Tina’s shock news! Mum again at 54!
At 54, Tina Malone is using a surrogate to carry the baby she longs for – and she couldn’t care less if people don’t approve
She hit the headlines when she gave birth to an IVF baby aged 50. And now, at 54, Tina Malone is going to be a mum again.
The Shameless star will use a surrogate to carry one of the eight embryos – created from the sperm of husband Paul Chase, 32, and the egg of a donor – currently in storage at a Cypriot fertility clinic to produce a sibling for threeyear-old daughter Flame.
Already a grandmother, Liverpool-born Tina knows her decision will be a controversial one.
‘People are going to say I’m selfish and irresponsible, because when the baby is 20, I’ll be 74. But I don’t want Flame to be an only child. I’ve no intention of shuffling off this planet yet, and I’ll probably live until 104, because I am that wilful. But if I don’t, then Flame will have a sibling,’ says Tina.
‘To be honest, I’d have 10 more if I had the room. I’d adopt a few Syrian babies – I’d have a Romanian baby and a Bulgarian baby.
‘The only difference between me and Simon Cowell, Elton John, Mick Jagger and all those other old parents is that they’re loaded. I’m not. But we wouldn’t have gone into this if we didn’t know we could afford it.’
Already mum to Danielle, 35, and besotted with daughter Flame, Tina longed for another child – but Paul feared a pregnancy would take too much of a toll on her body.
Tina suffered pre-eclampsia and underwent an emergency Caesarean with Flame, and she’s had additional surgeries, related to her incredible 12st weight loss following gastric band surgery.
‘I’d gone down to a size 6, so I had my tummy tightened and my boob implants replaced from a 34D to a 34C. So that meant, in 20 months, I’d had 10 major surgical procedures,’ she says.
‘For the past three years, I’d cry and say to Paul, “Please let me have another one.” The doctor said I was more than fit enough, but Paul said, “No, she’s not doing it.” He wasn’t prepared for me to risk my life.
‘My husband is no pushover. I can scream and tantrum, but he’s having none of it. So by January, I realised I had to accept defeat. I couldn’t risk depriving Flame of her mother. I was wrong to consider having another baby at 54.’
But, when the couple returned to Cyprus to discuss what to do with the eight embryos they had in storage from Tina’s first IVF attempts, they had a eureka moment.
‘My surgeon said, “Have you thought about surrogacy?” and I nearly fell off my chair – my eyes lit up like I’d won the lottery,’ recalls Tina.
Tina and Paul are now set to choose the surrogate who will carry the child they hope will be a boy.
‘If the embryos are eight girls, I’ll have a girl. But I have always wanted a son,’ admits Tina.
‘Paul and I will be there when the embryo is planted, and then I will go back every four weeks for her tests and scans. We can be in the room with her when she gives birth.’
And Tina has no issues with hiring a stranger to carry her baby.
‘This is not a baby farm. These girls see it as a job, a means to an education for getting on in the world. Their health is the clinic’s main concern,’ she says.
Nor is she focusing on the fear that the surrogate could decide to keep the baby.
‘She can decide not to hand it over, and there is nothing you can do about it. And it happens. But you can’t go through life being negative,’ says the actress.
So Tina will soon be mother to a newborn, who’ll be younger than her one-year-old granddaughter, Dorothy, – and she couldn’t be prouder of her decision.
‘My days of Champagne, cocaine and rock ’n’ roll are very far behind me. I am healthy, sound of mind and solvent. I don’t care what anyone else thinks. If a hundred trolls want to say what a selfish, ugly, wrinkly, loud, brassy old trollop I am, tell me all day long,’ she says.
‘I have looked into this every way, and I wish myself good luck, even if others don’t.’