February 4, 2025 • 21 mins
Today on Diary of a Birth, we hear the remarkable story of how two women came together to bring baby Lily into the world through surrogacy. When Trudy Bateman was down to her last embryo and unable to carry her own child, she found an unexpected angel in Julie - a "retired" surrogate via a Facebook group. This dramatic story shines a light on the altruistic act that is becoming a surrogate through Australia's complex laws.
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CREDITS:
Host: Ksenija Lukich
Birth Story: Trudy Bateman & Julie Laherty
Australia’s Favourite Paediatrician: Dr Golly
Executive Producer: Thom Lion
Audio Producer: Scott Stronach
Mamamia acknowledges the Traditional Owners of the Land we have recorded this podcast on, the Gadigal people of the Eora Nation. We pay our respects to their Elders past and present, and extend that respect to all Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander cultures.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:21):
You're listening to a MoMA Mia podcast.
Speaker 2 (00:25):
Mamma Mia acknowledges the traditional owners of land and waters
that this podcast is recorded on. We pay our respects
to elders past, present and emerging, and feel privileged to
continue the sharing of birth stories and knowledge that has
been a fundamental part of Indigenous culture.
Speaker 1 (00:45):
Hi.
Speaker 2 (00:45):
I'm Cassenya Lukitch and this is diary of her birth.
Today's birth story comes to us from not one, but
two beautiful women, the surrogate and the intended parent.
Speaker 1 (00:57):
Took me out her coffee one day and I really
fell off my chair when she said I want to
be your surrogate, and I told her she was mad.
Speaker 2 (01:07):
But srogacy in Australia is no easy feat. The laws
surrounding it are incredibly complex, and perhaps the key difference
here is that surrogacy is an altruistic act in Australia,
which in my opinion makes this story even more remarkable.
Speaker 1 (01:23):
And it felt like like we weren't strangers at that
point either, so it felt like you know, a friend
doing this for us so and we both just knew
deep down that this journey would be a great one.
Speaker 2 (01:38):
So let's meet today's mums.
Speaker 1 (01:40):
Hi, I'm Trudy Bateman and this is my sarrogacy birth
story A Lily. Hi. My name is Julie and this
is my birth story for baby Lily. As Trudy's friend
and sarrogate.
Speaker 2 (01:56):
Meeting her partner Tom Later in life, Trudy knew that
the journey to parenthood may not be so easy, and
after a medical procedure left her unable to carry her
own children, she turned to surrogacy. Tom's sister Sarah, was
the surrogate for their first child, Bonnie, born in twenty twenty.
Speaker 1 (02:15):
And she got pregnant first go and COVID then hit
a few months later and she had to fly back
from the US to give birth in Sydney during the
height of COVID. So so we're really lucky first go
round to have Bonnie through sarrogacy.
Speaker 2 (02:32):
But knowing they wanted a sibling, they turned to the
sarrogacy community via a Facebook.
Speaker 1 (02:36):
Group, and then we decided to put our effort back
into the Australian surrogacy community and see if we could
find a surrogate that you know, we didn't know because
no one in our close circle lafriends or family was
able to do it, so we joined the Australian Surrogacy
community to see if we could meet someone potentially to
be our surrogate. Tell us about how you met Julie. Yeah,
(03:00):
so I met Julie through the community in twenty nineteen.
It was so I had just entered the community, I
was learning, and she had just given birth to her
first surrogate baby, and she was, I guess, riding the
highs of the post birth of surrogacy. And we chatted
a fair bit and I asked her lots of questions
(03:21):
because I was trying to learn a lot about surrogacy
in Australia. And my sister in law then offered to
be our surrogate. So we went through that journey, and
then fast forward to twenty twenty three and we just
had our failed journey with our other surrogate for a sibling,
and so I went to one of the in person
(03:41):
catch ups through the Facebook community and Julie was there,
and I'd never actually met her in person before. So
we sat and we chatted and drank Margarita's all night,
and I guess the rest is history. We saw each
other a lot after that and caught up, and then
she took me out for coffee one day and I
(04:03):
really fell off my chair when she said I want
to be your surrogate, and I told her she was mad. Yeah,
it was a crazy idea, and I thought she was
a retired surrogate, but she was adamant that she was
ready to do another journey for Tom and I.
Speaker 2 (04:19):
So how does the proces work?
Speaker 1 (04:22):
So we really delved into all of the topics that
we needed to cover to make sure we really were
on the same page. So there's lots of things to discuss.
You want to make sure you're on the same page
about termination, about what the birth looks like, about vaccinations,
about diet, exercise, or what happens in pregnancy, birth and beyond.
