelt reunions, is now giving birth to friendships that last, even after the babies are born.

Look at Joan Lunden, former Good Morning America host, who recently graced the cover of People touting her relationship with the surrogate mother who's carrying her twins, due in June.

In the story, Lunden says she hopes the twins will meet the surrogate mom some day and that the surrogate and her husband will "remain part of our lives and connected to us forever."

Adds husband Jeff Konigsberg, speaking from the children's camps he runs in Maine: "We look at it as two families coming together. For us, it wouldn't feel natural to not have them as part of our lives."

Consider it more evidence that surrogacy, though still a controversial path to parenthood, has taken a deeper plunge into the mainstream. In recent years, a constellation of stars, including Cheryl Tiegs and Kelsey Grammer, have children born by a surrogate.

Their kids are among the estimated 18,000 born in the roughly 25 years that surrogacy has been an option. Harder to count are the long-term friendships that have developed based on this most intimate and incredible event: the birth of a baby.

For certain, friendships happen, based on the lively reunion unfolding in the Glickmans' living room. The two couples exchange anecdotes about the twins while the delighted shrieks of four children at play threaten to drown out their parents' voices.

Then Alexa enters the living room, playing dress up and looking resplendent in a silky pink number with rhinestones and feathers.

Surrogate mom Carrie Russell pauses mid-sentence and gives her an approving nod.

"Oh, Alexa, you look so cute," she says.

Started on Internet

For Carrie, seeing is believing. During her first visit, the twins were only 18 months; now they're talking and running and leaping fearlessly into the pool.

During the time between reunions, Ilene Glickman, the twins' mom, tries keeping Carrie up-to-date. She sends photos every three months or so, and the women e-mail often and talk occasionally by phone.

After all, they have two children in common.

Four years ago, Ilene, already the mother of two, found Carrie on the Internet through a surrogacy Web site. Ilene wanted more children, but for medical reasons needed another woman to carry the baby.

The women ultimately worked out legal details with a surrogacy agency, but their friendship was forged in their hearts, not on paper.

"She is the most thoughtful, giving person," Ilene says of Carrie.

When the twins were born, Carrie presented the Glickmans with a detailed diary she'd kept during pregnancy. Ilene was also struck by Carrie's motivation, more altruistic than monetary.

Carrie's surrogacy fee, not counting medical expenses, was $9,000, compared to the typical compensation, between $15,000 to $18,000. The Glickmans puts their total expenses, which include an agency fee, legal and medical fees and the surrogate mother's compensation, at $26,000, several thousand dollars below some agency estimates.

Carrie was taken with Ilene's intense desire to have more children.

"You could see Ilene's personality through her e-mails," Carrie says. "She was this loving woman who really wanted more family."

Carrie understood. Having lost an ovary at 17, she feared never being a mother. But happily, two successful pregnancies followed -- Stephanie, now 7, and Anthony, 5.

"I wanted more than anything to be a mother," Carrie says. "When I first saw an ad in a magazine looking for surrogates, it was like a light bulb turning on. I thought, `This is what I was meant to do.'"

Striking differences

On the surface, you wouldn't think these couples shared much in common.

Their age difference spans nearly a generation. Ilene and Steven Glickman are 50. Carrie is 27 and husband Steven is 32. The Glickmans are Jewish, the Russells, Lutheran.

Steven Glickman is an established dentist and Ilene designs and manufactures children's clothing. Steven Russell is a cook and Carrie is a stay-at-home mom who has been a surrogate mother twice since the Glickman twins.

In spite of so many differences, the women -- both chatty, open and enthusiastic -- hit it off immediately, from their first e-mail exchange in 1999.

The husbands, quieter and lower key, had reservations about the surrogacy at first. Both became believers after everyone met.

Meanwhile, Ilene and Carrie's friendship flourished via the Internet and phone calls. Carrie delivered frequent detailed updates, including who was doing somersaults in her womb and who hiccupped today.

Ilene typed friendly admonitions: Please, eat healthy. No caffeine. No pork.

At Christmas time, mindful of the Glickmans' Jewish faith, Carrie sang dreidel songs for Hanukkah. And Ilene sent Carrie boxes of maternity clothes.

At the birth, eight weeks early at a Cincinnati hospital, the Glickmans arrived with red roses for Carrie. They also set up a mutual fund account for the college education of the Russells' children. Today, the e-mails and phone calls aren't as frequent, but they're just as newsy. Alexa is potty-trained. Ryan is learning to swim. The kids have the flu. It's the same chitchat family members exchange when catching up on what's new.

