Episode 153: Bundle of Joy via a Gestational Surrogate

Dan Bulger: Today’s guest is Samantha Busch. You might know Samantha, she’s an author, founder of Bundles of Joy, an organization that gives grants to people for fertility treatment. She’s a television personality. You might also know her husband, Kyle Busch, the famed NASCAR champion. We featured Samantha on our podcast before. In that episode, she shared her experiences with infertility, pregnancy loss, and she shared how she eventually found her way to motherhood. When trying to expand their family, they came to the realization that this time Samantha wasn’t going to be able to carry and they needed a gestational carrier. It’s no small thing for a woman to come to terms with the idea that they won’t be the one to carry their child.

Samantha Busch: Having that ripped away from me was really hard. Because, you know, I think there were things that I took for granted, like being pregnant that I just assumed I’d get to do it again. And so that was hard. What was really difficult was just the whole process to find a carrier.

Dan Bulger: We’re proud to welcome Dr. Dorette Noorhasan, a reproductive endocrinologist and fertility expert from CCRM Dallas Fort Worth. Dr. Noorhasan is not only an expert when it comes to gestational carriers as a fertility doctor, but she’s also an expert because she herself utilized a carrier when she and her husband were trying to conceive.

Dr. Dorette Noorhasan: Traditional surrogacy is when the embryo, or the fetus that’s being carried, the egg that is used to create that fetus is biologically related to the woman that is carrying the pregnancy. Traditional surrogacy is rarely if ever done in the United States any longer. Now, we do gestational surrogacy where the woman carrying the pregnancy is not biologically related to the pregnancy. And therefore, embryos are created, whether it’s with the eggs of an intended mother or donor eggs. And then those embryos that are created from these eggs are then transferred to another woman, the surrogate and she’s a gestational surrogate. Women who should consider surrogacy or gestational surrogacy are women with prior medical or surgical history that would preclude them from carrying a pregnancy themselves.

Samantha Busch: We spent days making this like perfect profile and the pictures and all that stuff. And we just thought it was you know, like match.com like, Okay, now we’re going to be matched up with these people and it was going to be easy to find that match and what people getting into finding carrier don’t know is that it’s many months, if not years out there. It’s not a huge pool of, you know, candidates and that wait time when you want something so bad and you’ve already been trying for so long, was really hard for us. And so, we went out on our own, just kind of talking to women in the community that were doulas or midwives and just saying like, hey, if you’ve ever, you know, met somebody that’s been a gestational carrier before, can you let us know? Like we’re looking and just really kind of put ourselves out there that this was our next step.

Dr. Dorette Noorhasan: The reality is the surrogacy process is not an easy process. And I will tell you this, I am a fertility doctor. I have been practicing infertility every single day for decades. And I thought I knew everything about surrogacy. And the reality is I only understood the medical aspect, I didn’t understand the legal aspect, the psychosocial aspect, any of that I didn’t really, I didn’t have a good grasp of what that was like, until I actually went through as an intended parent. You really want to find someone that you click with where that person has the same views as you do on pregnancy. For example, I will tell you, we interviewed probably about a dozen women before we found the person that was right for us. And there was even one of the surrogates that we interviewed; she didn’t think we were the right fit for her either. And so, finding the right person is very important. But once we found the right person. For us, it was very easy after that.

Samantha Busch: We met with some women, and it just didn’t work out. One was so amazing and just loved her to pieces. And unfortunately, it was an issue with a fallopian tube. You know, different things like that. And so it was like every time that we thought we had a match, and it didn’t come through it, it felt like another failed round and emotionally it was really hard. So, we were going through the process, I had met with a woman. And we were really getting further along in conversations. And then she decided just where she was with her children in her life that she was like, I don’t actually know if like, right now I can take on being pregnant. And so, a few hours after we got that devastating blow, our GC who we proceeded with, literally sent me a DM and she was like, “I have followed your story for years. You know, I’m local, I have written this message and deleted it to you 1000 times.” We ended up meeting and she was absolutely wonderful. And then our families met, and our son met her kids. And it was just this very natural. It was just a set.

Dan Bulger: Those are two very different approaches to finding a carrier that both went pretty similarly, some pain, some frustration and heartache. But ultimately a match was made. So, the question is, what should people be looking for when searching for a carrier?

Dr. Dorette Noorhasan: You have to trust them and let go and allow them to carry the pregnancy and do so without feeling the need to control every aspect of what they do day to day because this is another human being, and they need to live their lives too.

Samantha Busch: I saw her when it was convenient. And I texted with her often, but I also didn’t want to invade and interrupt her schedule and time with her family and friends. So that was you know, we really did find a good balance of seeing each other in person versus like saying we read text almost every day. But you know, having that respect and understanding that she has two young kids as well and a family.

Dan Bulger: I think it’s so wonderful that Samantha is so open about her experiences. When we speak about these things, we can give people a lot of power. And we can clear up myths and misconceptions along the way, which is why I’m so excited to share this next story from Samantha, it involves the language we use to discuss this kind of thing. And I think it’s something we all need to be a bit more mindful of.

Samantha Busch: We had been through a different facility, and they kept referring to our GC as mom. “So, Mom, how are you feeling? Mom?” “How’s baby mom?” And even our GC, her and I were on the same page the whole time. And I was like, no, no, I’m mom. And she would be like, “No, no, no, I’m temporary housing like I am the carrier. I’m not mom.” We had a person in the medical field who’s just like, oh, it’s no big deal. And I have connected with a lot of women who agree it is a big deal.

Dr. Dorette Noorhasan: I think it’s great that she’s sharing her story publicly. And that’s very important when someone who is a public figure shares their story. It makes people realize that infertility can affect anyone. And it’s really important that public figures share their story because then people realize anyone can be affected by infertility and we all can struggle with very similar diseases. And there’s hope for all of us.

Samantha Busch: I wanted to write this just really raw and candid account of what you go through physically, emotionally, as, you know, as a woman, as a couple. And, really talk about the kind of nitty gritty, ugly truth behind all of it, so that when other couples are reading it, they feel heard and understood and related, and I think, you know, a big part of that was discussing how it affects your marriage. It’s a very high pressure, high emotional situation. And so, a lot of what we went through was what a lot of other couples went through. Infertility kind of consumes your entire relationship, you know, everything from what you talk about to your schedules to your sex life, like it all gets wrapped by this one overriding thought of like, we need to be pregnant.

There were a lot of times in our journey that I was like, Why? Why am I still putting my body through this? You know, am I strong enough to get through this trial? Am I strong enough to face this? And I will say I am so happy for couples that are getting ready to face infertility, that they have the resources that are out there today that I feel like have evolved over the years. Because a lot of times, it was literally complete strangers in you know, support groups or apps or just, you know, Instagram connections that kind of motivated you to keep trying or keep speaking out about something. And so that’s just really exciting.