(04:44):
So I guess first off, we wanted to make sure
we ticked off everything on that list to make sure
we were on the same page and that there was
nothing that was going to come up later that would
be detrimental to our team. So that was kind of
the first step. And once we knew we're all on
the same page, we go and do the mandatory counseling
(05:05):
that you do, so you do intended parents do counseling
Julie does counseling, and then we all do counseling together
to try to, I guess, go through everything to make
sure there's no red flags, to make sure that we're
all on the same page, and it really is one
of those exercise you've got to do as part of
the legal process. Then we go through the legal side,
(05:26):
which is to write a surrogacy agreement, We get independent
legal advice, we signed that agreement. We then have to
go through our ethics committee at the IBS clinics. Julie
has to go through and get approved as a surrogate
from a specialist obstetrician. We have to get approved as
requiring surrogacy. We need to have a legitimate reason for
(05:48):
requiring surrogacy. So all of that needs to happen, and
the IVF clinics have to approve your case. And once
you've been approved, then you can move forward to the
next step, which is the transfer stage to trying to
transfer those embryos.
Speaker 2 (06:04):
And one thing that I personally love hearing from parents
who have gone through in fertility is what was it
like getting that positive test.
Speaker 1 (06:13):
When Jules told us, You know, it was immediate shock
that you'd done it already, but I was so happy
that she had been sneaky as well, because the pressure
of that blood test and it's just it's so overwhelming
to go to that blood test and then wait for
the phone call. So when she did that and I
(06:33):
saw Tom kind of automatically going, yeah, nah, it doesn't matter.
You know, you've got to have the blood test too,
and she pulled it out, I was like, here we
go with. You know, we've hicked that first hule, that
is the biggest one. And yeah. It was complete disbelief
because you know, at that stage, we only had one embryo,
so we had one shot at it as well. So
(06:57):
when Jules offered to be our surrogate, we didn't have
any embryos. We were doing round after round after round
trying to make embryos and transferring them to me just
to try for a miracle. And when she asked us
if she could be our surrogate, then I said to Tom,
just one more round, Just one more I'd said that
many times, but I really meant it this time. And
(07:19):
it was the magic round. And I was forty four
and a half, so it was such a small chance
of it being a normal embryo, and sure enough I
got one embryo. She was normal, and that was the
one embryo we had to transfer to Jules. So there
was a lot writing on that transfer as well. Coming up.
She kept saying to me, I think it's strong to
(07:40):
go to hospital, Mum. I think I think we need
to get out of here.
Speaker 2 (07:54):
The time has finally come. And despite being a midwife herself,
Julie was like every other mum in early labor.
Speaker 1 (08:02):
The contractions had really picked up by then, and so
I actually messaged a friend of mine and said, I
don't know what to do with myself. You know, these
contractions are getting stronger. I just I'm so tired, and
I'm a midwife, and I'm seeking the advice of a
friend to say what do I do. So ended up
calling Truty, and Truty like, oh, we're on, I'll head over.
(08:22):
I said, no, No, don't head over yet, you know,
maybe get Tom home from work. But I, in my head,
I felt wearing for a long hul there is another
eighteen hours before you know, we meet this baby, So
no need to rush and no need to panic. But
I could hear in Trudy's voice that she was probably
feeling quite nervous and anxious. Anyway, I hung up from
her and got my daughter home from work. She arrived
home and I was in the shower being quite vocal,
(08:45):
so she was a bit sort of scared. Anyway, I
continued to labor at home, tried the bath. I didn't
realize at the time that my poor daughter was feeling
extremely overwhelmed. It was just the two of us here.
She kept saying to me, I think it's time to
go to hospital. Mum, I think, stime, I think we
need to get out of here. I'll just give truth
to a call and let it. No, don't call Trudy,
don't tell Trudy. Trudy doesn't need to be here.
Speaker 3 (09:06):
It's too early.
Speaker 1 (09:06):
It's too early. And then my other support person, who
is a dear friend, Hannah, who also is a midwife.
I'd been in touch with her, and she said, let
me come over, let me come over, and I said, no,
it's only early, it's too early to come over. Little
did I know it was things were really happening quite quickly.
So Indian Hannah did come over, and Trudy and Tom
had actually left home. Despite me saying, no, it's going
(09:29):
to be hours yet, But thankfully they'd left home to
head over in this direction, and my daughter had actually
then messaged Trudy and said, look, meet us at the hospital.
Don't come here because things are progressing quickly, so just
come straight to the hospital. The drive to the hospital
is quite harrowing. It wasn't an enjoyable ride. I'm only
five minutes from the hospital, but it was really I
think I've scarred my daughter for life with that drive.
Speaker 2 (09:51):
After arriving at the hospital, Trudy and Tom were right
there in the delivery room waiting for their child to
be born.