"As far as I'm concerned, Carrie and Steve are part of the family," Ilene says. (Lunden's husband says he plans to invite the surrogate and her husband to their annual family reunion in Maine, a gathering of about 70 people.)

When the children get older, the Glickmans will explain the circumstances of the twins' birth. They'll tell them that mommy's tummy was "broken" so Carrie helped out.

In years to come, they expect to invite the Russells to the children's bar and bat mitzvahs and high school graduations. And the Russells hope to attend.

"I love these children, but not the same way a parent loves a child," Carrie says. "What I feel is pride -- that I could help this family."

Though the Glickmans have a special relationship with their surrogate family, it isn't unique, say those in the surrogacy business. Occasionally, two women, strangers at first, forge a friendship beyond the baby one carries for another.

That's OK for the children as long as the surrogate is seen as a family friend, not another mother figure, says Gary Eisenberg, a Boca Raton child psychologist.

"Otherwise, this can be anxiety-producing for the child," he says. "Parents need to keep their roles clear."

Typically, face-to-face visitation after the baby's birth isn't part of the contract.

But agencies do suggest some minimal contact -- an occasional photo and card -- for the first two years of the child's life.

"This isn't adoption," says Sherrie Smith of the Center for Surrogate Parenting and Egg Donation, which arranged Lunden's surrogacy. "A surrogate is choosing to do this for them, and they need to be involved. It's not like ordering a car."

Taking a chance

Indeed, surrogacy is different -- and controversial. In some states, Florida included, it's illegal for a woman to accept a fee as a surrogate. (Compensation is arranged through expenses.)

It can be fraught with religious, social, medical and legal issues, and no one knows that better than Ilene and Carrie.

"A lot of my friends thought I was taking a big chance," says Ilene, who has since counseled about 50 women who wanted children, including five who are now parents with a surrogate's help. "They said, `You don't know anything about this woman.'"

As a surrogate mother, Carrie found more acceptance among women younger than 30.

Older women often said, "How can you be so cruel and give that baby away?" Or, "I couldn't do something like that."

"The rest of the world looks at us as baby machines," Carrie says. "Some people think, `Oh, she's only doing it for the money."`

For days after the twins went home to Boca, Carrie's mother called her frequently, asking if she was OK. And she was. Some also remember the famous case of Mary Beth Whitehead, a surrogate mother who went to court nearly 20 years ago to keep the baby girl she delivered. And she lost.

Back then, surrogacy typically used the birth mother's eggs, creating a genetic link. Today, "gestational surrogacy," with the surrogate carrying someone else's fertilized eggs, is the norm so genetic ties aren't an issue.

Typically, the couple uses an anonymous donor's eggs, which are fertilized in vitro by the husband's sperm. Or, like the Glickmans, the couple uses their own eggs and sperm, so genetically the child is theirs.

"In that way, it's easy to detach," Carrie says. "I never thought they were my babies, ever. ."

In fact, the surrogate's attachment is often greater with the baby's parents, especially when a friendship develops. Carrie, for instance, misses the near-constant e-mailing that took place during the pregnancy.

"Now Ilene is busy with the kids," Carrie says. "She can't be on the computer as much."

`Incredible moment'

In some ways, Ilene's surrogacy story is similar to Lunden's.

Both already had older children and wanted more. Both suffered miscarriages, then moved on to in vitro fertilization.

"I never stopped wanting more kids and tried for eight years," says Ilene, mother of Cheryl, 23, and Andrew, 20. "I wasn't willing to give up. I didn't want to be 75 and think, `I should have done this.'"

For the Glickmans, several in vitro fertilization attempts failed but yielded seven embryos that the couple had frozen. Lunden, who's 52, declines to say who provided the eggs; her husband provided the sperm.

Like Lunden, Ilene then scoured the Internet and signed on with a surrogacy agency to handle the details. Like Lunden, she was ecstatic when she learned two babies were on the way, not just one.

"It is the most incredible moment," Ilene says. "You want something so badly, for so long and then it happens. It really is a dream come true."

On the first Mother's Day after the twins' birth, Ilene sent an e-mail to Carrie that read:

"You have made my dreams come true, and I consider myself a very lucky lady. Revel in the fact that you have made one mother in South Florida deliriously happy."

Now three years after the twins' birth, the red roses Carrie received are sun-dried and carefully tucked in an album. Photos of the Glickman twins hang on her living room wall, along with pictures of her kids.

"It was a privilege for me to be able to do this," Carrie says as she ruffles Ryan's hair and smiles. "If this isn't a happy ending, I don't know what is."

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