A young woman who was once told she wouldn’t be able to have children due to fertility issues has given birth to her second child at the Royal Lancaster Infirmary.
Sarah Igo, a writer from Arnside in Cumbria, and her husband Karl, are delighted to now have two beautiful children – daughter Dillon and baby boy Indie – thanks to the kindness, compassion and generosity of Sarah’s sister, who donated her eggs to the couple, enabling IVF treatment to take place.
Sarah was so moved by the experience of having her first daughter that she wrote a delightful children’s book on the subject called ‘Hetty the Hen Who Couldn’t Lay’.
At just 14 years old Sarah was told that having children would not be possible for her and this terrible news sent her into a downward spiral of despair, depression and anxiety.
Sarah said: “I was in my early teens and, unlike most of my friends, I hadn’t started my periods. I didn’t think much of it at the time, but I did eventually go to the doctor in Preston and they ran some tests.
“I just thought I was a bit slow, but to my horror, a scan showed that I didn’t have any ovaries. They said: ‘You are not going to have any babies’. I can still hear the woman’s voice – that has never left me. I think at the time I tried to block it out, but, looking back, I started having terrible panic attacks and social anxiety, especially when I started college.
“I had always loved school, but I started skipping classes because, in retrospect, I just didn’t want any contact with people.”
However, what Sarah had been told in her early teens wasn’t strictly true as she did have a uterus.
“In my 20s I started to investigate the possibilities,” said Sarah. “I found out I could try for a baby with a donor’s egg. This was an incredible thing for me to hear after thinking I was never going to be able to have children.
“I had met my husband Karl, and we knew that we wanted to have children so we started thinking about how we could make it happen.”
Sarah’s younger sister, Beth Gillies, then made an incredible offer to Sarah and Karl.
“Beth was born when I was 13 years old and when she was old enough, we talked about my condition,” explained Sarah. “Beth has always been very understanding and wise beyond her years.
“She offered to donate her eggs to us – it was incredible! She hadn’t had a family of her own at that point and she understood that donating wasn’t without risks, so I didn’t want to put her future in jeopardy.
“Beth just kept offering and eventually all three of us had an in-depth discussion and Karl and I gratefully said ‘yes’.
“I told Beth it was a gift I could never repay and it was really hard for me, as her big sister, to let her to do this – as I felt that I should be the one helping her. She is simply an amazing person!
“We’ve all been very open about things and the three of us have a fantastic relationship. Once we had decided to do it, we laughed a lot about some of the comical situations we found ourselves in at meetings and appointments. My go-to defence is humour and it has served me well.
“It was an overwhelmingly joyful experience when the pregnancy test was positive. I didn’t expect the IVF to work at all. From 16 eggs taken, only two developed to a day five blastocyst. The first attempt didn’t work, so when the second one did, it was a shock.
“I went through the pregnancy in a terrified state, constantly worried something would go wrong. After my daughter Dillon was born, I now realise I experienced imposter syndrome, doubting myself incredibly due to believing for years I wasn’t born able to be a mother. Looking back, I think I was quite depressed and I doubted myself so much. It took good year before I really accepted that Dillon accepted me as a mum.”
The second time around with IVF, Sarah and Karl decided to opt for an anonymous donor.
Sarah said: “We had no embryos left from the first time and, out of concern for Beth and the fact that she might choose to pursue a family in the future, we chose not to ask Beth to put herself through the process again. Five years later, as a qualified junior doctor she is in a much different position in her life.
“We are still very open about things and I said I hoped she wasn’t upset that we didn’t ask her again. I said I was relieved she didn’t offer to donate again, as if she had offered I would have refused out of concern for her; but she also said she was relieved, because if I’d asked her to donate, she would have done. We both care about each other so much, it’s a characteristic I really hope Dillon and Indie will share growing up.”
This time, Sarah and Karl had an anonymous egg donor and are excited that Dillon now has a sibling.
“We are so lucky that this has been possible on the NHS,” said Sarah. “We’re also very grateful to the anonymous donor who just wanted to help.
“It blew me away to know that it was a woman who just wanted to help people like me, who were in a similar position to some of her friends. If it’s ever possible to meet the donor, I would like to shake her hand and thank her for her incredible gift.”
Hetty the Hen Who Couldn’t Lay, was written for Beth and Dillon by Sarah as she was going through her first IVF treatment.
Sarah said: “My book is all about openness and honesty. It’s about making children aware of their origins in a sensitive way.
“When we were having counselling, the literature about our situation that was available at the time didn’t resonate with me.
“That was when I thought, I’m going to write something for myself, and that was when Hetty the Hen was born. It’s a natural allegory for our story.”
Sarah’s illustrator friend, Rebecca Williamson from Lupton, created the charming illustrations for the book.
Sarah said: “It was during lockdown and Rebecca rang me one day and said: ‘Have you ever fancied writing a children’s book?’
“I did have this wonderful story in mind and Rebecca has such a talent for illustration, so we went for it. It was just incredible.
“I wanted it not to just be for children, but also for people stuck in stuffy waiting rooms anticipating news. If the story of Hetty is just a little bit helpful to families, I will be happy.”
Hetty the Hen Who Couldn’t Lay is about a hen who wants a chick and needs the help of another hen to have one. It’s a story about sharing and kindness.
“Dillon can read now and it’s wonderful to hear her reading Hetty and chuckling at the pictures of the hens,” said Sarah. “She once said to me: ‘You don’t have eggs - like Hetty’, which is exactly what I wanted from this story – for it to act as a prompt for Dillon and I to explore her own origins. Everything is out in the open.”
A note on the back cover of Hetty the Hen reads: ‘Meet Hetty, the hen who just couldn’t lay. A simple and heartfelt story, dedicated to all mums and their chicks, and especially those who needed to borrow an egg’.
Sarah said the response to the book from children and adults has been incredibly positive: “Many adults are visibly moved when they read it. That’s how I feel when I think about what Beth did.”
Dillon is five-years-old now and is a wonderful big sister to Indie. Like Dillon, Indie was born at the Royal Lancaster Infirmary.
Sarah added: “I’m incredibly lucky to have Dillon and Indie – I really am.
“My midwife was amazing and so proactive. I talked to her about what happened in my first pregnancy. She reassured me all the way through the second pregnancy, especially when I was worried. She was so astute and she made me feel empowered. We could talk things through and I never felt judged. It was a completely different pregnancy to the first time and I was able to enjoy the experience more and embrace it.
“If my book can help people to get though a similar situation - that would be wonderful.”
Hetty the Hen Who Couldn’t Lay is published by Troubador in the UK.
For more info, please go to Troubador.