Speaker 1 (09:58):
Yeah, so Jules had her support people around her as
well as Tom and I. So she had her daughter
and her best friend and her two midwives there and
Tom and I in the room. And for a lot
of it, they'd done that before with Jules. They'd been
her support person, so they knew exactly how to get
her through the labor. So they had a huge role
(10:20):
in helping her. And there was lots of moments when
Tom and I were over there holding her hand and
telling her how wonderful she was, and a lot of
moments where poor Tom was hiding in the back because
he was quite traumatized as well. You get a good
sense of what it feels like to be the partner
of the person giving birth when you feel so helpless
(10:42):
and there's nothing you can do to take that pain
away from them. They've just got to kind of get
through it. So it's really hard to watch, especially in
a surrogacy birth. Feels like such a privilege to be
in the room for a surrogacy birth because they are
so rare and they're so emotional. And I remember I
(11:02):
was right but Tom and I were right beside Julie
on that last push, and I remember the midwife saying,
you know, pop your head down and have a look.
You'll see her come out. And I saw this dark
hair and then I saw her face and she was
still in the sack. It was the most incredible thing
I've ever seen. So she was still in the sack,
(11:24):
and the midwife, Heidi, had to kind of tear the
sack open around her face, and it was the most
incredible thing I've ever seen, sort of seeing her kind
of come out of this sack. Water went everywhere, and
then you know, it was just one contraction and she
was completely out, like it wasn't just her head it
was her whole body was just kind of came over
(11:45):
and flipped onto Julie. So it felt like it happened
really quickly. At the end, there we were at the
hospital less than two hours and even looking at Julie
and we've got photos from the berth, we had a
birth photographer, and just the look of shock, like we
all knew a baby was going to be born, but
just the look on Julie's face was like, Wow, she's
(12:07):
looked gobsmack that she'd done it. And I couldn't believe
this baby was there either, after everything that we've been through.
So it really is the most surreal experience seeing that
baby for the first time and then hearing her cry.
She cried straight away, so that was, you know, the
hugest thing of relief for me is to hear a
(12:27):
cry and see everybody okay. So it was incredible.
Speaker 2 (12:33):
Despite delivering a healthy baby girl still in the memoranes,
might I add, things took a scary turn for Julie.
Speaker 1 (12:41):
I noticed that the dynamics in the room had changed
between my friends, my midwifs, and I thought something wasn't right.
And I looked at Heidi and I said to her
I'm bleeding, aren't I? And she said, yeah, yeah you are.
So I knew at that point I just needed to
focus on newly and let them do what they needed
(13:02):
to do. The doctor came in very quickly to try
and stop the bleeding, and then you know, all the
different drugs and ivy fluids and commenced, and I just
kept looking at Tom and Trudy. I just kept making
them my focus and tried to sort of distance myself
to what was happening because I've been in the emergencies
before and they're not much fun. So I thought, I
(13:24):
just and I remember looking at Trudy and Tom saying,
I'm just not ready to hand her over yet. I
just needed her to stay on me. And they had
no objections at all that were like no, no keeper,
please keep her so and I think she was probably
looking back at photos. I think she's probably about forty
forty five minutes before I handed her over. I just
(13:46):
didn't feel ready until that point. I just felt like
I needed her with me, and I felt no pressure
or no sense of urgency from Trudy or Tom to
hand her over. Yeah, it was probably around four o'clock
when I handed her over, and by that stage the
bleeding had settled and stopped and the doctors had finished
(14:06):
doing what they needed to do.
Speaker 2 (14:07):
This moment of pure love and selflessness, despite the craziness,
is incredibly heartwarming to me. But then it was time
for Julie to hand over Lily to her intended parents.
Speaker 1 (14:21):
I felt very passionately about being the one that handed
the baby that I've grown over to her parents. I didn't,
you know, want someone to take her off me and
hand her over, And we'd sort of discussed that during
pregnancy that you know, what if the baby's born and
she's not well and she has to go to the
special care nursery, you know how a handover might look
(14:41):
in that scenario. Thankfully we weren't faced with that. But
to me, that handover was really important because that's that
real altruistic part where what you've done and that that
official handover to the parents was pretty special and yeah,
very very emotionally fueled.
Speaker 3 (15:01):
Lots of tears true to tell me about meeting Lily
for the first time.
Speaker 1 (15:12):
One of the best parts I think about Zeregacy is
actually watching Julie with that baby as well, so we
get to see what she looks like we get to
look over her and see this incredible human that Jewles
has grown. And she could have stayed there for hours,
it wouldn't have bothered me. I'd waited years for this moment,
so I didn't care how long it took for Jewels
(15:35):
to hand her over, Like that is the moment. You know,
all the planning or the counseling, all the legs, all
the whole pregnancy, you're leading up to this moment when
the baby's born, she's healthy, and then you have that
handover moment. And so that to us, we needed to
preserve that. And it was a beautiful moment because Jewles
(15:56):
literally just picked her up and handed her to me.
