Grandma gives birth to her own grandchild

September 8, 2012

Cindy

Chicago, September 8: ?Setting foot in a hospital again, Emily and Mike Jordan couldn't help but feel anxious.

More than two years before, at age 29, Emily had been diagnosed with cervical cancer. But just before she was to undergo a radical hysterectomy, she was told that she was pregnant.

Faced with saving her own life or their unborn child's, the young couple made the excruciating decision to go forward with her surgery. It meant losing the baby, and forfeiting any chance at having their own children.

Or so they thought.

“I can't describe what that was like after finding out you have cancer, after finding out your chance of ever carrying a baby is gone,” Emily says, still stammering at times as she recounts that painful day in 2010.

Simply put, her body no longer had a place where a baby could grow.

But now, more than two years later, she and Mike had come from their suburban Chicago home to the labour and delivery department of a downtown hospital to realise the dream they thought was lost — to become parents, though not the way they, or most people, would have imagined.

Alongside them that day was Emily's mother, Cindy Reutzel — a fit, silver-haired 53-year-old grandmother whose profile revealed a round belly, a pregnant belly.

Reutzel was about to give birth to her own grandchild.

Just 34 years ago, Louise Brown, the first “test tube” baby, was born in Great Britain. The result? A veritable in-vitro baby boom.

It started with would-be mothers in their 20s and 30s. “Then people started pushing the envelope,” says Dr Helen Kim, director of the in vitro

fertilisation programme at the University of Chicago. “If you could help a menopausal woman in her 30s, could you help a menopausal woman in her 40s? And then it became, ‘Can you help a menopausal woman in her 50s?'

“And the answer is yes.”

Some older women were having their own babies. But more often, they were using egg donors to have their own children, or serving as surrogates or “gestational carriers”.

There was the 51-year-old grandmother in Brazil who gave birth to her twin grandchildren in 2007. There've been others, grandmothers in their 40s or 50s and even 60s.

Cindy Reutzel, Emily's mom, had a vague recollection of those stories. So when doctors shared the good news that they had been able to keep Emily's ovaries intact, Reutzel immediately made the offer.

“What if I carried your baby for you?” she asked.

Emily and Mike didn't take it too seriously at first. “We didn't really think that was a realistic option,” says Emily, who works in hospital administration.

It turned out, though, that it wasn't really that far-fetched after all, particularly for a young grandmother who's in good health, like Reutzel.

After a process that included psychological evaluation and hormonal manipulation to prepare their bodies, Kim eventually implanted Reutzel's uterus with an embryo created with an egg from Emily and Mike's sperm.

It was no easy process, with a regimen of hormonal shots. Work schedules were interrupted and vacations postponed. But Reutzel was committed.

“The thought of Emily and Mike not being able to have children and share that piece of their lives with someone just broke my heart,” says Reutzel, who lives in Chicago and is executive director at medical foundation. “I want Emily to have that connection with another human being like I had with her.”

As her belly grew, people started asking about “her baby”. But she was quick to tell them the story. This was not her baby, she was Grandma.

Admittedly, she says, she worried about the physical toll pregnancy might take, though her body handled it better than she expected. She also wondered how well she'd bounce back from a Caesarean section. That's how she had delivered Emily and her older brother, but that had been three decades ago.

Still, she reassured Emily and Mike throughout the pregnancy that the baby was fine, she was fine, everything would be fine.

Humour helped. Mike often teased his mother-in-law each time they'd take her to dinner or do something nice for her.

“Are we even yet?” he'd ask.

“Not yet,” she'd reply, laughing.

In truth, Mike and Emily knew there'd really be no way to repay this kind of gesture.

“This is a continuation of everything that she has done her entire life for me, which is to make sure that I have the best life possible,” Emily says.

All they could do, they said, was to promise to raise their baby as best they could. And that was enough for Reutzel.

“I know I gave a gift,” she says. “But I'm also getting so much in return.”

Last week, a few days after Emily's 32nd birthday, daughter sat next to mother, holding hands in the delivery room.

And Elle Cynthia Jordan was born.

“She looks just like you! She looks just like you!” Emily shouted, running from the delivery room to introduce their newborn to Mike.

Reutzel is recovering well. She even says she'd consider doing it again.

“When I watch both of them hold that baby and look into her face, it's like everything I could have imagined wanting for them — better than I could have imagined,” she says, her eyes filling with tears.

“This is what it was all about for me.”

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News Network
March 19,2020

Rome, Mar 19: Italy on Wednesday reported 475 new deaths from the novel coronavirus, the highest one-day official toll of any nation since the first case was detected in China late last year.

The total number of deaths in Italy has reached 2,978, more than half of all the cases recorded outside China, while the number of infections stood at 35,713.

The previous record high of 368 deaths was also recorded in Italy, on Sunday. The nation of 60 million has now recorded 34.2 percent of all the deaths officially attributed to COVID-19 across the world.

With the death rate still climbing despite the Mediterranean country entering a second week under an effective lockdown, officials urged Italians to have faith and to stay strong.

"They main thing is, do not give up," Italian National Institute of Health chief Silvio Brusaferro said in a nationally televised press conference.

