<p>"Jaci Dalenberg can be forgiven if she is a little extra-doting on her three new granddaughters. After all, she had them all to herself for nearly eight months.</p>
<p>In a remarkable display of a mothers love, the 56-year-old Cleveland resident acted as a surrogate in carrying triplets for her daughter, Kim Coseno, who desperately wanted to start a family with her husband, Joe. Kim, 36, had a partial hysterectomy that doomed any chance of her having children on her own with Joe. But then her mom stepped up and volunteered to carry a baby (babies, as it turned out) on Kims behalf.</p>
<p>Its just another thing Im doing for my daughter, you know, a mothers love, Dalenberg told Meredith Vieira on TODAY Tuesday via satellite hookup from Cleveland…</p>
<p>Coseno, who has a teenage daughter and teenage son from a previous marriage, had nearly given up hope of starting a family with Joe, her husband of six years. But Dr. James Goldfarb of the Cleveland Clinic told NBC why it wasnt necessarily a lost cause.</p>
<p>I saw this story on TODAY this morning…my first thought was that I didn’t even have MY OWN 3rd child b/c of my difficult pregnancies…going through it again for my daughter? I guess that until it came up, it’s hard to answer, but, yea, I don’t think so…</p>
<p>I could definitely see doing this for a close relative or friend. My pregnancies were very easy. But I think carrying triplets is much too risky. The doctor was irresponsible to transfer so many embryos from a fairly young woman.</p>
<p>My first thought was “I’m glad I am too old for this to even be a possibility”.</p>
<p>Of course if my daughter were in need of that sort of help at some point maybe i would wish I was in a position to help her. But my first thought is probably how I really feel.</p>
<p>I can’t put myself in someone else’s shoes. But I am happy for that family and I saw it on TV this morning. I have never been in the situation of not being able to bear children. I do know one family who used a surrogate mother in a very open way but that surrogate was not a relative. I think it is a loving act for a relative to do (often, however, it is a sister how makes the offer). It seems quite unusual for the grandmother to be the surrogate but if it works for them, I don’t object. It seemed to be done out of love for her daughter and a mother’s love knows no bounds. She was on the old side to carry a baby let alone triplets but supposedly the doctor thought she was up to the task.</p>
<p>I’m personally familiar with the risks of being older and being pregnant as I almost died with my last child, who was born when I was 37. The problem that I had – placenta abrupta – was one that being an older mom places one at risk for.</p>
<p>What amazed me most about the story was that the daughter was willing to have her 56-year-old mother become pregnant with her children. I can’t imagine expecting such a thing from my mom. I would have been very concerned about the risk to my mother’s health. </p>
<p>The biological mother of the children also had 2 other kids. While she hadn’t had those with her current husband, it’s not as if she had had no chance to become a biological mom.</p>
<p>I’m also wondering about the economics involved. Unless they are wealthy, having three infants plus two other children and the costs of the infertility treatments would be quite a financial strain.</p>
<p>OMG - the Mom was 56? That is a year older than me. I just can’t imagine (don’t even want to try and imagine it actually) being pregnant and - aaaaah - giving birth at my age. To one baby let alone 3.</p>
<p>Northstarmom, I’m with you on this one. She has two biological children all ready and I wonder if she felt some kind of need to do this for her new husband. I’m not going to judge her though. It’s her life to live.</p>
<p>I see in another story that the dad is a firefighter, and the mom is a nurse, who plans to be a stay at home mother. The triplets all were preemies. The parents have been married 3 years and were planning to internationally adopt before her mom volunteered to have her daughter’s fertilized eggs implanted in her.</p>
<p>Having had one preemie, I know how difficult it is to go through the various health problems that occur especially when they are very young. </p>
<p>I wish the family the best, but in all honesty, I don’t understand why they would have made such a risky decision.</p>
<p>I just watched the video in the link that you provided. Sure enough, he wanted kids of “his own.” Hope it works out for them. It’s a little too weird for me—if the kids have long term health issues, are they going to subconsciously blame Grandma? Is the Mom going to feel trapped because now she has three babies because “that’s what her new husband wanted”? Isn’t this weird for the Dad—to think that his babies were carried by his mother-in-law? </p>
<p>I hope everything works out for them and the babies grow up to be happy and healthy.</p>
<p>If my child already had children, then my answer would be “no.” And do not get me started on the wanting “kids of his own” thing. </p>
<p>For me this is all theory because it took several years and lots of medical assistance for me to carry my only child to term in my early 20s. Clearly, several decades on, I’m not a good choice. </p>
<p>I really hoped that my own child would not face infertility. But my son is gay and without getting into too much detail, that means that he and my future son-in-law will not be able to have a baby easily. There are so many ways to build a family and so I’m confident something will work should my son ever decide to parent but I wish it was going to be easier for him.</p>
<p>My first thought (honest!) was, “Isn’t that wonderful!”</p>
<p>2nd thought… Isn’t she too old for this? 56??? TRIPLETS???
3rd thought… Aren’t there other surrogates available?</p>
<p>4th and final thought… Is insurance paying for any of this? Should insurance pay for
any of this voluntary whacko stuff??? You know, we are all struggling to pay for
health insurance so that if we contract some dreadful disease we can get some decent
care without going into bankruptcy and these folks voluntarily enter into this strange
arrangement that is definitely going to cost a lot of money and very likely cost a huge huge
amount of money. Sorry, it just aint right.</p>
<p>Agree with nearly all the thoughts voiced on this thread. I can’t imagine asking my mom to bear my kids at age 56. Any way you look at it, it’s a huge risk for someone of that age (even in excellent health) to carry one, two or three babies to term.</p>
<p>The second point is that it seems unfair that we as a society will end up footing the bill that three preemies will end up costing with their increased medical issues and later all their other expenses. One firefighter and one nurse’s full-time salary will have a hard time paying bills for a family of 5 kids (including 3 preemies) and two adults. Who will pay for educatiion & colleges & those other things?</p>
<p>I would strongly suspect that insurance paid for the fertility treatments & medical care involved in the treatments and pregnancy and post natal care and the figures continue to grow! </p>
<p>There are so many struggling these days for basic necessities and medical care, it really seems unfair and selfish.</p>
<p>I don’t know–chronic health conditions can strike at surprising times. I was thought to be in perfect health until age 42 when we were all shocked to learn that things are not what they seem. I know of many others who have had similar unhappy discoveries/surprises. Being pregnant would subject baby & mom to that much more physical stress in greatly increase the risk of birth defects just because our bodies don’t really work quite the same at 56 as they did at 20-30, no matter how we dress or feel & what our pocketbooks say.</p>
<p>Wow. Tough audience. Never thought that because <em>I</em> might not do something, others shouldn’t!</p>
<p>And yeah, I think I’d at least consider this, even though I’m over 50, if I had a kid old enough to be a parent; by the time my kid is old enough to ask, however, I’ll be too old to consider it. (I had BETTER be too old to consider it, because he’s only 15 now!)</p>
<p>I can certainly understand one’s desire to have kids of his own; after all, don’t most of us have kids of our own?</p>