Those of you who have been following our journey to parenthood through surrogacy over the last 18 months will know that we are getting very close, so close that she could arrive at any time now. Those of you who follow me over on Instagram will also know that I have also been counting down the weeks to the due date. From the '10 weeks to go' stage I have written a promise that I make to the little baby girl who will be our daughter. With only 1 week to go, the last promise has been added and I wanted to share them all in one place, so here they are...

So once again I find myself apologising for the lack of updates or articles here on the site. In terms of our journey to parenthood, there has not been a great deal to talk about. Lisa is getting bigger by the day and assures us that everything is fine aside from the far hotter than usual weather we have been experiencing here in the UK. To any woman who has experienced pregnancy in this kind of weather, you are incredible!

Everything has ticked along quite pleasantly over the last few months. I spoke last time about how I was experiencing a lack of motivation and generally feeling a bit out of sorts. Thankfully that has passed and I am back in a good place. I think that at times the journey to fatherhood felt like we were on the sidelines a little, especially being a two-and-a-half hour drive from the incredible human carrying our child. With all due respect, she did say that at times it might feel like that for us. Lisa has experience when it comes to talking about the emotional journey and she is gifted enough to know, understand and appreciate what a father may go through long before we did. Marc and I have both, at different times, felt like we should be doing more even when we are assured we are doing everything we should be. That was a little tough to navigate but we got there.

Now we are just over three weeks away from our due date. Three weeks! It is a little scary just how quick the last year has gone. It genuinely feels like we were just discussing matching and agreement paperwork only mere weeks ago. Part of the reason it has moved so quickly is that of how busy we seem to have been. For both of us, our jobs are quite fast-paced and particularly for me, where I spend a lot of time reporting and analysing everything by week, those weeks have flown by. When we are not working we are also keeping busy, from creating our little girls nursery (and I will be doing a nursery tour post soon too) and getting our home baby ready through to having a pretty decent social life, visits down to Lisa and her family or appearing in a production of Priscilla Queen of the Desert. It has been very busy. Many people said that time would seem to slow down or drag for us, particularly after the first 12 weeks and particularly in the last 10 weeks but for me, it hasn’t really dragged at all. It has felt like everything has moved at such breakneck speed and now we are almost 37 weeks down, 3 to go!

At this point, lots of people ask about how we are feeling, whether we feel ready or prepared and I can honestly say yes to all of the above. As discussed previously, being a father is one of the things I was most looking forward to in adulthood when I was much younger and so after believing it would never happen or wasn’t possible and accepting that reality at the time, I am now so excited it is ridiculous. I think part of the reason that the weeks have flown by so fast is as a result of me being a ‘planner’. Even when I was a teen, I had plans for the type of father I would be so that need to plan has come in really handy whilst preparing to actually be a Dad. Having all those plans have helped to keep me focused and busy. To say I am excited and elated is a little bit of an understatement. I’m not sure there are enough adjectives to properly account for all my feelings.

That isn’t to say that there aren’t some nerves, fears and anxieties too. I have plenty of those too. I struggle with anxiety and so it has been a little challenging to keep on top of it and not let it diminish my positive feelings. I think it is healthy to feel a little fear before becoming a parent, after all, it is a massive life event that comes with its very own ups and downs. The things I feel anxious about centre around the last few weeks of the pregnancy and praying that both the baby and Lisa are safe, happy and healthy. I will be totally honest and I am a little nervous or even scared at the prospect of the labour. I was already feeling anxious about whether everything would be ok through the labour which I won’t lie, was compounded by the consultants at the hospital. You can find out a little more about that by checking Lisa’s updates by clicking on the link to YouTube. I try not to, but there are times when I’m genuinely frightened that something might go wrong for Lisa or our little girl and I would never be able to forgive myself if it did. That said, when I do feel those fears bubbling away I try to remember just how many babies are born every day that do so without any problems arising and so on. Instead, I focus on how close we and how happy I am.

For all those years I carried hopes and dreams about becoming a father. I used to daydream about what it would be like changing nappies, giving them the biggest hugs, putting them to bed and reading stories, picking them up when they fall down and scrape their knees, drying their eyes when they are crying, taking them off to school. Those daydreams were endless back then and over the last 12 months, but particularly in the last couple, those hopes and dreams have come flooding back. People may cite a naïveté on my part like I’m seeing it all with rose-tinted glasses and perhaps I am. I’m under no illusion that there are some very testing and challenging days ahead but part of me is relishing that challenge. I want to embrace everything about fatherhood; the good, the bad and the downright ugly (probably smelly too). It wouldn’t be parenting without all of it and I wouldn’t want it any other way.

I think at this point, it is safe to say that our journey has been one heck of an emotional rollercoaster. I’ve experienced feelings that I wasn’t expecting to throughout the journey. Feelings that I would definitely tell others to expect when they are in their own pregnancy journeys. I think that the fathers' emotional changes may often get overlooked throughout pregnancy, often it feels like the daddies-to-be aren’t allowed to talk about their emotions because they are totally inconsequential compared to what a woman goes through. Of course, I am in no way whatsoever trying to diminish what the ladies go through in pregnancy, absolutely not. Everything they go through is nothing short of miraculous but it shouldn’t mean that the fathers' journey is a silent one. In recent years there has been a lot more attention focused on men’s mental health and now more than ever, men are encouraged to open up and talk about their feelings I think that during something as monumentally life-changing as becoming a father is as good a time as any to start talking about how you are feeling.

We still have a few weeks to go so I know there are likely to be a whole new wave of intense feelings to encounter so I am so grateful to have a husband that will listen when I need to talk and make sure I am returning the favour. This whole journey has strengthened our love and support for one another which is probably going to come in even more handy in a few weeks time! I can’t really mention support without also talking Lisa and her family. As I said before, her experience and her empathy while on this journey has been nothing short of incredible, especially when she is carrying around a hitchhiker in this unbelievable weather.

You may read this and think oh my, he is getting all emotional and gushy and I’ll take that, guilty as charged. I am so unashamedly emotional at the moment. I have such a strong positivity and hopefulness for the future which fights off any niggling doubts or anxiety. I feel amazing right now with mere weeks to go so I can only imagine where I will be at when our little princess arrives. It feels incredible to say we are almost there but I dare say it is not a patch on where I will be so very very soon.

I would usually say I can’t wait, but I can, reluctantly, hold out just a few more weeks because I know, deep down in every fibre of my being, the awesomeness that is coming will make every last moment of waiting patiently totally worthwhile.

Thanks for stopping by and reading xx