BEATING THE ODDS TO HAVE A BABY
It’s many a woman’s wish to bear her own child. But if you can’t, it doesn’t mean you can’t be a mother. The following celebrities overcame many obstacles to become parents…
JIMMY FALLON
& NANCY JUVONEN
The couple have two daughters, Winnie (6) and Frances (5), born via a surrogate. “If there’s anyone out there who is trying and they’re just losing hope… just hang in there,” Jimmy told the Today show.
“Try every avenue; try anything you can do, ’cause you’ll get there. You’ll end up with a family, and it’s so worth it. It is the most ‘worth it’ thing.” TYRA BANKS & ERIK ASLA
Tyra admits to having had fertility problems. “When I turned 40, the one thing I was not happy about is that I did not have kids.
“Of the IVF procedures I’ve undergone, I’ve had some not-happy and very traumatic moments. It’s difficult as you get older. It’s not something that can just happen.”
Tyra, who is now 45, and long-term partner Erik’s baby boy was born through surrogacy in 2016.
“The best present we worked and prayed so hard for is finally here,” the supermodel shared on Instagram.
“He’s got my fingers and big eyes and his daddy’s mouth and chin. As we thank the angel of a woman who carried our miracle baby boy for us, we pray for everyone who struggles to reach this joyous milestone. York Banks Asla, welcome to the world.”
ANGELA BASSETT & COURTNEY B VANCE
The couple opened up on Oprah about their years-long journey to conceive their fraternal twins, Bronwyn Golden and Slater Josiah, carried via a surrogate, in 2006.
They went through seven years of failed fertility treatments before a friend who was using a surrogate herself mentioned the idea.
GABRIELLE UNION & DWAYNE WADE
Gabrielle wrote about the couple’s battle to fall pregnant in her book We’re Going to Need More
Wine and also spoke to the media. “I have had eight or nine miscarriages,” she writes. “For three years, my body has been a prisoner of trying to get pregnant – I’ve either been about to go into an IVF cycle, in the middle of an IVF cycle, or coming out of an IVF cycle.”
Before she got together with Wade, whom she married in 2014, Gabrielle said she never expected to have children. “I never wanted kids,” she told People. “Then I became a stepmom, and there was no place
I’d rather be than with them… For so many women, and not just women in the spotlight, people feel very entitled to know, ‘Do you want kids?’
“A lot of people, especially people who have fertility issues, just say ‘no’ because that’s a lot easier than being honest about whatever is actually going on. People mean so well, but they have no idea the harm or frustration it can cause.”
The couple welcomed their first child – a baby girl – last November. Gabrielle took to Instagram to make it official.
Quoting the Bill Withers song Lovely
Day, she wrote: “We are sleepless and delirious but so excited to share that our miracle baby arrived last night via surrogate and 11/7 will forever be etched in our hearts as the most loveliest of all the lovely days. Welcome to the party, sweet girl!”
ELIZABETH BANKS
To introduce her first son, Felix, to the world after his birth in 2011, Elizabeth took to her blog: “The one true hurdle I’ve faced in life is that I have a broken belly.
“After years of trying to get pregnant, exploring the range of fertility treatments, all unsuccessful, our journey led us to gestational surrogacy: we make a ‘baby cake’ and bake it in another woman’s ‘oven’.” She later revealed: “It was a womb issue for me. Embryos wouldn’t implant.” MARIAH CAREY
Before she became pregnant with twins Moroccan and Monroe, who were born in 2011, Mariah suffered a miscarriage. When asked by Barbara Walters if she and exhusband Nick Cannon had fertility treatments, Mariah confirmed. “The main thing I did that was tough was to go on progesterone, like, every month. And then when I was pregnant, I had to stay with the progesterone for 10 weeks,” she said. “It minimises the chance of miscarriage by 50 percent.”