Hier bekommt ihr einen Einblick in unser Profil, welches uns mit unseren beiden Leihmüttern Heidi und Susan, sowie unserer Eispenderin Rose zusammengebracht hat.
Auf www.howleoseesit.net findet ihr Fotos von uns.
Dear Surrogate Mom!
We would like to thank for taking the time to review our profile. We realize, for many the wish for a gay couple to have their own children is still a new idea, but we truely hope that you will read our profile and consider helping us to have our own family and raise children. We do believe, we will be the stable and loving environment that you would wish for any child.
Thank you for letting us introduce ourselves: Jens and Andreas!
From the beginning of our relationship eight years ago, having our own children was a topic between us. Andreas grew up in a small town with lots of family around, and Jens has always been particulary close to his siblings and his six nieces and nephews. We are both very much accepted by each others families, and travel together to family reunions and celebrations frequently or to just spend time with them. Both of us are also proud godfathers for one of our sibling’s children, Jens for his oldest niece, who now is twenty-two, and Andreas for his first niece, who is now two years old.
Our home is in the beautiful old cathedral city of Cologne! This city is known for ist friendly and open inhabitants and its medieval churches and sites. It is located by the river Rhine and there is lots of green around. Cologne is also known for very good schools and childcare. The other wonderul thing about German town as opposed to US-cities is that there is very easy public transportation.
We both had first experienced alternative family concepts when living in California during the early ninetees, Jens as a business student, Andreas a few years later as a med student while he was doing a research project. While we did not know each other then, we both had already developed very similar ideas about relationship values, trust, and love. Back then, for neither of us was it the right time to consider parenting as we didn’t have financial means to support a family.
Instead we build very strong relationships specifically to Jens 6 nieces and nephews. There is David, who is now 22 and who just couldn’t make up his mind about what he was going to study. Andreas, who always knew excactly what he wanted in life, gave him lots of good advise, for example that it is important to be passionate about one’s profession. Or there is Lene, my eldest niece, who just started to study photography and was inspired by Andreas, who went to art school for 2 years before starting med school.
Now fifteen years later, we feel this is the perfect timing for us to build our family. It was natural for us to explore all the options we had, and working with an egg donor and surrogate quickly turned into our preferred option.
Andreas is a plastic surgeon working in a hospital close to the place where we live. His focus is reconstructive surgery, working mainly with cancer and trauma patients. He holds a leading position as an attending physician, working in a team which cooperates very well. His work environment is very personal and warm hearted, and all his coworkers including his chief, a woman who has three children herself, know Jens. The hospital is known as very family-oriented and offers various supporting facilities for their employees like nurseries and day care for children. We believe that this environment can help us a lot in raising our children.
Jens is a Management Consultant who works for large corporations. He is working in a team of various consultants, all very open minded towards his relationship, and many of them also know Andreas. During the ninetees, Jens moved to California for professional training and to complete a Master’s degree. He stayed overall ten years in the US which turned out to be his formative years. He here developed his ideas about the kind of life, relationship, professional development, and values regarding family and friends he was going to build in his life.
Jens still keeps in touch with his old friends from California, and he even left some of his things there with friends, such as a beautiful Yamaha piano, books and several paintings. His oldest nephew David spent 6 weeks in Jens old apartment in California with his former roommate, where he had lived for 10 years as a student. Next summer, another of Jens’s nephews, Carlos will also spend several weeks in the same apartment, which means a lot to Jens.
We both met in Germany in 1998, when Jens was still living in the United States. The first two years of our relationship was long distance, so we both know what kind of commitment it takes to make it work. But for both of us it was the right time, so we did what it took. By 2000, Jens moved back to Germany and we started living together. Currently, we both share a nice apartment in Cologne, and settled comfortably here as most of our friends and family live in a circle of fifty miles.
Many of our friends have recently had their own children, both straigth and gay couples. In California we are in close contact with several gay couples who also worked with egg donors and surrogate moms, who helped them to fulfill their dreams. One couple from San Francisco had beautiful twin daughters last year, and we visited them last summer. Another female couple from San Jose had their first son 2 years ago. A couple from Germany, both doctors, are considering parenthood, and we share the same hopes and desires. In addition, most of the straight couples we know have children and we are close to many of them. Also, our parents and siblings look forward to taking an integral part in our children’s lives.
While living in Germany now, our ties to the US and specifically to California are still very strong, as we are in contacts with many friends who have become very dear to us and travel there at least annually.
We also hope to develop a friendship to our surrogate mom. We think that the relationship between a prospective surrogate mom and their couple is something very unique and will develop in ways no one can foresee. We clearly understand that surrogate moms come to the program with many different wishes and expectations. We believe they all have in common the ideal of helping a couple that is not able to have children by conventional means. We are very thankful for the opportunity that a surrogate mom and her family can help us fulfilling our dream of raising children. We appreciate this as a very special gift and in this regard we will be more than happy to be guided by the wishes of a surrogate mom.
The photograph below was taken during Jens’s 40th birthday, and shows us with our moms. Both of our moms are very important to us. We therefore hope that we can also develop a friendship to you, our child’s surrogate mom! We are open to discuss with you the level of contact you would like to have with us during and after the pregnancy, but we know that we will also thank you for what you helped us achieve.
Thank you for sharing this very special journey with us!
Jens and Andreas