Chef and TV host Kelsey Nixon’s journey through motherhood, loss, and leaning on a chosen family.
– KEYS SOULCARE
How chef, blogger, and TV personality Kelsey Nixon moved on after a newborn loss, and through a surrogacy journey that brought unexpected gifts.
As told to Tiffany Davis.
My journey with surrogacy began with losing my second son.
My first baby had been born at 28 weeks. I had a mysterious condition called HELLP Syndrome, which is named for life-threatening characteristics including Hemolysis, elevated liver enzymes, and low platelet count. My doctors didn’t know if I’d suffer from it again with future pregnancies. After that, I really made an effort to seek out a doctor who specialized in the condition, to make sure it was “responsible” to get pregnant again.
I got the two thumbs up: “You’re in good health. There’s a chance you might deliver a few weeks early due to preeclampsia, but nothing that should deter you from growing your family if you’d like to.” That’s an important part of the story, because I think that one of the biggest challenges with surrogacy as the intended mother — which is what we are called — is that many times, you feel as if your body has failed you.
I felt like I’d done my homework and that it was safe for me to get pregnant. And then it wasn’t. I had those same mysterious complications — but with worse, additional ones on top of them. I ended up having my son, Leo, at 25 weeks, under even more dire circumstances. He lived for a month before passing away. I not only felt like I’d failed a test, but also experienced a shame cycle, within myself and my body.
My doctors suggested that my body might trigger an autoimmune response to pregnancy. They said that they couldn’t explain it with an official diagnosis, but they strongly discouraged any future pregnancies.
My husband Robby’s sister, Betsy, had been with us throughout our experience with Leo. She’d watched us live through the dream of raising this child, figuring out how we’d take on raising him with potential special needs, and then the heartbreak of losing him.
On the day of Leo’s graveside service, I remember sitting next to her on the couch and her saying, “I don’t know if you guys would ever do this, but I’d totally carry a baby for you. I could do that. I would love to do that, actually.”
Robby’s initial response was, “Oh, that feels weird. I can’t imagine we’d ever do that.” My brain went to, “Oh, we’ll have to foster or adopt to grow our family.”
My perception at that time was that surrogacy was for only rich celebrities who didn’t want to deal with the physical inconvenience of pregnancy. And that we could never afford it. And that it was even potentially inappropriate to use another woman’s body that way. But after the pregnancy, when I went to my six week follow-up appointment with my doctor, I was surprised to hear that we were great candidates for gestational surrogacy — without even mentioning my sister-in-law’s offer.
I don’t know that we would have sought it out had we not had those two pieces of the puzzle.
As I have gotten to know women in the surrogacy community, I’ve heard over and over again that it’s not a casual (or compelled) decision a woman makes — that it’s more like a calling. There are systems in place to avoid someone feeling coerced or being taken advantage of on either side of the relationship. When handled responsibly, much in the same way that adoption should be, it can be a very beautiful thing for families.
To prepare, I did step one of IVF. But, the emotional experience was much more challenging. All of a sudden — again — it was like my body was supposed to perform and produce results when doctors were counting my eggs. I asked myself, “Am I doing a good job?” (I didn’t have stellar numbers. So, in a way, I felt like I was failing again.)
Egg harvesting is a numbers game. You may start with 13 retrieved eggs… but only seven of them are fertilized… and only five turned into embryos. And then, they have to be genetically tested to make sure that they’re safe for the carrier and genetically viable. (As you can imagine, going from 13 to two is an emotional trip, especially when there’s absolutely no guarantee that it will work.)
IVF is also very expensive. My maternal fetal medicine doctor actually wrote a letter to my insurance company, saying that she had advised against future pregnancies. Because of that, they did cover a small portion of my IVF. (To those who find themselves in a similar situation, it saved us thousands of dollars.)
With Betsy, we became quite the team. Between daily communication — at times, doctors trips for both us at the same time, for different pieces within the process — I had to let go of so many of my previous expectations surrounding pregnancy. It was humbling to accept that I couldn’t do this on my own.
It kind of drives me crazy when people say, “Oh, I don’t know how you did it. I don’t know how you could get through the loss of a child.” And it’s like, Well, I did it the same way you would do it.
I don’t think I realized how much I expected myself to become a mother in a traditional or typical way. I don’t think I realized I’d be so disappointed in my body — the emotional cracks that I didn’t anticipate, but had to fight for a long time.
But, it also taught me to not wrap my entire identity up in motherhood. Motherhood is so beautiful and it should be praised and honored, but it’s also important to remember that there are other things that make us every bit as incredible and worthy and wonderful: My relationships with friends, my husband, and myself. It’s just as important to give equal attention to those aspects of my life.
We can do just about anything and get through anything that life throws at us — physical, emotional, or otherwise. It’s not going to be neat and pretty or always pleasant. But we really can. And it’s freeing to know that I did.
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