Tracy Marie Taylor

We met Latonya on a rainy Tuesday. 
The kind of rain that makes California feel almost like home, like Miami in hurricane season when the sky opens up and washes everything clean. 

Kevin and I had just come off a long call with our agency the week before, finally narrowing down our list. 
Jasmine and Emily had both been incredible in different ways—but something hadn't quite clicked. 
Not in a bad way. 
Just... not in the way we were hoping for. 
Like trying on clothes that fit but don't feel right, that don't make you look like yourself. 

Then they sent us Latonya's profile. 

It was understated in a way that reminded me of my grandmother's best advice—the important things don't need to shout. 
She didn't write a long essay or include fancy photos—just a short, steady paragraph about being a mom of three, a registered nurse, and someone who felt called to help another family experience the same kind of love she lived for every day. 
The kind of simple truth that cuts through all the noise. 

"She sounds grounded," Kevin said, reading over my shoulder. 

"She sounds like she knows exactly who she is," I replied. 
And in a world where we'd spent the last year figuring out who we were in a new place, that felt like something to hold onto. 

We scheduled a Zoom call. 

When the call connected, Latonya greeted us with a soft smile and a voice that was instantly calming. 
Not performative like a job interview. 
Just real, like talking to a neighbor over the fence about ordinary things that matter. 
She told us about her kids—two boys and a girl—how they'd reacted when she first mentioned becoming a surrogate. 

"My youngest asked if we'd be keeping the baby," she laughed, and her laugh was the kind that makes you want to laugh too. 
"I told her no, sweetie, this one's not ours. This one belongs to a family that needs our help to bring their baby home." 

We asked her why she wanted to do this, and she didn't pause to think of the right answer. 
Didn't reach for something that sounded good. 
Just spoke from whatever place inside her had already decided. 

"Because I know what it's like to want something with your whole heart," she said. 
"And I believe helping someone build their family is one of the most sacred things I can do with mine." 
Her voice carried the weight of someone who'd thought about sacred things, who understood that some acts of love require everything you have to give. 

That landed hard. 
In the best way. 
Like truth does when you haven't heard it in a while. 

We told her about our journey—how long it had taken to get here, how we'd had to leave Florida when the laws changed, how hopeful and scared and exhausted we both were. 
How we'd packed up our life in boxes and driven west because love had become illegal where we used to call home. 
She listened. 
Really listened, the way people do when they understand that stories matter, that the path to this moment is part of the moment itself. 

And when I mentioned that I sometimes worried this whole thing might feel transactional, like we were paying someone to solve a problem instead of inviting them into something beautiful, she leaned in a little, eyes soft. 

"It's not just a job to me," she said. 
"I'm not carrying a product. I'm carrying love. Yours." 
She paused, and I could see her choosing her words the way my grandmother used to choose the ripest fruit at the market—carefully, with intention. 
"I'm carrying hope across the finish line for people who can't get there on their own. That's not business. That's ministry." 

By the end of the call, Kevin and I didn't need to say anything out loud. 
We both felt it. 
The way you feel it when you walk into a house and know you could live there. 
When you meet someone and know they're going to matter to your story. 

This was her. 

This was Latonya. 

Later that night, curled up on the couch with a mug of tea going cold in my hands, I looked over at Kevin. 
The rain was still falling outside our temporary windows, and for the first time since we'd left Miami, it felt like blessing instead of sadness. 

"She feels like someone we can do this with," I said. 

He nodded. 
"She feels like someone we can trust." 
And then, quieter: "She feels like family already." 

And that—after everything we'd been through, after losing our first home, after starting over in a state that didn't know our names but was willing to learn them—was more than enough to move forward. 
It was everything.