Jayson sings him songs from The Sound of Music. Many times I hear “Edelweiss” sung as a lullaby. It is beautiful to hear him sing to our son.
We never feel entirely comfortable bathing him because he cries and screams the apartment down. But, predictably, we both love dressing-up time, love seeing Roman in new outfits – mostly “onesies”, a baby’s most popular outfit, versatile for day and night. Almost half of his wardrobe is navy blue, navy being popular on the runway this season. We are still new at this but we are adjusting to parenthood like “ducks to water”.
We love taking him to breakfast in the apartment’s restaurant. He mostly stays asleep in the capsule while we eat. Some of the other guests gawk at him and then later behind our back you hear them snicker, wondering about the dynamics. We make friends with the restaurant manager so he reserves us a bigger area at the back where we can have some privacy. He asks where Roman’s mother is, but I don’t bother explaining.
“Back home in Australia.”
He doesn’t believe me entirely, I figure.
34
Good and Bad Journalists
“Impressive we haven’t been exposed,” I joke to Jayson.
Our new addition is still a secret but I may have spoken too soon because Mr X emails us. The gossip columnist who contacted us several months ago to say he heard the stork was coming, signals his intentions.
He is trying to reach us, having left messages for us in vain. He is intending to run a piece about our baby in Thailand in the weekend papers; he wants us to call him to comment because he has had the story verified from several sources, despite Jayson’s denial several months ago.
My heart sinks. “No, not him again,” I say to Jayson. “The thought of our baby’s birth being announced in the gossip pages is making me sick.”
He must have been tipped and put two and two together. I wish he was compassionate enough to understand this is a private time for us. But he wants to break the story; a story like this will make his column shine.
I trunk call my PR guru friend, my sounding board, gold for this kind of thing. She will guide us in the right direction. Landing in Mr X’s column is a downright sabotage of my principles. The thought of it feels dirty and demeaning. It is awful to imagine friends finding out about our son by reading about him in a gossip page.
“If you don’t say anything to him,” she says, “he will speculate. At the moment, all he has is not much. He wants to speak to you so that he has something concrete.”
“But this is not gossip. I feel exploited. It’s tarnishing and I won’t fuel him. He doesn’t deserve to write our story.” I am fuming at the audacity.
“Well, you have Prue, whom you have known for a very long time, and her newspaper wants to give you editorial confirmation, probably front page, and she will write the story herself. I would consider that prospect. It’s respectable?”
“You mean give Prue the story?”
“Yes, consider it, for sure. You haven’t much time. It’s Wednesday afternoon and only a matter of time before the story breaks news in the papers. If I were you, I would get on the phone now and ring her.”
I make the call to Prue. It is about 4pm Wednesday in Sydney and newspapers are on weekend deadlines. The phone rings for several seconds until she picks up.
She wasn’t expecting a call from me. I get straight down to business.
“I haven’t rung because we were trying to keep this matter private for as long as possible but I can no longer keep it in the bag.”
I explain the sequence of events, the whole story in a nutshell. I tell her we are in Thailand at the moment with Roman. The phone goes silent before a shocked Prue responds.
“I didn’t know any of this. I heard you were expecting but nothing about Thailand and the stuff you just told me. Miracle you kept it under wraps for this long. I want the story.”
“What do we to do with Mr X?” I ask. “Is there a way we can nip it in the bud so it can’t be exploited?”
“Yes, there is. Let me speak to my editor and will call you back in ten. You sure you haven’t spoken to him?”
“No, we haven’t spoken to anyone.”
Fifteen minutes later, Prue rings back.
“I have spoken to my editor; we will run a small piece in Friday’s paper, a column on page three announcing the birth, with several quotes from you both. We’ll keep it minimal and short, straight to the point. Then we run an exclusive for the Sunday Telegraph, probably either a page one or three. Are you ok with that?”
“That sounds like a plan. Will you write the story? Because I won’t trust anyone else with it.”
“Yes, will ring you later this afternoon and you guys can proofread it on Friday morning some time.”
“We want to extend a positive image to the story,” I say, “to touch the public but not be poster boys for surrogacy.”
It may aggravate our exit plans if the media paints a bad picture of the Thai government. I try to remain positive because there is nothing I can do except face the consequences.
That Friday, I receive an email from Ellie. News has broken in Australia that we had become parents. There is a short paragraph on page three with a photo of Jayson and me taken some years ago. We read that we have a “baby boy born via a surrogate mother in Thailand”.
The cat’s out of the bag, I think. Not a bad photo, either, which is a relief. Later in the day, on both our Facebook pages, an influx of messages comes from friends, old and new who didn’t know about Roman until they read the piece. There are congratulatory messages from complete strangers, customers and clients. We never expected such an outpour. I guess I underestimated the public’s view on non-traditional families. One woman from a country town in rural Australia says she is so inspired by us, she is considering a surrogate-born baby after many years of being infertile.
Jayson rings his parents in Ballina. When Malcolm picks up the phone, he bursts into tears, sobbing uncontrollably. Jayson can hardly understand what he is saying. When he calms down slightly, he tells Jayson what had taken place that morning.
