Happiness at last: After years of struggle, Sikeston couple welcome baby girl

SIKESTON — New mother Tate Warren of Sikeston will celebrate her first Mother’s Day on Sunday, but her journey to motherhood status wasn’t without its challenges.

Warren and her husband, Phillip, tried to get pregnant for three years and suffered a miscarriage along the way before their daughter, Sawyer Raye Warren, was born at 2:02 p.m. March 1 at Missouri Delta Medical Center in Sikeston.

“We couldn’t get pregnant,” Warren recalled. “We were going to a fertility doctor. We tried different fertility methods, and nothing was working. We were at the point where we had to decide if we wanted to do IVF (in-vitro fertilization) or traditional adoption.”

However, Warren said she really wanted to experience pregnancy if she could.

“My husband and I were talking one night about it, and I talked to a friend who had done IVF. She mentioned embryo adoption to me, and I basically told her no. I didn’t want to do that,” Warren recalled.

Then a couple hours later, Warren said she was talking to her former youth pastor’s wife, who mentioned embryo adoption to her.

“I was like no – but someone just mentioned it to me earlier,” Warren said. “Then I took a shower and got out of the shower, and my mom texted me.”

Warren’s mother told her a friend had just called her and wanted her to tell Warren about embryo adoption.

“So we were like: ‘OK, God. I guess we’re doing embryo adoption — because I never heard of this before and then three times within 24 hours people have said it to me!”

Warren laughed, and noted those mentions of embryo adoption are what kickstarted the couple’s quest to learn more about it. When couples go through IVF, sometimes there are fertilized eggs (embryos) that remain and are frozen for later use. Embryo adoption allows the genetic parents to give their embryos a chance for life by donating their embryos to someone else.

Her mother’s friend put Warren in touch with a contact at the National Embryo Donation Center, or NEDC, in Knoxville, Tennessee.

After some discussion, Warren said she and her husband decided to make an appointment with NEDC in December 2019.

“We filled out paperwork,” Warren said. “You have to have a home study done, just like in a traditional adoption. We did all that and had our initial appointment on Jan. 29, 2020. At that appointment they just check everything over.”

Then after that, the couple had to decide if they wanted to do an open or anonymous adoption.

“We decided we wanted to do an open adoption because we would like her to know her biological family, and if she has any siblings, we’d like her to know. We wanted to know for health reasons, too, if their kids ever need something or she needs something,” Warren said.

The couple went through the matching phase, and the Center gave them 250 parental profiles of couples with frozen embryos for open adoption. After looking through the parental profiles, the Warrens narrowed it down to one family.

The couple they chose are from Colorado and have the same interests as the Warrens. They even resemble them in looks, Warren said.

They had two embryos for adoption — a little boy and little girl. They had already been genetically tested,” Warren said.

The NDEC likes couples to have five or six embryos before they transfer, and the couple picked four embryos from a secondary donor from New Jersey, she said.

From there, the couple entered the consulting phase, and they were put in touch through a meditator with the donors and they decide what openness they want.

“Both of our donors were wonderful and said whatever you want is what we want,” Warren said, adding she and her husband are social media friends with their donor family. They send emails, texts, photos and would like to one day meet the family, but they will let their daughter make that decision, she said.

Once that was decided, Warren began taking medications, which included shots in her back and stomach and oral medications. The embryo was transferred to Warren’s uterus on June 25, 2020, in Knoxville, she said.

“They asked if we wanted to pick if it was a boy or girl, and we told them to pick but then tell us which one,” Warren recalled.

During the transfer, which took less than 30 minutes for the entire visit, they were told: “It’s a girl.”

Embryos are graded 1 through 6 with 6 being the best number and A-D with A being the best and D the worst, Warren said. Their daughter’s grade was 6AA, which is the highest grade, she said, adding the boy embryo was also graded high.

Less than two weeks later, it was confirmed Warren was pregnant.

She noted the donor couple’s situation had been similar to hers and her husband’s.

“They could not have children. They had miscarriages, and they did IVF. She was 37 and 39 at the time – so our daughter’s embryo was frozen for four years before they transferred her to us. She has a biological sister who is 3 and a biological brother who is 2,” Warren said.

The four embryos from the Warrens’ secondary donors have been frozen for 20 years. The secondary donor’s son is 19 years old now.

“Our daughter’s biological donors did IVF. They transferred a girl and have a daughter and they transferred a boy and have boy, and they decided they were done with their family. They had two embryos left, and your choices after IVF with embryos are: destroy them, donate them to science, keep frozen but pay a storage fee or give them up for donation/adoption. They sent them to the NEDC and gave them up for donation/adoption.”

By law, the embryos are considered property and they transferred the donor families transferred their property to the Warrens.

“Once she is transferred into me with the transfer process, she is biologically our child at that point,” Warren said of her daughter. “They have been doing some studies and think my DNA could pass on to her through touch DNA so she could have some of my features.”

Warren said she had a wonderful pregnancy.

“I can’t complain at all,” she said.

After the initial appointment and transfer, the Warrens didn’t have to return to Knoxville. They had to have a six-week ultrasound done at a fertility clinic and did that in St. Louis. Then they had to have a nine-week ultrasound done and it was conducted in Sikeston, Warren said. Her medication was monitored for 17 weeks by NEDC, and then she was fully released to her obstetrician in Sikeston.

Thirty-eight weeks and two days after the transfer, Sawyer was born via C-section since she was breach.

“She’s a good baby, too. She sleeps all night,” Warren said of her daughter..

Warren said she isn’t sure she would have achieved pregnancy had they not learned about embryo adoption.

“Technically, with us, our infertility was unexplained so they couldn’t tell us what was wrong. There was no reason we weren’t getting pregnant,” Warren said.

Also, with embryo adoption, NEDC gives couples three chances to achieve pregnancy. Once they achieve pregnancy, then they have three more chances.

“We plan to transfer her brother next summer,” Warren said.

Embryos that aren’t used can be released back to NEDC and another family could adopt them, Warren said. She noted there is an annual storage fee for embryos.

Compared to IVF, embryo donation costs half that of IVF, Warren said, adding there’s a higher probability rate of achieving pregnancy with embryo adoption than IVF.

Throughout the Warren home, there are decorations featuring different sayings and among the most prominent one is a sign and now blanket that says: “There will be miracles.”

“We took a picture – around this time last year before we transferred — on our front porch during COVID. We had gotten a sign from my grandma the Christmas before that said: ‘There will be miracles.’ We took a picture with that sign and it’s just kind of been our saying.”

Warren said she always knew God would give her and her husband a baby – somehow.

“She sure is a miracle,” she said. “I texted her donor family after she was born and during the whole pregnancy and sent them pictures. They’re wonderful. … In one text, she told me: ‘You did so good. She’s beautiful. Thank you so much for giving her life.’ … That was really sweet.”

In the meantime, Warren said she is looking forward to her first Mother’s Day. She is planning to spend with her family, who are also enjoying their newest member. Sawyer, who is the granddaughter of Marty and Kelly Williams and Marie Warren of Sikeston, is the first grandchild for both her and her husband’s families, Warren said.