Many intended parents pursue independent surrogacy, or a surrogacy journey that is done without the help of a surrogacy agency, to save money avoiding the fees that an agency charges. When you choose an independent journey, it means that you have to do all of the things that an agency would normally do, although there are consultants and agencies you can work with who can offer their services at a lower rate than the full agency fee. We recommend you read and research as much as you can on the subject if it is your first surrogacy journey and you are thinking about an independent surrogacy journey.
Here are some of the major steps you will have to get through before your surrogate can be cleared for an embryo transfer:
Finding a suitable surrogate;
Obtain medical clearance;
Obtain psychological clearance;
Obtain legal representation and refer counsel for the surrogate so that the case can be legally cleared.
Finding A Suitable Surrogate
The first step is one of the most challenging for independent intended parents. We find some of the most common independent surrogacy situations are (1) when a friend or family member offers to be intended parents’ surrogate or (2) it is a repeat journey with a surrogate they previously worked with.
For intended parents who do not have suitable friends or family members to act as surrogates or who haven’t completed a journey before, intended parents look for a surrogate through word-of-mouth, sometimes finding a surrogate through friends or professional contacts, or by searching for a surrogate on the internet. For those who search the internet, a big word of caution is to avoid scammers who impersonate surrogates or are simply not qualified to be surrogates.
Keep in mind while you can save money without an agency, you may not find the same pool of candidates. Some candidates who are repeatedly turned down by agencies will still hold themselves out to be potential surrogates for independent cases. Be careful with this step as who you find to be surrogate it is probably the most important one you make.
Your IVF physician should have guidelines as well such as BMI and a list of disqualifying conditions which should be requested before getting into any deep negotiations with surrogates. Women who have not had a live birth will be disqualified by most clinics because they will lack a record of maintaining a pregnancy.
Women who live outside the United States are generally not suitable surrogates for a domestic journey as there is a large potential for fraud, catfishing, or it may just be unrealistic or unsafe from an immigration standpoint. Your gestational surrogate should be a permanent resident or US citizen, have a stable financial situation, not be receiving government benefits (food stamps, Medicare, Section 8, etc.), and should not have a criminal history. At this stage or a later stage, you will also want to consider whether she has health insurance suitable for surrogacy, and contact a broker to review her insurance and offer alternative options.
By consulting with an attorney at this stage, you can obtain professional referrals, request a criminal background check and a blank compensation template so that you know you and your potential surrogate are on the same page for compensation. If you work with Tsong Law Group, you can also have the benefit of signing up for Seedcoach at an earlier stage which can help you budget your surrogacy journey or find new ways to fund it.
Obtaining medical clearance.
The next step is getting your surrogate approved by your IVF physician. This is a step can be one of the most time consuming steps and potentially costly.
First, you will need to gather medical records of the surrogate related to her past pregnancies. Your surrogate can attempt to obtain records herself, but unless you know the surrogate well, these records should be coming from the hospital or doctor’s office and not from the surrogate, to avoid omissions or alterations. Your IVF physician will be looking her records to see whether your surrogate is likely to safely carry a pregnancy to term.
Once she passes that step, the surrogate will also receive a medical evaluation and screening for infectious diseases. You can read what is specifically needed in the ASRM guidelines.
Psychological clearance.
With the exception of cases involving a family member surrogate in states where it is not required by law, the parties should make sure the surrogate is psychologically cleared by a licensed mental health professional. Intended parents may also be required to receive a screening or consultation in states such as Washington, Illinois and New York.
The Legal Stage.
In cases where the match is a first time surrogate who is not a family member or close friend, the legal stage can be challenging. We discuss in several blog articles what to expect during the legal stage from the intended parents’ and surrogate’s side, and why we encourage escrow in independent cases. We recommend that you and your surrogate agree to important terms including compensation prior to having your attorney drafting the contract, otherwise the contract may not never reach a final stage. For more tips on the legal stage, you can watch our Youtube video on independent journeys.
Once the parties finalize the surrogacy agreement and sign, and the attorneys issue legal clearance, your surrogate is finally cleared to begin medication and schedule the embryo transfer.
Conclusion
An independent surrogacy journey is more challenging than an agency surrogacy journey. If you aren’t able make it through these all the stages yourself, you may want to look for the right agency or find a consultant to help. Consulting with a lawyer when you find a candidate for surrogacy or just to ask questions about the legality of different states is a very good idea. As Fellows of the Academy of Adoption & Assisted Reproduction Attorneys (AAAA) and the Academy of California Adoption-ART Lawyers (ACAL), Tsong Law Group brings extensive expertise to the practice of surrogacy law. Our award-winning lawyers are licensed in California, New York, Illinois, Washington, Oklahoma, and Arizona.
For a free consultation in surrogacy, contact us now.
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