First time mum Laura Folan and her baby boy George have everything to smile about as they celebrate a true miracle this Christmas after a rare condition meant she feared she may be left childless
Instead, thanks to a friend’s extraordinary kindness, in April Laura delivered her own biological baby and is now looking forward to her first Christmas with baby George and his dad Daniel Clarke, 33.
She says: “Christmas is going to be incredibly special for us this year. It’s our first Christmas as a family, and something we didn’t know if we were ever going to have.
“And which other mother can say they delivered their own baby and brought him into the world?”
Laura, 32, from Sutton Coldfield, West Midlands was told by doctors at 16 that she had no womb and knew her chances of her being a mum relied on either surrogacy or adoption.
She had a condition called MRKH (Mayer-Rokitansky-Küster-Hauser syndrome) which affects around one in 5,000 women and meant she didn’t have a womb.
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Her condition was further complicated as her ovaries weren’t attached to anything and were floating around in her abdomen. MRKH had also left her deaf in her left ear and her kidneys were conjoined in her pelvis, where her womb should be. With no clinical explanation as to why this had happened to her, doctors told her it was just one of those things.
She says: “When I met Daniel, a marketing and communications manager in 2017 through Tinder, it was one of the first things I told him. I wasn’t going to hide anything. But Daniel didn’t mind. He said he would support me whatever path we took.”
Committed to each other and both keen to have a family if they could, in 2019 the couple started investigating their options. Initially, there was upsetting news. “When we went to a fertility clinic for advice, they told me they wouldn’t be able to use my eggs because of not being able to access my ovaries,” says Laura, a learning and development business partner.
“That was upsetting to hear. We needed to go through surrogacy, but it would have been amazing to have been able to use my eggs and have my own biological child. We went to see several fertility doctors and they each said the same thing. Then we joined an organisation called Surrogacy UK. A couple we met there told us to try the Hewitt Centre at Liverpool Women’s Hospital for one last option and the doctor there said he would give it a try for us.”
Laura started two weeks of injections to try and stimulate her ovaries to produce as many eggs as possible. She says: “We didn’t know if it was going to work and whether or not the doctor would even be able to see my ovaries. But we wanted to give it one chance. We had already met a lovely lady through Surrogacy UK called Annie and got chatting to her. After we had got to know her for a few months, she offered to carry a baby for us. It was such wonderful news.
“When we started the fertility treatment, we kept her posted with any developments. And then there was good news – after two weeks of injections into my belly, amazingly, the doctor managed to retrieve eight eggs. That was in December 2023 and we created five precious little embryos. Our five little hopes of having a baby. One of our embryos didn’t survive the thaw, but the second one did, and it was placed into my womb.”
A nailbiting wait followed. Laura continues: “After ten days a present arrived from Annie. It was a lovely pen case. Inside it was a note saying, ‘baby Folan-Clarke arriving 2025.’ It had worked! It was so exciting. Our baby was growing inside her womb. Annie kept us posted with regular updates and we went to scans together and visited her when we could. It was wonderful to feel our baby kick and we really felt like we lived through the pregnancy with her.”
In April this year, Annie was induced at the University Hospital Coventry, as she was overdue at nearly 42 weeks pregnant. Laura says: “Her labour progressed really quickly and within minutes she was ready to push. That’s when the midwife asked, after checking with Annie, if I wanted to deliver George. I had been worried about how I would bond with George if I hadn’t given birth to him, so that worry now completely disappeared.
“The midwife was so sensitive to my feelings. This meant I wasn’t the spare part that I’d feared I might be. Instead, I was there actually delivering my own son. It felt amazing. He was born after just a 40 minute labour on April 5, weighing 8Ib. She instructed me where to put my hands and I held him as he came slithering out. The moment when I held my own son for the first time, as he entered the world was indescribable. I never thought I’d have that moment and now thanks, to Annie and the midwife, I was experiencing it.”
George had the umbilical cord wrapped twice around his neck when he was born, and he was a grey colour, so the midwives spent 10 minutes working on him to clear mucus from his lungs. Laura says: “It was the longest 10 minutes of our lives – it felt like three hours. But, eventually, he started crying and his colour came back.
“Daniel and I were both allowed to hold him too properly for a cuddle. My mum Sandra Harding was there too, and she met George for the first time just as he was born, which was lovely for her, as she knew what it had taken for me to become a mum. Annie had helped Daniel and I create the family we had longed for, and we couldn’t thank her enough for what she had done. She has given birth to six surrogate babies for couples like Daniel and I, and helped all those families. It’s an amazing gift to give.”
Laura had been on medication for eight weeks before George was born, to help her to produce milk – also pumping, so she could breastfeed him. She says: “I was able to breastfeed George for six weeks. It made it so special being able to feed him myself. We keep in touch with Annie and still see her. She’s great with George. She’s his Auntie Annie and he will always be aware of how special his entrance into the world was.
“She has said she will carry a sibling for us too, so we will be looking at doing that in the near future. We have an amazing friendship with Annie and her husband, and will never forget what she has done for us.” For now, the little family can’t wait for their first very special Christmas together. Laura says: “We are having it at our house, and our friends and family will be coming round to celebrate with us.”
And there will be more to look forward to in the future. “We are due to get married sometime in the next year or so” says Laura. “George will be our page boy and Annie will be a very special guest at the wedding, as I would never have been a mother without her.”
Daniel said: ‘When I met Laura I accepted what she told me as it was being with her that was the most important thing to me. To be able to have our miracle son now is the icing on the cake for both of us, and I can’t wait to get married to her in the future. To be spending our first Christmas together as a family is the best gift ever.”
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