Georgia Barrington has just been madrebut it was not she who gave birth to her daughter. That moment belonged to her best friend, Daisy Hope, who carried the baby in her womb after a promise they made to each other as a teenager.
These two women have been inseparable their entire lives. They consider themselves “soul sisters” and have grown up together, with their parents being best friends.
Their childhood closeness would later become the basis for an act of generosity that changed their lives.
At age 15, Georgia was told something no young woman expects to hear: she had been born without a uterus and would never carry a child.
The diagnosis, Mayer-Rokitansky-Küster-Hauser (MRKH) syndrome, affects approximately 1 in 5,000 women, and for Georgia, it was as if her future had been rewritten in an instant.
“It was devastating, my whole world collapsed,” he remembers. “I always grew up thinking I would be a mother, but he was taken away from me and everything I ever dreamed of was gone.”
Georgia’s family helped her come to terms with the diagnosis, as did her childhood best friend, Daisy Hope.
Daisy was not particularly maternal at the time and vividly remembers the diagnosis and how unfair it seemed to her that her friend, who had always wanted to have a child, couldn’t.
“I wanted her to feel good and, to give her hope that it wasn’t the end of the world, I told her that one day I would carry a baby for her,” she says on the BBC podcast. Ready to Talkpresented by Emma Barnett.
“I don’t think I understood what he was saying then, but I always knew this was something I was going to do for Georgia.”
More than a decade later, Daisy kept her promise and in 2023 both women began the In Vitro Fertilization (IVF) process.
Georgia had trained as a midwife, immersing herself in a world she feared she could not be a part of.
“I was once asked if this was the right career for me,” he says. “But it actually helped me heal and deep down I knew I was going to have a child one way or another.”
Years later, Daisy had her first child, with Georgia as her midwife, and becoming a mother strengthened her conviction to keep her promise.
“The love I felt for my daughter was incredible and I thought everyone should be able to feel the same,” she says.
She admits that she was a little naïve at first, as she had an uncomplicated pregnancy and therefore “took for granted that everything would go smoothly again.”
She became pregnant with the first embryo and everything seemed to go smoothly, and both women allowed themselves to believe that the future they had imagined was finally happening. But an ultrasound at seven weeks revealed an empty uterus.
Georgia remembers the moment the nurse told her she couldn’t see anything on the ultrasound.
“I felt a sense of discouragement and all hope vanished,” he says.
“I had never felt that sadness in my life and I thought it was my fault,” admits Daisy, who was overwhelmed by grief, feeling like she had let her friend down, while Georgia struggled to understand that even her most promising attempt had not been successful.
They both agree that what was supposed to be one of the happiest days of their lives turned into one of the worst, and a week later it was confirmed that the embryo had not become a baby.
Still, they tried again, and the second time, something felt different, as Daisy says: “When I found out I was pregnant again, I thought the world couldn’t be so cruel twice.”
Six weeks later, they both sat in a hospital room holding their breath as a small heartbeat appeared on the screen, but later that day, Daisy began bleeding profusely.
“I thought it was happening again and I was terrified,” she says.
She bled for six hours and was convinced she had suffered a miscarriage, but when doctors checked her, the heartbeat was still present and the pregnancy came to term.
Daisy went into labor a little earlier than expected and gave birth to a baby girl a few months ago.
Georgia was so overwhelmed at the time that she “forgot to check the sex of the baby.”
“As soon as I saw the baby’s head, I went crazy and we cried.”
She says she still finds it hard to believe she actually has a child and wishes she could “take advantage of this moment and have him when I was 15, sitting in the GP’s office.”
While Georgia talks about how “lucky and grateful” she feels, Daisy says she always knew she would help her best friend in any way she could.
“We have this bond that no one will ever have with their friends because we’ve been through something very personal,” Daisy says, adding how special their friendship is.