A northern Illinois grandmother gave birth to her own granddaughter at an Illinois hospital earlier this month.
51 year old Julie Loving of Manteno was the gestastional surrogate carrier for her daughter, 29 year old Breanna Lockwood. Loving gave birth to her granddaughter via emergency C-section on November 2nd at an Illinois hospital. Breanna and her husband Aaron had been trying to have a child since they wed in 2016.
After trying naturally for a year, Lockwood began seeing a fertility specialist. According to the Chicago Tribune, Lockwood had multiple rounds of in vitro fertilization, multiple surgeries, and two miscarriages one of which included twins. Doctors eventually told Lockwood her body could not sustain a pregnancy.
Lockwood’s doctor, Brian Kaplan, of Fertility Centers of Illinois, suggested that finding a family member or friend to act as her gestational carrier would be a good option as the cost through an agency can be more than $100,000, according to Kaplan. After multiples tests, Loving was eventually determined to be a good carrier for the pregnancy. After a successful embryo transfer in February, Loving was confirmed to be pregnant in March.
The family’s story appeared on Good Morning America this week.