And it's the most emotional moment because I could not
give birth to her, but you know, she is genetically mine.
She is Throughout the whole pregnancy, I felt close enough
to Jules that she still felt like she was mine.
And it's yeah, it's just that moment that we become
(16:18):
parents again, thanks to the selflessness of our beautiful surrogate, Julie.
So it's an incredible moment and thank goodness, we've got,
you know, the photos to remember it by, and we've
all got a great memory of that process because it
was something that we had wanted for so long. Yeah,
and she was healthy and Jules was healthy. Like, you know,
(16:42):
she had the big bleed, but at that point of handover,
we knew the bleeding had stopped, she'd been sewed up,
and everything was hopefully okay. It was definitely a scary
moment because I knew something was going on, and you can,
I saw that moment kind of let dynamic in the
room change as well, and I'm automatically like, how's Julie.
(17:06):
Is Julie okay? Is Julie okay? And I just wanted
to know that she was okay and yeah, and goodness
was okay.
Speaker 2 (17:14):
Now, the fourth trimester looked a bit different for this family,
but one thing's for sure, Baby Lily had no shortage
of love and nutrition.
Speaker 1 (17:23):
I also induced blactation, so I was able to feed Lily.
So that was something that was really special. That also
happened posts you know, just after the birth. So after
the handover, I got to feed Lily, and that then
makes me feel part of then growing her. You know,
jewels grow her to nine months, and I got to
(17:44):
grow her afterwards. So it's a really special thing to
be able to do that. And Jewels also pumped milk
for us to help, So really the two of us
grew her, you know, for the first few months. You know,
I'm eternally grateful that Jewels gave up years really of
(18:07):
her life, control of her poor body. And yeah, and
we've got this beautiful little girl now to celebrate.
Speaker 2 (18:19):
Here on Diary of a Birth, lucky enough to have
the wisdom of Australia's favorite pediatrician, doctor Gollie, to give
us some insight into some of our burning medical questions. Now,
what I really wanted to know is how does inducing
lactation work? And can anyone do it?
Speaker 4 (18:36):
It's a really fascinating question. The answer is yes, it
is possible. It's not particularly easy. You know, there's a
certain cascade of hormone changes, body changes that happen throughout
pregnancy that set the scene for breastfeeding and breast milk production. Ultimately,
what you need to make breast milk is you need
three things. You need stimulation, which means baby sucking on
(19:00):
nipple or a breast pump providing that stimulation. You need
the lactating woman to have good hydration, so you need
to drink lots of water, and you also need to sleep,
so sleep water stimulation equals breast milk. Now, you don't
actually need that cascade of pregnancy and delivery in order
(19:21):
to create breast milk. You can actually stimulate someone to
make milk just simply by stimulating the nipple. So technically,
and it's not something I recommend for anyone to do,
but technically, if you sucked on someone's nipple enough, they
would eventually lactate.
Speaker 2 (19:41):
Witnessing that magical moment when a surrogate hands over the baby,
it's hard to put into words.
Speaker 4 (19:48):
I don't know that there is a more beautiful, noble, altruistic,
and magnanimous act on the planet. I just can't think
of one. It blows my mind. I get so emotional
every time I'm involved in one of these incredible cases
because I know how challenging pregnancy can be. I know
(20:12):
how challenging childbirth is, and for someone to voluntarily put
themselves through that, they're family through that, their partner, their
own children, if that's the case, in order to give
the gift of life and the gift of family to
another person, sometimes a stranger, it completely blows my mind,
(20:33):
and for me, it doesn't matter if there's any money exchanged.
It's just absolutely phenomenal. I can't find the words to
describe how much I'm speechless when I talk about it.
So the moment that a child is born and the
surrogate or obstetrician, pediatrician, whomever it may be, hands that
(20:55):
baby to the expectant parents, it really is very, very
very difficult to describe. It's a kind of magic that
you feel really privileged to be able to witness that.
And then I hear a lot from the carrying mothers
that that comment like you've heard like you do it
(21:16):
for that moment. You do it for the moment where
you hand the child over and you can see this
couple or this individual that has usually come to this
point with so many years of trauma, heartache, pregnancy loss,
fertility struggles, and to get to that point where they
are holding their own child. It's special. To say the
(21:37):
very very least.
Speaker 2 (21:42):
Thank you for joining us on Diary of a Birth,
where we celebrate all the amazing ways that we as
women bring life into the world.
