Infertility, adoption and surrogacy are often considered difficult conversations, probably because of the illogical taboos around it and the trauma it may cause. However, these issues need to be normalised. In an interview recently, actor Sunny Leone opened up about her struggles with surrogacy.
In 2018, Sunny Leone and her husband decided to have kids via surrogacy and welcomed the twins Noah and Ashar. The couple also adopted a girl named Nisha. The actor shared that after a year-and-a-half of trying to conceive via IVF, it became ‘heartbreaking’ for her. And that’s when they registered for adoption. She said:
“It took about a year-and-a-half from start to finish and during that time, before we decided ‘hey, why don’t we just adopt?’, surrogacy wasn’t going as planned. We had six eggs – four girls and two boys.
She pointed out that in India, she tried to go for IVF but could not conceive. She shared that that phase was heartbreaking for her and she felt like a failure at times.
During that time, she and her husband, Daniel, were visiting an orphanage in Mumbai and thought of adopting. She said:
We went there and we were seeing all these babies and I was like, ‘Why can’t we just adopt a baby? What is the difference? She is still ours’. We are not connected genetically but we will be connected through our hearts.
After they adopted Nisha, the couple found out they were expecting twins in the same week. Now isn’t that a happy ending?
Genetics do not maketh a parent and kudos, to Sunny Leone for starting this conversation that so many people hesitate to have.