While Jayson’s parents were on the patio having their morning coffee, they were surprised by a knock on the door. Outside stood a group of three children, aged six to nine, with a bouquet of handpicked flowers from their garden. One child had a hand-drawn card with her. Malcolm was taken aback and asked them, why the privilege of the sweet gift? They replied they read the story in the papers and came to congratulate them for the birth of their grandchild. Malcolm was so moved he nearly broke down in tears in front of them. Smack-bang in the middle of rural Australia, people are open and accepting, young children bearing such attitudes of tolerance and acceptance.
After the exciting morning, mostly spent on vetting emails and Facebook messages about our new bundle of joy, we travel by taxi again, fortunately only for five minutes this time, to Silom‘s Global Clinic for Roman’s DNA test. This is our first outing since the hospital. We worry about taking Roman to places in Bangkok because of the smog and the humidity.
We pack the Bugaboo travel nappy bag and brave the Bangkok traffic, arriving at the clinic just after 11am, where another Australian, a single dad, is waiting with his newborn son. We have been crossing paths since our arrival in Bangkok and have several times bumped into each other at the embassy. Today we stopped to talk shop with the man whose name I can’t remember, Darren, I think. He is an electrician and lives in the Sydney suburb of Alexandria. He decided he wanted to be a single dad, and went down the surrogacy path.
“A brave move,” I say.
“My mates think I am crazy,” he replies.
I pry about the management of his child, considering he is a self-proprietor as well.
“How will you manage alone?” I ask.
“Guess you just do it. My friends have volunteered to help when it gets tough.”
Darren’s proclamation of a vast network of support at home makes me personally unsure if I could do this without Jayson. It woul
d be too intense to do it alone. I always admire single mothers and fathers. I am sure Darren understands what lies ahead and he is far from fearing he won’t be able to manage alone.
“There is a surrogacy group from Australia presently here in Thailand. We met for dinner last night. Some brought their babies, others are awaiting arrival any minute.”
I am intrigued, having not known such a support group existed. Darren says there are many – about forty – couples in the group, mostly gay but some heterosexual ones too.
The nurse calls Jayson in alone to see the practitioner. I am asked to stay with Roman. They are tactful, gracious – as Thais generally are – careful not to offend me. An official from the Australian Embassy greets Jayson. He is a pleasant guy, also named Jason, in his early thirties. He smiles at Jayson shyly, like he is struck by the presence of a celebrity. He asks a series of questions, like Jayson’s full name, date of birth and name of his son. Then he asks Jayson to bring Roman in.
“Is this your biological son?” He points to Roman.
“Yes, he is.”
Roman is fast asleep until a male Thai doctor takes his blood sample by pricking his feet. He screams for several seconds and quickly goes back to sleep. Jason fills out the details for the courier parcel that will travel back to Sydney to the DNA lab. He asks Jayson to take a photo of the consignment note so we can track the parcel’s whereabouts.
When we get to the apartment, there is an awful email from Mr X; the subject box reads “Very Poor”.
Mr X said we had lied to him outright, and chose to talk to the Telegraph, an unwise move on our part. I want so much to tell him that the decision to talk to the Telegraph was brought on from his initial request and if given the choice, we would rather not talk about it entirely. I really have nothing against Mr X – in truth I respect all writers’ work and I have always thought of him as the “Louella Parsons” of Australia. But the fact that he had chosen not to respect our situation forced me to act to protect our intregrity. We feel invaded and our private lives pried into at a time when I have no room for anything else but Roman and his safety. It makes me feel trapped, like I owe him something.
However, I will seek Mr X and explain my predicament upon my return. Smooth things over – you don’t want to be on the bad side of a gossip columnist.
“He is going to slaughter us when he reads Sunday’s papers,” I tell Jayson.
It is not uncommon for journalists who receive a tip-off to make last-minute attempts to provoke a response out of the subjects, without which there is no story to tell. The point I am making in general (and which I have learned the hard way many times) is not to bite or retaliate, so the story carries no substance.
At 6pm, the photographer Jürgen arrives. He is Swedish, and was a hippy once in his heyday. He has no idea who we are and why he has been asked to photograph us. He is standing in for his mate, whom the papers normally work with. He is a nice person, funny with a dry sense of humour, witty and sometimes hysterically funny with the foreign accent. He keeps asking questions about who we are and also keeps apologising for prying. We explain what has happened in the last few months. He understands that surrogacy is currently a highly sensitive issue in Thailand.
“We are fashion designers from Australia who got caught in the storm,” I add.
“Ya, ya, but the storm is big you know, my friend,” he replies.
He listens in awe to our story and feels privileged to document us. The shoot takes more than two hours. We pose for the camera alone, with each other and with Roman, who sleeps throughout his camera debut. We try to get him awake so we can get shots of him with his eyes open but there is no chance.
Jayson is wearing a cotton denim shirt and white pants. I am in a blue-and-white striped shirt with dressy blue shorts. Roman is wearing a long-sleeved, white terry-towelling romper. We are all three perfectly coordinated. The angles Jürgen chooses are good, the setup and soft lighting in the apartment creates a nice ambience and the mood of the photographs is happy.
