A cancer drug gave us our LITTLE MIRACLES

Estella Newbold-Brown was ready to take a risk to get the family she'd always wanted

- WORDS: MISHA AL KHAN, LUCY LAING

No journey to motherhood is the same and for same-sex couples like me and my wife Faye, it's never quite as straightforward as one would hope. But the uphill battle we faced made getting to that final destination all the more rewarding.

I met Faye, then 34, in September 2015 at a dinner with mutual friends. I worked as a lawyer and Faye was a charity company secretary. I'd been dating unsuccessfully for 10 years and had all but given up on meeting that special someone. But with Faye there was an instant spark and we bonded over our shared love of drag queens and cats!

Early in our relationship we spoke about our desire to have a baby - and we had some important conversations about everything from which one of us would carry the baby (we were both happy to) to adoption (which we were both open to if it came to it).

In June 2017, I asked Faye to marry me at Glastonbury, presenting her with a diamond ring. We were excited about getting married and starting a family, so just a month after our wedding in August 2018 at Danson House in Bexleyheath, Faye and I had an appointment at the fertility clinic. We had our hormone levels checked as well as scans and blood tests, and chose a sperm donor, all the while trying to decide which of us would be the one to carry our future child.

After lots of back and forth conversations about it, one day we just agreed that I would be the one to do it. We got through the IVF process together, the daily injections becoming something of a ritual as we laid out the medication I had to take at home every evening, in preparation for egg retrieval. I'd set an alarm to go off at the same time each day, injecting my tummy and writing it down in a notebook. Faye was there, supporting me through it all.

Failed attempt