The Pros and Cons of Self Matching
If you’re an intended parent looking into surrogacy, it can be really overwhelming. One of the first decisions you may come across is whether you should self match or to use an agency. Self matching can certainly feel like walking into the great unknown. Rest assured, many have successfully done it. Two of our fabulous team members have experience self matching! Amber, our intake coordinator for Montana Surrogacy did both her first and is doing her second surrogacy journey by self matching, and Amanda, our Business Manager for Bright Future Families, also self matched.
Some people self match because they have friends or family who are in need of a surrogate but many match with people they’ve never met before. Matching entities are a great asset, but you can do it all yourself, if you have to.
The main pro of not using a matching entity to match is that it saves the intended parents money. You may also feel like a matching entity is a bit cumbersome and you want to cut out the middle man or the third party. However, that also leaves you little or no buffer during this process, especially for the hard conversations and parts of the process like number of embryos to transfer, termination, money, special requests and other preferences. The clinic or lawyers can help with some of these conversations, but they rarely are able to give it the full and honest discussion that it deserves. If your IPs are friends or family, it can still be hard (if not harder) to talk with them about how you’re feeling or what you need because it’s a unique and stressful process.
The biggest con of self matching is that all of the moving pieces involved in the surrogacy process (and there are A LOT) are all on you. This means everything, from contacting the clinic, knowing the next steps, finding a lawyer, keeping up with your med calendar, everything, is all on you.
Self matching is always an option, just one we warn people to be cautious of because there are some steps that are vitally important to the process.
Even if self matching, these things are very important:
IPs and GC must each have their own attorney (one of the attorneys must be in the state in which the baby will be born) – A good lawyer would NEVER allow either party to not have their own representation.
Baby needs to be born in a state in which IPs can legally be named the parents (through a pre-birth order or other appropriate legal documents), here is a map about laws and surrogacy friendly states.
Escrow/expense account should be established for any cost reimbursement, the surrogate should never have to ask or wait for money; most lawyers will require this.
Health insurance review – the surrogate’s insurance should be surrogate-friendly and not have a lien or exclusionary clause.
All that being said, it can be done! Amanda did it! The goal is to help someone with their dream of growing their family whether self-matching or using a matching entity.
What if you do want to self match or are already self matched….but still want some matching entity help? We can help with that! Contact us today about our concierge services, and let us assist with the process and those other sticky pieces. If you are a parent considering surrogacy, contact us here for a free consultation. If you want to be a gestational carrier and help build another family’s dreams, fill out our intake form here.