The best ever gift My sister gave birth to my baby

“Family bond gave me a son I never thought I’d have.”

Bright-eyed bundle of fun Freddie Wright is mesmerised by the ice-blue lights twinkling on the Christmas Tree. With a sudden chuckle he reaches out to grab one, just as mum Kelly Yeats scoops him up and smothers him with kisses. “He loves to caper,” beams the proud, 34-year-old Scot.

From her place wrapping parcels on the floor of Kelly’s Aberdeen home, four-month-old Freddie’s auntie Laura laughs: “She can’t put him down. She’s been like that since the day he was born.”

The women share a special bond. Laura is not just Kelly’s sister she gave birth to Kelly’s son.

Surrounded by Christmas decorations and gifts for the baby who nearly never was, cancer survivor Kelly opens her heart about her fight for life, the illness that robbed her of the chance to give birth, and the surrogacy pact that has brought the sisters closer than ever.

Cradling Freddie in her arms, former logistics co-ordinator Kelly, who lives with her baby’s father, joiner Craig Wright, 27, says: “I was diagnosed with cervical cancer when I was 24. It was a real shock. I was so young.

“The doctors told me they could remove the cancerous cells by taking a wedge of tissue out of my womb in a procedure known as a cone biopsy. But there was no guarantee it would get them all and there was a chance the cancer would spread.

“They suggested removing my entire womb, but left the final decision to me. I opted for the hysterectomy. I wanted to be on the safe side.”

Kelly pauses, takes a deep breath, and continues: “It turns out I made the right choice. When they operated they found that the tumour was of such a size that I would have needed the hysterectomy anyway. Without surgery, I would have had little more than four months to live.”

Kelly’s surgery took place a week before her 25th birthday, but surgeons saved her ovaries so she could still produce eggs with the help of regular injections to boost her fertility.

Yet she reveals: “It was hard because I had always wanted children. I come from a big family I have two brothers and four sisters, two of whom are adopted.

“I had initially wanted to give birth naturally. I knew though that love for your children, whether they are adopted or biological, is the same. So I just thought I would adopt and that would be that.”

She adds: “On the day I was diagnosed and found out the treatment options, Laura came to the hospital to see me. She told me that if I could not carry and deliver a baby myself, she would do it for me.

“She was 22 at the time, pregnant and having a really hard time with it.

“I couldn’t believe what she was offering, but I knew she meant it and it meant the world to me.”

Despite gratefully agreeing to the arrangement Kelly did nothing about it. Even after she met the love of her life she was reluctant to call in the promise.

Kelly says: “At first I shoved it to the back of my mind. After I met Craig I didn’t have the heart to ask Laura to do something as huge as that. She has three children of her own and two foster children. I felt it was too much to ask. But when Craig and me had been together a couple of years, she asked again if we wanted to have a child. It was the most wonderful thing anyone could have done for us.”

The couple sought the help of the Aberdeen Fertility Centre where doctors took three eggs from Kelly and fertilised them with Craig’s sperm.

“With the full support of Laura’s husband Andy, the first egg was implanted in her womb in a procedure that is said to have less than a 30% chance of succeeding,” Kelly says.

“Unsurprisingly it failed. But they were undaunted and tried again this time successfully. The whole process, from initial IVF appointment to implantation, took nearly four years.

Little Freddie Christie Wright (named after his great-grandfathers) came into the world by Caesarean section on July 28 his own great-grandad’s birthday weighing a healthy 8lb 9oz.

Kelly recalls the moment she first saw the son she never dreamed she could have: “The nurse pulled aside the curtain separating us from Laura and let us see Freddie being born. The surgeon turned him to us so we could see if we had a boy or girl as we didn’t want to know during the pregnancy. It was one of the only things we had complete control over.

“A nurse asked Craig if he wanted to cut the cord but he couldn’t do it, so I did. Then Freddie was handed to me.”

Her voice falters slightly as she says: “The feeling of holding him and knowing he was mine was the best feeling in the world. I never want to be apart from him.”

Craig then cradled his son while the sisters chatted before the couple left the theatre. They returned a little later with Freddie so that Laura could have the first of many cuddles with her nephew.

Laura, mum to Ellie, 9, Maisie, 7, and Lennon, 4, says: “People ask how you feel when you give birth and hand the baby over to someone else, but I always knew he was not my baby, he was my sister’s. I had all of my own children naturally, so Freddie’s birth by Caesarean felt more like a procedure.”

She smiles: “Seeing Kelly and Craig with Freddie for the first time made it all worthwhile.”

Laura stayed in hospital for three days, but Kelly and Craig were allowed to take their new baby home just six hours after he was born.

Says Kelly: “It was the most amazing time. I can’t describe how it felt. Laura has given us the greatest gift anyone could give.

“There are not words enough to say how thankful we are. Our son is everything to us. Laura and me were always close, but her gift to us has made us even closer.”

And she reveals: “Not long after we got home from hospital Craig put a specially printed T-shirt on Freddie. It read: ‘Mummy, Will You Marry My Daddy?’ It was the most beautiful proposal.”

The couple, who have yet to set a wedding date, are taking their son on holiday to Florida next year where they’ll mark his first birthday with a family party and a trip to Disney World.

But first there is Christmas.

Says Kelly: “This will be the best Christmas ever it is Freddie’s first so it will be special.

“But we are looking forward to all the others that will follow as our baby boy grows.