Speaker 1 (21:49):
If you'd like to share your birth.
Speaker 2 (21:51):
Story with us, we'd love to hear from you. Details
are in the show notes. Diary of a Birth was
hosted by me Cassenia Lukige, with expert input fromp Doctor Golly.
This episode was produced by Tom Lyon and myself Cassane Lukage,
with audio production by Scott Stronik,
You're listening to a MoMA Mia podcast.
Speaker 2 (00:25):
Mamma Mia acknowledges the traditional owners of land and waters
that this podcast is recorded on. We pay our respects
to elders past, present and emerging, and feel privileged to
continue the sharing of birth stories and knowledge that has
been a fundamental part of Indigenous culture.
Speaker 1 (00:45):
Hi.
Speaker 2 (00:45):
I'm Cassenya Lukitch and this is diary of her birth.
Today's birth story comes to us from not one, but
two beautiful women, the surrogate and the intended parent.
Speaker 1 (00:57):
Took me out her coffee one day and I really
fell off my chair when she said I want to
be your surrogate, and I told her she was mad.
Speaker 2 (01:07):
But srogacy in Australia is no easy feat. The laws
surrounding it are incredibly complex, and perhaps the key difference
here is that surrogacy is an altruistic act in Australia,
which in my opinion makes this story even more remarkable.
Speaker 1 (01:23):
And it felt like like we weren't strangers at that
point either, so it felt like you know, a friend
doing this for us so and we both just knew
deep down that this journey would be a great one.
Speaker 2 (01:38):
So let's meet today's mums.
Speaker 1 (01:40):
Hi, I'm Trudy Bateman and this is my sarrogacy birth
story A Lily. Hi. My name is Julie and this
is my birth story for baby Lily. As Trudy's friend
and sarrogate.
Speaker 2 (01:56):
Meeting her partner Tom Later in life, Trudy knew that
the journey to parenthood may not be so easy, and
after a medical procedure left her unable to carry her
own children, she turned to surrogacy. Tom's sister Sarah, was
the surrogate for their first child, Bonnie, born in twenty twenty.
Speaker 1 (02:15):
And she got pregnant first go and COVID then hit
a few months later and she had to fly back
from the US to give birth in Sydney during the
height of COVID. So so we're really lucky first go
round to have Bonnie through sarrogacy.
Speaker 2 (02:32):
But knowing they wanted a sibling, they turned to the
sarrogacy community via a Facebook.
Speaker 1 (02:36):
Group, and then we decided to put our effort back
into the Australian surrogacy community and see if we could
find a surrogate that you know, we didn't know because
no one in our close circle lafriends or family was
able to do it, so we joined the Australian Surrogacy
community to see if we could meet someone potentially to
be our surrogate. Tell us about how you met Julie. Yeah,
(03:00):
so I met Julie through the community in twenty nineteen.
It was so I had just entered the community, I
was learning, and she had just given birth to her
first surrogate baby, and she was, I guess, riding the
highs of the post birth of surrogacy. And we chatted
a fair bit and I asked her lots of questions
(03:21):
because I was trying to learn a lot about surrogacy
in Australia. And my sister in law then offered to
be our surrogate. So we went through that journey, and
then fast forward to twenty twenty three and we just
had our failed journey with our other surrogate for a sibling,
and so I went to one of the in person
(03:41):
catch ups through the Facebook community and Julie was there,
and I'd never actually met her in person before. So
we sat and we chatted and drank Margarita's all night,
and I guess the rest is history. We saw each
other a lot after that and caught up, and then
she took me out for coffee one day and I
(04:03):
really fell off my chair when she said I want
to be your surrogate, and I told her she was mad. Yeah,
it was a crazy idea, and I thought she was
a retired surrogate, but she was adamant that she was
ready to do another journey for Tom and I.
Speaker 2 (04:19):
So how does the proces work?
Speaker 1 (04:22):
So we really delved into all of the topics that
we needed to cover to make sure we really were
on the same page. So there's lots of things to discuss.
You want to make sure you're on the same page
about termination, about what the birth looks like, about vaccinations,
about diet, exercise, or what happens in pregnancy, birth and beyond.
