THERE IS unbridled happiness in Jacqueline Rhone's voice as she talks about her baby, due in May.

She does not know whether she is having a boy or girl, and does not want to know.

For her, just being able to get pregnant is a miracle.

Jacqueline, 44, and her 39-year-old husband, Jeremy, tried to have a baby for a year. The chances were not great.

Diagnosed with cancer just after she returned from her honeymoon in 2005, Jacqueline spent late 2005 and early 2006 being treated with chemotherapy for an aggressive cancer, non-Hodgkin's lymphoma.

"When I was told I had cancer, I cried like a baby. I cried for about four days," Jacqueline said.

"They did a blood test (after treatment) and said, 'You are still ovulating so crack on and have a baby'. But I was still trying and nothing was happening.

"Then I saw three doctors and one of them said to me, 'It would be a miracle if you got pregnant on your own'."

Chemotherapy

In 2007, a year after chemotherapy treatment, she again approached doctors about having a baby. Doctors told her that her best chance to get pregnant was through in vitro fertilisation (IVF), an assisted contraception technique to help couples who have difficulty conceiving.

According to the National Health Service (NHS), one in seven couples in the United Kingdom attempting to have a baby experience a delay in conception. During the IVF process, a woman's egg is surgically removed from the ovary, fertilised outside the body and then reinserted. Doctors in the UK referred the couple to Spain. But there they would have had to pay privately for treatment and work with doctors who, according to their research, had not spent much time working with couples of Caribbean descent.

Jacqueline and her information technology consultant husband, who are both of Caribbean heritage, were not happy.

Jacqueline told The Voice that she and her husband had been determined to find doctors who had worked with couples of Caribbean heritage.

"I thought, 'I am not taking this sitting down'," said Jacqueline, who has worked as a nurse for 24 years. "I said, 'I am going to do some research', and I started looking on the Internet."

IVF holiday packages

That is where she first saw that there were IVF holiday packages available, and that the Caribbean was a destination where couples like her and her husband could go to get help having a baby.

Her research brought her to the doors of the Barbados Fertility Centre (BFC) in Christ Church, Barbados.

She was drawn to the BFC for a number of reasons: not only was it in the Caribbean, but the centre was offering a luxury holiday package as part of the cost.

The centre also had more black egg donors and a much shorter waiting list - about three to six months, compared with the UK's two-to-three-year waiting list.

"I thought, 'Wicked! Barbados, Caribbean. I like that'," she said. "I also had to bear in mind that there were very little black egg donors in the UK.

My chances for getting a black egg donor were practically zero, so I would be waiting forever."

In January last year, Jacqueline started talking with the BFC, a US-accredited facility that offers a range of packages that allow couples to combine a relaxing holiday while getting help to become pregnant.

State-of-the-art building

By July, the centre offered Jacqueline, who underwent several IVF preparation tests, and Jeremy a spot in its state-of-the-art building in Hastings, Christ Church.

"They said, 'We may have found a donor for you'. I was elated. I said, "So soon?!'" By August, she was in Barbados.

A BFC spokesperson said of the centre: "Although the medical treatment always remains paramount, the team actively creates an environment of optimum 'stress reduction', which maximises the chance of success.

"The difference is that the Barbados Fertility Centre is surrounded by turquoise sea, dazzling white sandy beaches and exquisite weather, which create an ideal environment for stress-free IVF."

Jacqueline told The Voice she and her husband paid a much cheaper IVF rate of £3,000 plus another £3,000 for the trip.

For that price, the centre handled everything, including flight and hotel arrangements for the couple, IVF treatments, medication, a mobile phone preset with BFC's number, massages, and even escorted transfers to the centre for the treatments and to and from the airport.

"It was such an easy process. Nothing about the process was stressful at all," Jacqueline said. "It was so well organised. Everything ran smoothly."

11 days in Barbados

She and her husband spent 11 days in Barbados. They visited the clinic four times where she underwent screening and tests and had three fertilised eggs inserted.

Two of the eggs did not develop, but on August 29, she and Jeremy realised their dream when a pregnancy test gave them the green light.

"There was no overwhelming elation because I knew I was pregnant before we left Barbados. I was so confident that the IVF was going to work. Now I feel so blessed. I am so grateful. One heartbeat is there," she said. "I can't wait for the baby."

Jacqueline urges other black couples with fertility problems not to give up.

"There is an alternative out there. There is no reason why you can't go to the Caribbean," she said.

"They are so strict with screening. They screened us and they screened the donor as well. I would do it again. It was money well spent."

For more information, visit the Barbados Fertility Centre's website at www.barbadosivf.org.

Reproduced from The Voice, a British newspaper owned by The Gleaner Group. yourviews@gvmedia.co.uk