Standing in Two Places: A New Landscape of Motherhood

Standing in Two Places is a moving memoir that tells the story of a journey through the controversial practice of surrogacy. Ashley Dyson is the intended mother who, after enthusiastically entering a surrogacy arrangement with Norah, suddenly finds herself stuck in a sort of motherhood purgatory: she is a mother of a three-year-old daughter and an unpregnant mother-to-be of a baby growing inside the womb of another woman four states away; she and Norah have formed a close friendship, but they are also business partners, the 'business' being carrying Ashley's baby; there is the traditional role of 'mother' and there is this new, ambiguous role of 'intended mother,' which for Ashley feels more like the father's role, the man who goes about his business for nine months then-Voila! a baby appears in his arms. Ashley finds herself in the middle of what she calls "an actual transition in human evolution," where she's in the passenger seat of a car, driven by a friend who also happens to be five months pregnant with her baby. This is motherhood with a twist, and it is complicated. With honesty, humor, and heartbreaking insight Ashley shares her experience of navigating through this new landscape with no guidebook, no map. "My generation and our children are the subjects of this reproductive revolution, how we live through it must be figured out on a trial and error basis," Ashley writes. And like motherhood, which demands responsibility and love, Ashley is determined to figure it out, thereby shedding light and possibility on an uncharted place. In the end, Standing in Two Places is a memoir about love. If not for love, what other reason is there to willingly throw oneself headlong into the unknown?