(04:44):
So I guess first off, we wanted to make sure
we ticked off everything on that list to make sure
we were on the same page and that there was
nothing that was going to come up later that would
be detrimental to our team. So that was kind of
the first step. And once we knew we're all on
the same page, we go and do the mandatory counseling
(05:05):
that you do, so you do intended parents do counseling
Julie does counseling, and then we all do counseling together
to try to, I guess, go through everything to make
sure there's no red flags, to make sure that we're
all on the same page, and it really is one
of those exercise you've got to do as part of
the legal process. Then we go through the legal side,
(05:26):
which is to write a surrogacy agreement, We get independent
legal advice, we signed that agreement. We then have to
go through our ethics committee at the IBS clinics. Julie
has to go through and get approved as a surrogate
from a specialist obstetrician. We have to get approved as
requiring surrogacy. We need to have a legitimate reason for
(05:48):
requiring surrogacy. So all of that needs to happen, and
the IVF clinics have to approve your case. And once
you've been approved, then you can move forward to the
next step, which is the transfer stage to trying to
transfer those embryos.
Speaker 2 (06:04):
And one thing that I personally love hearing from parents
who have gone through in fertility is what was it
like getting that positive test.
Speaker 1 (06:13):
When Jules told us, You know, it was immediate shock
that you'd done it already, but I was so happy
that she had been sneaky as well, because the pressure
of that blood test and it's just it's so overwhelming
to go to that blood test and then wait for
the phone call. So when she did that and I
(06:33):
saw Tom kind of automatically going, yeah, nah, it doesn't matter.
You know, you've got to have the blood test too,
and she pulled it out, I was like, here we
go with. You know, we've hicked that first hule, that
is the biggest one. And yeah. It was complete disbelief
because you know, at that stage, we only had one embryo,
so we had one shot at it as well. So
(06:57):
when Jules offered to be our surrogate, we didn't have
any embryos. We were doing round after round after round
trying to make embryos and transferring them to me just
to try for a miracle. And when she asked us
if she could be our surrogate, then I said to Tom,
just one more round, Just one more I'd said that
many times, but I really meant it this time. And
(07:19):
it was the magic round. And I was forty four
and a half, so it was such a small chance
of it being a normal embryo, and sure enough I
got one embryo. She was normal, and that was the
one embryo we had to transfer to Jules. So there
was a lot writing on that transfer as well. Coming up.
She kept saying to me, I think it's strong to
(07:40):
go to hospital, Mum. I think I think we need
to get out of here.
Speaker 2 (07:54):
The time has finally come. And despite being a midwife herself,
Julie was like every other mum in early labor.
Speaker 1 (08:02):
The contractions had really picked up by then, and so
I actually messaged a friend of mine and said, I
don't know what to do with myself. You know, these
contractions are getting stronger. I just I'm so tired, and
I'm a midwife, and I'm seeking the advice of a
friend to say what do I do. So ended up
calling Truty, and Truty like, oh, we're on, I'll head over.
(08:22):
I said, no, No, don't head over yet, you know,
maybe get Tom home from work. But I, in my head,
I felt wearing for a long hul there is another
eighteen hours before you know, we meet this baby, So
no need to rush and no need to panic. But
I could hear in Trudy's voice that she was probably
feeling quite nervous and anxious. Anyway, I hung up from
her and got my daughter home from work. She arrived
home and I was in the shower being quite vocal,
(08:45):
so she was a bit sort of scared. Anyway, I
continued to labor at home, tried the bath. I didn't
realize at the time that my poor daughter was feeling
extremely overwhelmed. It was just the two of us here.
She kept saying to me, I think it's time to
go to hospital. Mum, I think, stime, I think we
need to get out of here. I'll just give truth
to a call and let it. No, don't call Trudy,
don't tell Trudy. Trudy doesn't need to be here.
Speaker 3 (09:06):
It's too early.
Speaker 1 (09:06):
It's too early. And then my other support person, who
is a dear friend, Hannah, who also is a midwife.
I'd been in touch with her, and she said, let
me come over, let me come over, and I said, no,
it's only early, it's too early to come over. Little
did I know it was things were really happening quite quickly.
So Indian Hannah did come over, and Trudy and Tom
had actually left home. Despite me saying, no, it's going
(09:29):
to be hours yet, But thankfully they'd left home to
head over in this direction, and my daughter had actually
then messaged Trudy and said, look, meet us at the hospital.
Don't come here because things are progressing quickly, so just
come straight to the hospital. The drive to the hospital
is quite harrowing. It wasn't an enjoyable ride. I'm only
five minutes from the hospital, but it was really I
think I've scarred my daughter for life with that drive.
Speaker 2 (09:51):
After arriving at the hospital, Trudy and Tom were right
there in the delivery room waiting for their child to
be born.
