When I decided to do IVF in Georgia, the thing that stressed me out most wasn’t the money. It was the leave. Asking my company for two months off? I couldn’t even say it out loud. But after actually going through the whole process, I realized the time you physically spend there is much shorter than you’d think — most of it is waiting, and waiting can happen at home. Here’s exactly how many days I burned at each stage, so you can plan your leave around it.
First Trip: 9 Days in Tbilisi (Budget 12 for the Woman)
My first visit packed three things into 9 days: registration and testing, sperm-egg fertilization, and a face-to-face meeting with the surrogacy agency. The female workup took two days to get all reports back — AMH, uterine cavity check, the six hormone panel. On day three, the doctor set my antagonist protocol and stimulation started. Don’t assume you have to stay there for the whole stimulation — mine was 8 days of injections, and for the first 5 days I injected myself at the hotel. A nurse taught me over video call twice and I was fine. Realistically, the woman should budget around 12 days for this first trip. One tip you can use right now: get your infectious disease and chromosome reports notarized into English in China before you fly. That saved me 2 days of repeat testing. My travel companion didn’t do it and spent over $1,000 redoing everything.
From Egg Retrieval to Embryo Screening: 26 Days You Don’t Need Off
The male partner must be there on egg retrieval day — the sample itself takes half an hour, but many agencies require the man to be present the whole time to sign documents. Fertilization rates came out on day 3: my 18 eggs became 11 blastocysts, which went off for PGT testing. The results took almost 4 weeks. This entire stretch you can wait at home — zero leave needed. Honestly, a lot of people assume the IVF process means staying abroad from start to finish, but this screening wait is the longest blank gap in the whole timeline. Whatever you do, don’t count it into your leave request, or you’ll burn a whole extra month of vacation for nothing.
Second Trip: Transfer Plus Pregnancy Test, 11 Days of Leave
While the surrogate prepared her lining in parallel, we only needed to be there around the transfer itself. The transfer took ten minutes. Afterward she stayed locally for support meds while we rested at the hotel for two days and flew home. On day 10, the HCG blood draw happened — we had the agency send the report and read the number from China: HCG 386. These 11 days can be planned precisely: the woman arrives 2 days early, stays 3 days after transfer for observation, and the rest is handled remotely. For the man, the entire process only requires two trips on-site — total leave under 3 weeks.
After Birth: Getting the Surrogacy Birth Certificate — Budgeted 21, Used 16
This is the most underestimated part of the whole journey. After the baby is born, a court judgment establishes parental rights, and with that judgment you apply for the birth certificate at the civil registry — with the intended parents’ names printed directly on it. In Georgia this step takes roughly 5 to 10 business days. Then comes the Chinese consular legalization plus travel documents; in my case the whole thing took 16 days. What I found out later: the name spelling on the birth certificate must match the passport pinyin exactly. One couple had a letter mistranslated and lost 11 days getting it reissued. My advice: have the agency pre-review the court paperwork a month before the due date, so you don’t land in Tbilisi and discover a paperwork gap.
Adding it all up: 12 days for the first trip, 11 for the transfer, 16 after the birth — the actual on-site leave requirement comes to about 39 days total, and the embryo screening wait in between can be spent working normally. Presenting your leave request to your employer in these three separate chunks is far easier than asking for two months upfront. And start the document notarization and birth certificate name checks before you even leave home — those two details cause the worst delays.