Me

you and I said to myself, ‘This is the type of father that I want for my children. ’” And it’s true. We have always had an incredible relationship, full of open communication and understanding, and this is the type of relationship I want to have with my own children.
    Besides, until the moment when I joined Menudo I felt like the best brother, because I taught my youngest brothers, my father’s sons, how to ride a bike, tie their shoes, and so many other basic childhood things. Later, when I joined Menudo, it hurt me to think I had abandoned my younger siblings, and I often felt that the eldest of them would look at me with an expression that seemed to say, “Where were you when I needed you?”
    But I later understood that I had to absolve myself of this melancholic attitude, and of the guilt I always carried for having left, because I finally understood that life took me down a certain path that distanced me from him, and that’s simply how it was. It was no one’s fault. It was a lesson for both of us and it never took away from the fact that I adore him, along with the rest of my brothers. The proof is that today we are all very close, we see each other at every opportunity, and we love each other so much. And it is because of this very special relationship I have with them and with my parents that I always felt I wanted to be a father.
    The more I considered the pros and cons of the various alternatives that exist to have children, the one that sounded best was surrogate motherhood. Now, I’d like to clarify that this was the best option for me . I’m not out to convince the rest of the world about surrogacy, nor will I stand on a mountaintop and scream that surrogacy is the most amazing thing that has ever happened. I am aware that this may not be the best option for everyone, but it was for me. I already knew I didn’t want to start a family with a woman, and since I also didn’t want to wait to find the love of my life in order to have children, I decided this was the way to go.
    When I told my mother what I was going to do, she looked at me and said, “Wait a moment, Kiki. Sit down for a second so we can talk. What you are telling me sounds like some kind of film from the future.”
    “No, Mami. This isn’t the future,” I answered. “This is the present.”
    And I explained to her how everything works. When I finished, the only thing she said to me was, “My son, you have to have your head screwed on the right way to make this kind of decision. Congratulations.”
    Some people may not be fully aware of what surrogacy is and therefore find it strange, or even might think it is something negative. But the truth is that it’s an excellent alternative that we have today, thanks to all the medical advances that science has been able to accomplish. To think that previously, when a couple was not able to conceive a child, they would have to resign themselves to that fact without many options. Today, a couple that cannot have children—or has difficulty doing so—has all kinds of options available to them.
    The surrogacy process takes time. It’s not just the nine months of pregnancy. It starts a lot earlier. I wanted to do it through an agency that specializes in this, and, obviously, I wanted a lawyer with expertise in the field who could guide me throughout the whole process. And that’s how I did it.
    Surrogacy is becoming more and more common each day. Even though there are no hard statistics, it is estimated that since 1976 there have been approximately twenty-eight thousand children born through a surrogate, and every day there are more single parents who opt to have children this way. More than ever, men are becoming more conscious of the meaning of fatherhood and feel the need to have children whether they have a partner (be it a man or a woman) or not.
    The first step in my own surrogacy process after finding the agency and then the attorney I wanted to work with was to select a donor for my eggs. I spent an entire week examining the bios of women who were offering their eggs. Even though I knew I wanted to find someone who embodied qualities that would complement my own, it was still very hard to choose the right person. Perhaps if I had fallen in love with someone it wouldn’t have been so difficult; we would simply be in love and have babies. But this was another story, and to choose a person based on their bio didn’t turn out to be as easy as I had thought it would