Meet Ricki and Davesh - New Dads-to-Be through Surrogacy and IVF

Ricki and Devesh are a same-sex couple who first met at University and later married after the Australian Marriage Equality plebiscite in December 2013. Ricki is a Florist and Devesh is an Account Manager for a pharmaceutical company.

For years they wondered if it was ever going to be possible for them to start a family together?

They learned all about the Australian foster care system and adoption, and even looked at expensive overseas options too.  After months of sleepless nights, endless conversations and an exhausting search for what felt like the best thing for them, together they settled on the idea of altruistic surrogacy in Australia.

Wanting a biological child of their ownmo

Ultimately both Ricki and Devesh decided they wanted to have a child who was biologically their own.

• Ricki and Devesh’s mutual friend Lillian had a girlfriend Jane, who already had two of her own children, still loved the idea of being pregnant but not the reality of adding a third child to her family.
• Together, Ricki and Devesh came to an agreement with Jane for her to become their surrogate and use IVF to begin their own biologically related family, together.

The next few months seemed to be a blur of appointments with Fertility Counselors, IVF tresatments and cycles, genetic tests, couples counselling and a mountain of legal paperwork.

Working with the right Financial Adviser

When it came to Ricki & Devesh getting Life Insurances in place to protect themselves and their Surrogate, their Fertility Counsellor recommended a confidential chat with unsuaulrisks.com.au who specialise in complex insurance situations.

• They were surprised to find unusualrisks.com.au had an confidential online Life Insurance Service, specifically for People Using IVF & Surrogacy services.

Deciding upon who the biological father would be?

For Ricki and Devesh, deciding which of them would be the biological father was fairly simple. Of the two, Rickie is far more attached to the notion of his child being biologically related to him, while Devesh is just simply excited by the prospect of becoming a ‘Dad’, especially if the baby has a biological connection to his husband.

How do you say thankyou for an unrepayable gift?

Now Ricki regularly sends Jane (what is often described as ‘an entire florist shop in a delivery van’) thank you flowers.  They're all excitedly looking forward to the arrival of their new child - made possible through IVF and the incredible love and generosity of a new family friend who agreed to become their Surrogate.