'Always Gave Us Hope': Fertility Doctor Does Special Photo Shoot With Babies He Helped Create
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WAYNE, Pa. (CBS) -- The heartbreak of infertility has turned around for one Main Line couple as their new family had a special moment with the doctor who made it all possible.
Fertility doctors help create babies, but don't usually get to meet them. That's changing now thanks to a portrait studio in Wayne.
Sophia and Liam Barbosa are energetic 14-month-old twins. They are the babies their parents, Jamie and Leo Barbosa, worried they'd never have.
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"It's just so emotional because just the struggles, the struggle that we went through," said mother Jamie Barbosa.
Barbosa says there were four pregnancies that didn't last and multiple rounds of IVF – all orchestrated by Dr. Michael Glassner of Main Line Fertility.
"He was just in our darkest hour, made us laugh, in our darkest hour, always gave us hope," said Barbosa.
Something special coming up #cbs3 at 6, Dr. Glassner @MLFertility gets to meet twins he created during an emotional photo shoot at Ivory Tree Portraits. @storyrd @CBSPhilly pic.twitter.com/1pSISpBBgU
— Stephanie Stahl (@StahlCBS3) October 3, 2018
After three years, when that hope turned into babies, that's when Glassner's interaction ends and he usually never meets the babies he creates.
"Out of consideration for our existing patients, we don't have children come in during normal office hours," said Glassner.
That changed as Glassner met the Barbosa twins and the special moment happens at the Ivory Tree Portrait studio.
"To see those two little babies and to remember those moments of despair and those moments of sadness and, you know, you see people devastated with news of miscarriages and to be able to turn around and see, you know, the shine in Jamie's eyes and to see the smile on the kids' faces, it's special that I get to do this," said Glassner.
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Studio owner Lara Aman Mattey came up with the idea.
"This is a really safe space for the doctors to meet these miracles that they helped create," said Mattey.
The doctor-family meetings are photographed. Barbosa says she'll eventually share them when she explains to her children their special beginning.
"I just think it's important to be truthful and that they understand the struggle and how much they were wanted and loved and how much he helped us," she said.
Ivory Tree Portraits donates the photos to the families.
Main Line Fertility, which has a state of the art lab onsite, has produced 50,000 babies.