Queensland woman with 14 miscarriages left heartbroken after surrogate couple changes their mind about baby

A Queensland woman’s long-awaited dream of motherhood has been heartbreakingly shattered, just hours after the birth of the baby she believed would be hers.

Kirby Hood, a 36-year-old photographer from the Gold Coast, was left devastated after the surrogate she had trusted changed her mind at the eleventh hour, ordering Ms Kirby out of the hospital and deciding to keep the child.

After 12 agonising years of infertility and 14 tragic pregnancy losses, Ms Hood thought her nightmare had ended when an “experienced surrogate” promised her what seemed like a once-in-a-lifetime miracle. Instead, it became her most painful heartbreak yet.

“I trusted her, and she kept my baby after leading me on for nine months, believing that the baby would be coming home with me,” Ms Hood told Daily Mail Australia.

“My baby was born in February, and I’m only just coming up for air.

“I have everything in writing. The card she gave me offering to be my surrogate, the paperwork from the lawyers, and all the texts.”

Throughout the pregnancy, Ms Hood was deeply involved — attending doctors’ appointments, watching ultrasound scans, and covering all medical expenses, all with the full encouragement and support of the birth mother.

She even celebrated every milestone in the lead-up to the birth, hosting a baby shower, revealing the baby’s gender, and sharing her emotional journey to motherhood on social media.

Ms Hood told the Daily Mail that she had hoped to keep the surrogacy journey private at first.

But when she shared that with the surrogate, the woman responded with a cutting remark: “Oh, you are one of those, are you?”

“She said she didn’t go through all of this for me not to experience things like a gender reveal party, and it made me feel guilty, so I had those things as much for her as me,” Ms Hood said.

“She even came to the gender reveal party and met all my friends and family who were all so clucky and wanted to touch her tummy and fuss around her.”

Ms Hood first met the surrogate in 2019, when she was having her third child.

“I was called into the hospital to take photos of the siblings and meet the baby,” she said.

“In September 2021, the woman rebooked for some family photos, and in 2022, I was booked again as the woman was entering her first surrogacy journey, and I was hired as her photographer to capture her first surrogacy birth.”

Ms Hood said she trusted the woman because she had personally witnessed her carry out a previous surrogacy with integrity.

“I physically witnessed, felt, experienced her hand a baby to another family that had longed for this moment in their life,” she said.

Meanwhile, Ms Hood continued her own journey to motherhood. She underwent an embryo transfer using embryos donated by a generous family she’d met through an IVF group.

“I met a beautiful family through an IVF group, and they kindly donated them for me, but in 2023, I suffered a miscarriage,” she said.

In the days following her loss, a surprising encounter brought the future surrogate back into her life.

“During the early days of my loss I made an Uber Eats order and the surrogate’s sister was the Uber Eats driver,” she said.

“She said to her sister, ‘Hey it’s Kirby your photographer friend — jump in the car and come for a run to drop this order off.’”

Ms Hood was resting when her mother came into the room.

“I was lying in bed and my mum came in and said, ‘Kirby, someone is at the door for you — she says she is a birth mum.’”

When she answered the door, it was the surrogate.

“I went out and it was the surrogate, and we hugged and I cried. She had a package with chocolates and magazines and flowers, and a card.”

The card read, “When the time comes, you know I’m good for it. Love to be your surrogate.”

The pair remained in contact about a possible surrogacy arrangement, but over time, Ms Hood began to pull away, unwilling to risk yet another heartbreak.

Then, everything changed with one unexpected phone call.

“It was July 12, 2024....my surrogate Facetimed me, and I said I was done, I was out, my heart can’t take much more heartbreak.

“And she held up a pee stick and said, ‘Well, you can, because you are having a baby!’ I was just mind-blown.”

Startled and confused, Ms Hood asked if the woman had gone ahead with an embryo transfer without telling her.

“She explained she had accidentally fallen pregnant with her husband, but they do not want another child,” Ms Hood said.

“At first I was cautious — how does this work? How does this happen? I’m pretty sure you can’t just cook a baby for someone and just hand it over.

“Aren’t there laws? I only knew of the laws of surrogacy (not adoption).”

Ms Hood said the woman had been an egg donor previously and had shown her photos of families that were successful from her donations.

“We’d talked in depth about how she felt seeing those children, and she was just so exceptional on the whole donor process.”

Ms Hood said she sought legal advice as the situation had changed from a standard surrogacy to an agreement to hand over a baby that was both conceived and carried by the birthing mother.

The Queensland adoption hotline reportedly explained that if the parents didn’t want to keep her, the baby had to go to foster care and would be placed with a registered family after an assessment.

When Ms Hood called the woman to pass on the disappointing news, she already had another plan.

“She told me that was rubbish and that I can be on the birth certificate as a same-sex couple, and so with a lawyer we drew up parentage orders,” she said.

“As part of that, you can legally name (the child) before birth so it’s in the paperwork. I named her Xanthe, and we agreed I was going to be at the birth.

But a few weeks before the birth, Ms Hood was asked to meet the couple, where they told her they no longer wanted her at the birth.

It was at this point Ms Hood started to have major doubts, wondering if the couple had changed their minds about handing the baby over to her.

On the day of the birth, she received a text to tell her the baby had arrived, and she drove to the hospital, unsure of what to expect when she got there.

“Things felt off, and I knew it wasn’t happening,” she said.

Ms Hood still went to the hospital out of hope and desperation, but when she arrived, she was asked to leave by the staff.

“The hospital went into lockdown as if I was a danger,” she said. “I just left and bawled in my car.”

Two days later, the woman told Ms Hood that Child Services were involved.

After weeks of trying to track the woman down, Ms Hood discovered the couple had decided to keep the little girl.

“Someone sent me a screenshot of the surrogate’s Facebook where she had announced the birth of her little girl,” she said.

“I wasn’t angry, just hurt. If they changed their minds, why didn’t they just tell me?”

“Of course, I would have been upset, but I would have understood. I know how hard it is to lose a baby. I would have understood.”

Ms Hood has not heard from the couple since March, and they have refused her requests that they refund the thousands of dollars she had spent on medical costs and baby equipment.

“They said they will see me in court,” she said.