Speaker 1 (09:58):
Yeah, so Jules had her support people around her as
well as Tom and I. So she had her daughter
and her best friend and her two midwives there and
Tom and I in the room. And for a lot
of it, they'd done that before with Jules. They'd been
her support person, so they knew exactly how to get
her through the labor. So they had a huge role
(10:20):
in helping her. And there was lots of moments when
Tom and I were over there holding her hand and
telling her how wonderful she was, and a lot of
moments where poor Tom was hiding in the back because
he was quite traumatized as well. You get a good
sense of what it feels like to be the partner
of the person giving birth when you feel so helpless
(10:42):
and there's nothing you can do to take that pain
away from them. They've just got to kind of get
through it. So it's really hard to watch, especially in
a surrogacy birth. Feels like such a privilege to be
in the room for a surrogacy birth because they are
so rare and they're so emotional. And I remember I
(11:02):
was right but Tom and I were right beside Julie
on that last push, and I remember the midwife saying,
you know, pop your head down and have a look.
You'll see her come out. And I saw this dark
hair and then I saw her face and she was
still in the sack. It was the most incredible thing
I've ever seen. So she was still in the sack,
(11:24):
and the midwife, Heidi, had to kind of tear the
sack open around her face, and it was the most
incredible thing I've ever seen, sort of seeing her kind
of come out of this sack. Water went everywhere, and
then you know, it was just one contraction and she
was completely out, like it wasn't just her head it
was her whole body was just kind of came over
(11:45):
and flipped onto Julie. So it felt like it happened
really quickly. At the end, there we were at the
hospital less than two hours and even looking at Julie
and we've got photos from the berth, we had a
birth photographer, and just the look of shock, like we
all knew a baby was going to be born, but
just the look on Julie's face was like, Wow, she's
(12:07):
looked gobsmack that she'd done it. And I couldn't believe
this baby was there either, after everything that we've been through.
So it really is the most surreal experience seeing that
baby for the first time and then hearing her cry.
She cried straight away, so that was, you know, the
hugest thing of relief for me is to hear a
(12:27):
cry and see everybody okay. So it was incredible.
Speaker 2 (12:33):
Despite delivering a healthy baby girl still in the memoranes,
might I add, things took a scary turn for Julie.
Speaker 1 (12:41):
I noticed that the dynamics in the room had changed
between my friends, my midwifs, and I thought something wasn't right.
And I looked at Heidi and I said to her
I'm bleeding, aren't I? And she said, yeah, yeah you are.
So I knew at that point I just needed to
focus on newly and let them do what they needed
(13:02):
to do. The doctor came in very quickly to try
and stop the bleeding, and then you know, all the
different drugs and ivy fluids and commenced, and I just
kept looking at Tom and Trudy. I just kept making
them my focus and tried to sort of distance myself
to what was happening because I've been in the emergencies
before and they're not much fun. So I thought, I
(13:24):
just and I remember looking at Trudy and Tom saying,
I'm just not ready to hand her over yet. I
just needed her to stay on me. And they had
no objections at all that were like no, no keeper,
please keep her so and I think she was probably
looking back at photos. I think she's probably about forty
forty five minutes before I handed her over. I just
(13:46):
didn't feel ready until that point. I just felt like
I needed her with me, and I felt no pressure
or no sense of urgency from Trudy or Tom to
hand her over. Yeah, it was probably around four o'clock
when I handed her over, and by that stage the
bleeding had settled and stopped and the doctors had finished
(14:06):
doing what they needed to do.
Speaker 2 (14:07):
This moment of pure love and selflessness, despite the craziness,
is incredibly heartwarming to me. But then it was time
for Julie to hand over Lily to her intended parents.
Speaker 1 (14:21):
I felt very passionately about being the one that handed
the baby that I've grown over to her parents. I didn't,
you know, want someone to take her off me and
hand her over, And we'd sort of discussed that during
pregnancy that you know, what if the baby's born and
she's not well and she has to go to the
special care nursery, you know how a handover might look
(14:41):
in that scenario. Thankfully we weren't faced with that. But
to me, that handover was really important because that's that
real altruistic part where what you've done and that that
official handover to the parents was pretty special and yeah,
very very emotionally fueled.
Speaker 3 (15:01):
Lots of tears true to tell me about meeting Lily
for the first time.
Speaker 1 (15:12):
One of the best parts I think about Zeregacy is
actually watching Julie with that baby as well, so we
get to see what she looks like we get to
look over her and see this incredible human that Jewles
has grown. And she could have stayed there for hours,
it wouldn't have bothered me. I'd waited years for this moment,
so I didn't care how long it took for Jewels
(15:35):
to hand her over, Like that is the moment. You know,
all the planning or the counseling, all the legs, all
the whole pregnancy, you're leading up to this moment when
the baby's born, she's healthy, and then you have that
handover moment. And so that to us, we needed to
preserve that. And it was a beautiful moment because Jewles
(15:56):
literally just picked her up and handed her to me.
And it's the most emotional moment because I could not
give birth to her, but you know, she is genetically mine.
