Nurse joins IVF clinic after baby success

Kirsty (L) and her wife Jess had baby Nora in April 2020 after seven rounds of IVF

A nurse is hoping to help same-sex couples become parents by working for the clinic that helped her become a mother.

Jess Abel, 34 went through seven rounds of IVF over three years to give birth to baby Nora last year.

She and her wife, Kirsty, 36, first discovered their fertility options through the Bristol Centre for Reproductive Medicine.

Jess was so pleased with the support from the clinic, she joined the team.

The assistant nurse practitioner for egg donation said: "I've gone from working with people with dementia to working at the clinic where we made Nora.

"I find it so rewarding being able to talk to the women going through treatment and being able to speak to them from personal experience."

"She is a little bit of both of us," her mother Jess said

The couple, from Bristol, received counselling from the clinic after losing a baby.

Kirsty said: "That in itself, because of the amount of pressure and preparation to go through IVF, was devastating."

They were down to their seventh and last embryo when Jess fell pregnant and gave birth last April.

"If we were to look back on it, through all the heartache, we didn't think this day would come, that we would have her, bringing a new chapter to our lives," Kirsty added.

"We would do it all again."

Talking about 15-month-old Nora, Jess said: "You couldn't have wished for a better character in a baby. She's a little bit of both of us."

The couple said although IVF put them through heartache "they would do it all again"

The Bristol Centre for Reproductive Medicine at Southmead Hospital has seen an rise in same-sex couples looking to become parents.

It offers intra-couple donation, where the eggs of one partner are fertilised and then implanted in the other who carries the baby to term.

Consultant in reproductive medicine Amanda Jefferys said: "For two women there doesn't seem to be a fertility issue and the same for single women. Statistically they seem to have a very good chance of success and across all treatment types."