Surrogate to Bear Child for Couple’s Lost Daughter

ANAHEIM HILLS — Before Jean and Howard Garber had even buried their daughter, the letters began to arrive.

Now, after an international plea that generated more than 80 responses, Jean and Howard Garber have found a surrogate mother to carry the fertilized eggs of their daughter, who died from leukemia in December.

If the pregnancy is successful, experts say, it will be the first time a surrogate child has been born to a mother after her death.

“This is delightful and exciting, but when we think about Julie we cry,” Howard Garber, 68, said.

“No one will ever replace Julie,” Jean Garber, 62, said.

Before Julie Garber, 28, of Anaheim Hills underwent radiation treatment for her cancer, she had 16 eggs removed. Twelve of those were fertilized with donor sperm, then frozen, so that she could have a child when she recovered. She never did.

The Garbers went public in the media and on “Oprah,” searching for a woman to carry their grandchild. With responses from Oregon to India, they settled on a Southern California woman in her early 20s and are paying her $15,000 for acting as a surrogate.

She has three chances to become pregnant, with four implanted embryos each time. The first embryos will be implanted within six weeks. If a baby is born, the Garbers said the surrogate will not be involved in the child’s life.

The Garbers would not release her name, but said she was a working mother of two and in very good physical condition.

They screened the applicants for caring women with supportive husbands. For those women with offspring, they made sure the children were well-behaved. They wanted a surrogate who had already had easy pregnancies and deliveries and enjoyed being pregnant.

“These girls were vying for the opportunity to be our surrogate. This outpouring of love from these women was just overwhelming,” Jean Garber said. “There is so much goodness out there.”

Loran Breazeal was folding clothes in her Rosamond home when she saw the Garbers on the news and felt an “unbelievable urge to help,” she said. She wrote them a letter and offered to be a surrogate for free, but medical tests later revealed that she had a deformed uterus, which might limit her chances of getting pregnant.

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“Life is the most wonderful gift you could ever give anyone,” Breazeal said. “I feel that Julie deserves to be a mother because I know how wonderful it is to be a mom.”

The Center for Surrogate Parenting & Egg Donation in Beverly Hills turned down the Garbers’ request for help. Center director Bill Handel said he was uncomfortable with the Garbers’ situation because the mother was single, and he questioned who would raise the child.

“It is not a question of morality or who should or shouldn’t be parents,” Handel said. “We deal with couples. We wouldn’t have done it if she were a live, single mom.”

Handel said it was common for women with cancer to freeze their eggs before radiation, but only if they have a good prognosis from their doctor. He said he turned away the Garbers because they wanted to create a grandchild for themselves.

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“The purpose of freezing genetic material is not to create progeny after death,” Handel said. “The purpose is so [the mother] can have kids after the treatment.”

Jean Garber said a grandchild would be a part of their daughter they could hold on to and also an example for other women who have cancer and would like to have their own children.

“They turned us down because we were not the traditional infertile couple, without looking at us as a family unit and what we could provide,” she said. “That was very painful to me.” A couple in the Garbers’ extended family will raise the baby in Southern California. The child will have brothers and sisters and be part of a “good, loving family,” Jean Garber said.

“This baby will enter the world wanted, loved and cared for,” Howard Garber said. “So why would anyone be opposed to these types of things?”