The Citizen, 2018-05-17, Page 11THE CITIZEN, THURSDAY, MAY 17, 2018. PAGE 11.
Local surrogacy website boasts 100 babies per year
In it together
Sally Rhoads -Heinrich (centre, in the white blouse) has
been at the head of Surrogacy in Canada Online for nearly
20 years. During that time, her organization has helped
families looking to expand with surrogate mothers,
By Shawn Loughlin
The Citizen
Working out of her home at RR1,
Londesborough, Sally Rhoads -
Heinrich and her company
Surrogacy in Canada Online have
helped hundreds of families to grow
since 2001.
Rhoads -Heinrich was one of the
first to the table in Canada as far as
connecting would-be parents with
potential surrogates over the
internet. She created the resource
website in 2001, in the early days of
the internet, and the service has only
expanded in recent years.
The website has since evolved to
match over 100 potential parents and
surrogates every year, operating on
the model of a dating site. So far
in 2018, 30 babies have already
been born with another 40 on the
way.
Rhoads -Heinrich lives in the
Londesborough area with her
husband and children, where they
also have a cash crop farm with corn,
soybeans, wheat and specialty beans.
When she was just 21, Rhoads -
Heinrich opted to venture into the
world of surrogacy herself after
having her first child.
During this time, Rhoads -Heinrich
found herself on a number of
internet forums and she saw a large
number of prospective parents
frustrated with a number roadblocks
on the way to starting a family.
Whether it was infertility or
challenging adoption experiences,
would-be parents were having
trouble starting a family, she said,
and she wanted to help.
After her first pregnancy, Rhoads -
Heinrich said she was happy to
sacrifice nine months of her life to
help another family. The pregnancy
was very easy, she said, and she
wanted to help others find the life -
changing love she found with her
first child.
While pregnancy was a smooth
process for her first child, Rhoads -
Heinrich said her most recent
pregnancy (she has four children)
was more difficult. Had her most
recent pregnancy been her first, she
may not have decided to become a
surrogate.
She decided to put her name out as
a surrogate mother and was
resulting in hundreds of babies being born. Rhoads -Heinrich and
many of her surrogate mothers are seen here recently at their
annual surrogate mother retreat, which was held in Benmiller.
(Photo submitted)
contacted by hundreds of potential
parent matches. Rhoads -Heinrich
said she wanted to find the perfect
match and she did so with a couple
from Maryland who had experienced
tremendous loss as the result of a
motor vehicle collision.
The mother was nine months
pregnant with twins at the time of
the collision. She lost her children
and had to have a hysterectomy,
rendering her infertile.
They had a low chance at
surrogacy, Rhoads -Heinrich said,
with only four of the woman's
embryos in storage, but Rhoads -
Heinrich became pregnant with
twins when the embryos were
created and transferred to her body.
Delivering those twins in
December, 2000 in Stratford,
Rhoads -Heinrich says, was a pivotal
moment in her life.
She became close with the family
in the months leading up to the birth
and was so happy for them.
She created a blog around that
time to keep the family, as well as
others updated on the process, which
turned out to be the precursor to her
current website.
The joy of a family
Sally Rhoads -Heinrich, seen here holding a pair of twins born through her Surrogacy in
Canada Online program, has been working at surrogacy for nearly two decades helping
families across the country and from around the world to have children. (Photo submitted)
After her first experience as a
surrogate, Rhoads -Heinrich was
inundated with correspondence from
both sides of the pregnancy. Not
only was she hearing from would-be
parents looking for surrogates, but
she was also hearing from women
who wanted to become surrogates.
She developed a resource website
that served to answer questions
about surrogacy and lead people to
get involved.
After her first surrogacy
experience, Rhoads -Heinrich would
spend the next eight years
unsuccessfully attempting to be a
surrogate mother once again. In
2005, she almost died from an
ectopic pregnancy which ruptured
one of her Fallopian tubes. She
retired from being a surrogate
mother in 2008.
The website, Surrogacy in Canada
Online at surrogacy.ca, eventually
evolved, however, to what Rhoads -
Heinrich has described as following
the dating site model. It provides a
place for would-be parents and
surrogates to list their profiles in the
hopes of finding a match that may
result in the growth of a family.
Once a couple is matched with a
surrogate — the matching is up to the
couple and the surrogate, Rhoads -
Heinrich says, she isn't legally
allowed to match -make as part of the
process — Rhoads -Heinrich then
provides any advice or resource that
is needed.
Once a match is made, Rhoads -
Continued on page 20
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