“You three are glowing,” Jürgen says repeatedly during the two-hour shoot. “How great the dynamics of the photo are; you complement each other.”
I have reservations, even at that point, about having Roman in the shot. Placing your young child, barely a two-week-old baby, in the Sunday newspaper for the entire nation to see? I ask Jürgen to photograph Roman from the side so he is slightly concealed. He politely refuses my request. The papers won’t run the story without good photos. It is beyond his control. I hope I will feel better tomorrow after reading the story in draft.
As soon as Jürgen finishes the shoot, Roman wakes up. His eyes are wide open now. But it is too late now, Jürgen has packed his camera equipment.
Sunday, I wake up to a bombardment of chimes from my WhatsApp. There are messages from friends and family, and snapshots of the Sunday Telegraph article. It is a double-page spread filled with full-colour pictures. It is a massive story; I can’t believe the size of it. The article has pictures of some of Roman’s godmothers, Kristy Hinze, Nicole Nacarella – who heads Myer’s womenswear department and is a very close friend – and Leona Edmiston. Several other colour photographs from Jürgen dominate the double-page story. It is the first time we have seen photographs of ourselves as a family.
The news is fashionably out, a big out. I shudder secretly. But the story is well written, and Prue did justice to it. She has integrity, being a mother herself. She empathises, and gives it the justice it deserves without embellishing any of the facts.
Masses of emails and Facebook messages clog our inboxes. There are offers and requests from the media and from manufacturers of baby and kids’ products. The Today Show wants an interview with Jayson about surrogacy, Who Magazine offer to do a story after we return about Roman’s amazing nursery and closetful of designer clothes, Vogue’s editor Edwina McCann would like to do a story about the three of us, even Jackie Frank, Marie Claire’s editor, rings to leave a message.
There are messages from old friends, schoolmates of Jayson’s from Cromer High, and so much goodwill pouring in. Messages come from the public, saying how much the story touched them. Johnson & Johnson send a big hamper full of gorgeous-smelling baby products. Baby Bjorn sends a box full of baby stuff. We are overwhelmed by all the kindness. It makes us feel special and blessed, fortunate in life as we already are for this baby, the most amazing gift ever.
One journalist, though, from an Australian current affairs television program on prime time TV, is persistent. The show investigates major characters and events in Australia and internationally, having previously run stories on major celebrities’ downfall. It is intelligent in content and no doubt has substance.
First, the journalist sends messages to each and every one of our social media channels. And when there isn’t a response, she goes to the extent of contacting Prue, who says, “They are private people, they won’t do it.” After carrying out some investigation on my Facebook pages, she gets my phone number. I had sent my new phone number to an old friend, who had contacted me on Facebook after she read Prue’s story. When I replied to her on Facebook, I thought the message was private, not realising I had in fact posted it on a wall for all to see. I have never been very computer savvy, I must admit. Not only was my private number splattered on there for 500-plus Facebook friends to see, the journo had managed to secure it. Good investigating, I must add.
When I pick up the call, I have no idea who it is. I had purposely changed my number before coming to Thailand, giving the new one to only a few selected people, or so I had thought. The journalist proposes making an episode about us. She wants to fly a camera operator over to Bangkok to follow us through immigration, customs and checkpoints with a handheld camera, to later screen the drama that unfolds.
How brave of her to ask? More like what a ridiculous idea, and how dare she ask? I think.
“We are not interested, but I will speak to Jayson. I am convinced he will say the same.” I say firmly. “We ar
e private people and prefer you respect our privacy.” I am offended that she has the gall to suggest this, to even consider jeopardising our exit out of Thailand.
“We will do it tastefully – you will love our work, I promise you. I am a mother myself,” she replies.
“Why would you even think we will contemplate such an idea?” I say.
Fear is mounting inside us both as our departure from Thailand approaches. We just want the application to be processed so we can return home swiftly. A story like this would create more duress and stress for us. Imagine a camera operator following us past junta-controlled customs officials!
“The answer is no. And that’s it. We have nothing more to discuss.”
She doesn’t give up. That afternoon, I go out to buy some groceries. The phone keeps ringing. Jayson, who is feeding Roman, thinks it may be his parents calling and picks up the receiver. Believe it or not, it is the journo on the phone.
“How the hell did you get this phone number?” a shocked Jayson asks.
“Oh, Aaron rang me this morning and the number showed up on my screen. I rang to convince you, hoping you would change your mind and let us film you coming home.”
“Keep hoping, it isn’t going to happen.” Jayson loses it at her. “Look, whoever you are, we are not interested and you should not be calling this number.” He hangs up on her.
The phone rings again in five minutes, and Jayson does not pick it up. But it rings relentlessly, for over fifteen minutes. In the end, Jayson decides to disconnect the phone. When I get home Jayson is clearly stressed, upset about being hassled and our whereabouts discovered.
It was a simple mistake to call her from the apartment phone. We are stressed, and our baby can feel our anxiety levels. Our agitation is making him restless and unsettled.
Designer Baby Page 28