"It will take a few days before we see the benefits" of containment measures, said Brusaferro. "We must maintain these measures to see their effect, and above all to protect the most vulnerable."

Imposed nationally on March 12, the shutdown of most Italian businesses and a ban on public gatherings are due to expire on March 25.

But school closures and other measures, such as a ban fan attendance at sporting events, are due to run on until April 3.

A top government minister hinted Wednesday that the school closure would be extended well into next month, if not longer.

The rates within Italy itself remained stable, with two-thirds of the deaths -- 1,959 in all -- reported in the northern Lombardy region around Milan, the Italian financial and fashion capital.

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Agencies
August 7,2020

Colombo, Aug 7: Sri Lankan President Gotabaya Rajapaksa's party and its allies won an overwhelming two-thirds majority in a parliament election, results showed on Friday, giving him the power to enact sweeping changes to the constitution.

The governing Sri Lanka Podujana Peramuna and its allies had won 150 seats in the 225-member parliament, according to the tally published by the election commission from Wednesday's vote.

Rajapaksa had sought a two-thirds majority in parliament to be able to restore full executive powers to the presidency, which he says are necessary to implement his agenda to make the tiny island economically and militarily secure.

He is likely to install his older brother and former President Mahinda Rajapaksa as the next prime minister. The brothers are best known for crushing the Tamil Tiger rebels fighting for a separate homeland for minority Tamils during the elder Rajapaksa's presidency in 2009.

On a congratulatory phone call from Prime Minister Narendra Modi of India, which is keen to check Chinese influence on its southern neighbour, Mahinda Rajapaksa vowed to deepen ties between the two countries.

"With the strong support of the people of Sri Lanka, I look forward to working with you closely to further enhance the long-standing cooperation between our two countries," he told Modi. "Sri Lanka and India are friends and relations."

The tourism-dependent nation of 21 million people has been struggling economically since deadly Islamist militant attacks on hotels and churches last year followed by lockdowns to slow the spread of the coronavirus. 

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News Network
June 6,2020

Washington, Jun 6: Washington mayor Muriel Bowser on Friday renamed an area near the White House that has become the epicenter of anti-racism protests over the past week "Black Lives Matter Plaza" -- unveiling a giant street mural.

But in so doing, the African-American mayor piqued the ire of the very movement she was supporting, as well as of President Donald Trump.

The protests are focused on the May 25 death in Minneapolis of 46-year-old black man George Floyd while in police custody. A white officer kneeled on his neck until he lost consciousness.

That officer and three others are now in custody and facing charges -- second-degree murder for the kneeling officer, and aiding and abetting that crime for his colleagues.

Just north of the White House, the words BLACK LIVES MATTER were painted in huge yellow letters along the street leading to the presidential mansion, along with the symbol from the DC flag.

"The section of 16th street in front of the White House is now officially 'Black Lives Matter Plaza'," Bowser tweeted.

A city worker put up a new street sign with the name.

"Determination to make America the land it ought to be," she said on Twitter.

The corner of 16th and H is significant -- in a controversial incident on Monday, peaceful protesters gathered there were dispersed with tear gas.

Shortly afterwards, Trump walked from the White House to a nearby church for a photo op, during which he held the Bible in his hand.

"There was a dispute this week about whose street this is. Mayor Bowser wanted to make it abundantly clear that this is DC's street and to honor demonstrators" who protested on Monday, her chief of staff John Falcicchio tweeted.

Rose Jaffe, one of the artists in the collective that painted the BLACK LIVES MATTER sign, told AFP it was "about reclaiming the streets of DC."

But she added that Bowser "has to do more than just a photo-op -- she must carry on when this is washed away" on issues like police accountability.

Stars Like LeBron James praised her move on Twitter, but the local chapter of the Black Lives Movement balked, calling the mural a "performative distraction from real policy changes."

"This is to appease white liberals while ignoring our demands," it said on Twitter, saying Bowser had "consistently been on the wrong side" of the movement.

'We are well equipped'

The US government deployed a significant contingent of federal officers and National Guard troops from other states -- many of them not wearing any identifying garb or badges -- to handle protests in Washington.

Bowser had called up the local Guardsmen but the Justice Department moved to take partial control of peacekeeping, with Guard troops from as far away as Utah brought in.

In a letter to Trump dated Thursday and tweeted early Friday, Bowser called for "all extraordinary federal law enforcement and military presence" to be removed.

She said their deployment was "inflaming demonstrators and adding to the grievances of those who, by and large, are peacefully protesting for change and for reforms to the racist and broken systems that are killing black Americans."

"These additional, unidentified units are operating outside of established chains of command," she added.

"We are well equipped to handle large demonstrations and First Amendment activities," including the right to assemble, Bowser said.

Trump reiterated on Friday that authorities need to "dominate the streets," and has been unapologetic about the deployment of forces.

And on Twitter, he lashed out at Bowser, calling her "incompetent" and saying the National Guard had saved her from "great embarrassment."

Senator Mike Lee of Utah accused Bowser of evicting Utah National Guard members from area hotels.

She replied: "DC residents cannot pay their hotel bills. The Army can clear that up with the hotel today, and we are willing to help."

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