Jun 10, 2026 · 1 hr 9 min · 10 segments
Richard and Julio of IVF Daddies share what intended parents need to know about IVF, surrogacy, egg donation, international family building, and why community can make all the difference on your…
Whitney HallHost
One thing that you kind of repeatedly hear is that intended parents aren't fully realizing how many systems they are actually navigating all at once.
What are some of the biggest things that you feel like intended parents need to understand earlier in the process?
I think for me, one of the things that intended parents need to understand early in the process that is not a linear project is not step one, two, three, four.
And we've been taught our entire life to learn how to ride the wave, but also in between waves.
Nobody really tells us what to do.
And there's a lot of in between waves.
We're not doing anything.
It's doing the things that you can do.
And also to me, I think the most important thing is empower yourself to ask the right questions, because if you have a doctor or an agency or anybody that just feels intimidated or threatened or gets activated by the questions that you ask, then there's a red flag right there.
Yeah, I think when I'm talking to people, one of the things I say is, You are the master of your own destiny.
that? I mean the fact that you can delegate this out to everybody in the stakeholders in this ecosystem.
You can say to the agency, do everything for me.
You can say to the clinic, do everything for me.
But you have to know what's going on.
You have to take control of understanding where things are.
It's your family.
You need to understand.
And from the outset, it's almost like somebody needs to draw a decision tree for you and say, right, this is where, this is how the process is going to go.
This is what could happen.
You're in the middle of your universe and you have your agency and your donor, and then the lawyers and the escrow, like all these different people that are going to communicate, but you're in the middle.
And if you're not getting answers to your questions, that's a problem.
And if you, if you're in that situation, just keep asking and asking and asking.
One thing that you kind of repeatedly hear is that intended parents aren't fully realizing how many systems they are actually navigating all at once.
What are some of the biggest things that you feel like intended parents need to understand earlier in the process?
I think for me, one of the things that intended parents need to understand early in the process that is not a linear project is not step one, two, three, four.
And we've been taught our entire life to learn how to ride the wave, but also in between waves.
Nobody really tells us what to do.
And there's a lot of in between waves.
We're not doing anything.
It's doing the things that you can do.
And also to me, I think the most important thing is empower yourself to ask the right questions, because if you have a doctor or an agency or anybody that just feels intimidated or threatened or gets activated by the questions that you ask, then there's a red flag right there.
Yeah, I think when I'm talking to people, one of the things I say is, You are the master of your own destiny.
that? I mean the fact that you can delegate this out to everybody in the stakeholders in this ecosystem.
You can say to the agency, do everything for me.
You can say to the clinic, do everything for me.
But you have to know what's going on.
You have to take control of understanding where things are.
It's your family.
You need to understand.
And from the outset, it's almost like somebody needs to draw a decision tree for you and say, right, this is where, this is how the process is going to go.
This is what could happen.
You're in the middle of your universe and you have your agency and your donor, and then the lawyers and the escrow, like all these different people that are going to communicate, but you're in the middle.
And if you're not getting answers to your questions, that's a problem.
And if you, if you're in that situation, just keep asking and asking and asking.
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