NEW YORK (NewsNation Now) — For the first time in history, the state of New York has made compensational surrogacy legal. The new law went into effect on Monday.
For New York couples like Alex and Kelly Cesare, surrogacy was their first choice to have a family of their own.
“We haven’t found a baby momma yet, but she’s out there,” Kelly Cesare said.
New York was previously one of a handful of states outlawing commercial surrogacy. The new law allows gestational surrogacy on a commercial basis.
Commercial surrogacy is when an intended parent enters a contract with a person who is not related to their embryo and offers financial compensation to have that person give birth to their child.
“Although we count our blessings daily and we are so thankful for all the gifts we have in this world, I’ve known since I was a teenager that carrying a child wouldn’t be an option for me,” Kelly explained.
Kelly has had congenital heart failure since birth. She said she had her first heart transplant when she was 2 ½ years old.
She survived the surgery, only to discover just a few years later that she had childhood cancer. Six months of chemotherapy and extensive treatments led to another miraculous recovery. But at age 11, her heart would fail again.
“I felt totally fine. I had no symptoms, no side effects and they found that my right coronary artery was 90% blocked and I received my second transplant within 10 days — 11 days,” Kelly said.
Her heart condition and medications prevent her from ever having children; so the couple started the journey of surrogacy.
“A lot of these women, they go out there and they are going to carry this baby for nine months for someone else. It’s probably the ultimate gift,” expressed Alex.
The couple says adoption is not out of the picture for them.
“We do want to adopt one day, but it was important for us for our first child to be genetically ours,” Kelly said.