She is Throughout the whole pregnancy, I felt close enough
to Jules that she still felt like she was mine.
And it's yeah, it's just that moment that we become
(16:18):
parents again, thanks to the selflessness of our beautiful surrogate, Julie.
So it's an incredible moment and thank goodness, we've got,
you know, the photos to remember it by, and we've
all got a great memory of that process because it
was something that we had wanted for so long. Yeah,
and she was healthy and Jules was healthy. Like, you know,
(16:42):
she had the big bleed, but at that point of handover,
we knew the bleeding had stopped, she'd been sewed up,
and everything was hopefully okay. It was definitely a scary
moment because I knew something was going on, and you can,
I saw that moment kind of let dynamic in the
room change as well, and I'm automatically like, how's Julie.
(17:06):
Is Julie okay? Is Julie okay? And I just wanted
to know that she was okay and yeah, and goodness
was okay.
Speaker 2 (17:14):
Now, the fourth trimester looked a bit different for this family,
but one thing's for sure, Baby Lily had no shortage
of love and nutrition.
Speaker 1 (17:23):
I also induced blactation, so I was able to feed Lily.
So that was something that was really special. That also
happened posts you know, just after the birth. So after
the handover, I got to feed Lily, and that then
makes me feel part of then growing her. You know,
jewels grow her to nine months, and I got to
(17:44):
grow her afterwards. So it's a really special thing to
be able to do that. And Jewels also pumped milk
for us to help, So really the two of us
grew her, you know, for the first few months. You know,
I'm eternally grateful that Jewels gave up years really of
(18:07):
her life, control of her poor body. And yeah, and
we've got this beautiful little girl now to celebrate.
Speaker 2 (18:19):
Here on Diary of a Birth, lucky enough to have
the wisdom of Australia's favorite pediatrician, doctor Gollie, to give
us some insight into some of our burning medical questions. Now,
what I really wanted to know is how does inducing
lactation work? And can anyone do it?
Speaker 4 (18:36):
It's a really fascinating question. The answer is yes, it
is possible. It's not particularly easy. You know, there's a
certain cascade of hormone changes, body changes that happen throughout
pregnancy that set the scene for breastfeeding and breast milk production. Ultimately,
what you need to make breast milk is you need
three things. You need stimulation, which means baby sucking on
(19:00):
nipple or a breast pump providing that stimulation. You need
the lactating woman to have good hydration, so you need
to drink lots of water, and you also need to sleep,
so sleep water stimulation equals breast milk. Now, you don't
actually need that cascade of pregnancy and delivery in order
(19:21):
to create breast milk. You can actually stimulate someone to
make milk just simply by stimulating the nipple. So technically,
and it's not something I recommend for anyone to do,
but technically, if you sucked on someone's nipple enough, they
would eventually lactate.
Speaker 2 (19:41):
Witnessing that magical moment when a surrogate hands over the baby,
it's hard to put into words.
Speaker 4 (19:48):
I don't know that there is a more beautiful, noble, altruistic,
and magnanimous act on the planet. I just can't think
of one. It blows my mind. I get so emotional
every time I'm involved in one of these incredible cases
because I know how challenging pregnancy can be. I know
(20:12):
how challenging childbirth is, and for someone to voluntarily put
themselves through that, they're family through that, their partner, their
own children, if that's the case, in order to give
the gift of life and the gift of family to
another person, sometimes a stranger, it completely blows my mind,
(20:33):
and for me, it doesn't matter if there's any money exchanged.
It's just absolutely phenomenal. I can't find the words to
describe how much I'm speechless when I talk about it.
So the moment that a child is born and the
surrogate or obstetrician, pediatrician, whomever it may be, hands that
(20:55):
baby to the expectant parents, it really is very, very
very difficult to describe. It's a kind of magic that
you feel really privileged to be able to witness that.
And then I hear a lot from the carrying mothers
that that comment like you've heard like you do it
(21:16):
for that moment. You do it for the moment where
you hand the child over and you can see this
couple or this individual that has usually come to this
point with so many years of trauma, heartache, pregnancy loss,
fertility struggles, and to get to that point where they
are holding their own child. It's special. To say the
(21:37):
very very least.
Speaker 2 (21:42):
Thank you for joining us on Diary of a Birth,
where we celebrate all the amazing ways that we as
women bring life into the world.
Speaker 1 (21:49):
If you'd like to share your birth.
Speaker 2 (21:51):
Story with us, we'd love to hear from you. Details
are in the show notes. Diary of a Birth was
hosted by me Cassenia Lukige, with expert input fromp Doctor Golly.
This episode was produced by Tom Lyon and myself Cassane Lukage,
with audio production by Scott Stronik,
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