My “Before”

Sunday 18 October 2026

It exists.

Not in public. If you type the address into a browser right now, you get a page that says the site is coming soon. But behind that page there is a website, and this week I clicked through all of it on my phone, which is how most people my age will see it.

It lives at co-authored.org. Papa helped me set it up.

Here is what is in the beta:

• A home page that says who the site is for, what it is, and that it is not for or against surrogacy.
• An About page, with the story of the name and the acknowledgement to Professor McLean: where the name comes from, that her book is not about surrogacy, and that she is not involved.
• A glossary. Twenty-four words with a one-line meaning each, and eight with a full page so far: surrogacy, surrogate, gestational surrogacy, intended parents, legal parent, parental order, pre-birth order and original birth record. Parental order is the one I needed most at twelve.
• The legal map, with the UK and US pages. Both say “being reviewed” across the top, because they are. Nothing on them counts until the two lawyers have checked them.
• The Who Knew Me First? page with the five questions, and how interviews will work. No episodes yet.
• A safeguarding page, a page with help lines for anyone who needs to talk to someone now, and a contact page.

And the list of things I am not going to do from Post 22 is on the site, as promised. Not at the bottom of the homepage in the end: it became part of the About page and the rules on the safeguarding page, because it turned out to be most of what keeps the site safe.

The site also has a logo now, at least a first version of one. It is the word Co-Authored with the hyphen drawn by hand, in red, and under it a small mark called a caret, the sign an editor uses to show where something has been added to someone else’s writing. The hyphen is the part that joins Co to Authored. In my logo, somebody added it later, by hand. I did not plan for the logo to say that. I only noticed after I picked it, and then I could not stop noticing. A real designer will finish it properly, but the idea is staying.

And under the logo, in small red capitals, one word: BETA. It is there so that anyone who sees it, starting with the three people who will see it first, knows this is a draft. It is also there for me, so I remember the same thing.

What is not in the beta: Episode 1. A named safeguarding lead. The project email address, which is on every page and does not exist yet. That gets fixed this week.

Thirteen days until the end of October. Ms. Shafqat first. Then the two lawyers, who will be the first people outside my family and my school to see it. I am more nervous about that than about anything I have sent so far, because an email can be careful. A website has to actually be right.

There is a fourth Post-It on my desk now, under Wait well. It says BETA.

— D.