News & Updates from I Want To Put A Baby In You!

Justine Witzke is the founder and CEO of Aligneage Fertility. Justine is an experienced strategist and operator having served in a variety of roles, including as head of clinical operations, at Weill Cornell Medicine’s Center for Reproductive Medicine. She is particularly proud of her work developing their fertility preservation program, expanding services to LGBTQ communities, and managing the department’s COVID-19 response, all of which required creative pragmatism. An expert generalist, Justine is passionate about sharing knowledge and information; she cares deeply about educating patients, colleagues, and the public. With interests in medical ethics, patient satisfaction, program development, and risk management, Justine is well-equipped to contribute as an advocate and thought leader in fertility. Additionally, she is a co-founder and the President of CP Extension, a non-profit organization aimed at supporting families of individuals with cerebral palsy.

A graduate of the University of Florida, Justine received a Master’s in Public Health from Hunter College with a focus on Community Health Education and a PhD in Clinical and Translational Research from the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai. Her dissertation was titled “Impact of Commercial Donor Sperm Preparation on Intrauterine Insemination Outcome.”

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Daniel Landau is the founder and executive director of Men’s Helpline, moderator of the MenTalk virtual peer support group, and host of the MenTalk podcast. A seasoned fundraiser and sales leader, Daniel has spent his career designing and implementing successful development and marketing strategies for mission-driven non-profits. Having experienced a pregnancy loss firsthand while he and his wife underwent IVF, Daniel created Men’s Helpline to help fill the critical gap in resources geared toward supporting men as they navigate infertility and pregnancy loss.

Steven J. Miller, a repeat guest on the podcast, obtained his Bachelor’s and Master’s Degrees in Psychology at Northern Michigan University. He is currently in the part-time MSW program at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Steven is an advocate for discussion among social workers about the impact of infertility on one’s mental health. Steven and his wife had struggled with infertility before being successful using In Vitro Fertilization, resulting in now almost five-year-old twin boys. Steven started his own podcast called MILES highlighting the male experience of infertility and family building. He joined Men’s Helpline as a board member in 2023. Men’s Helpline is a nonprofit whose mission is to provide emotional support to all men who struggle with miscarriage, and infertility. After his MSW, Steven plans to become a LCSW and specialize in Reproductive Mental Health and continue work with the nonprofit.

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Elizabeth Horn is a health care communicator and the cofounder and codirector of The ART of Infertility, for which she has curated more than thirty exhibits since its inception in 2014. The ART of Infertility was the 2018 recipient of the Hope Award for Innovation given by RESOLVE: The National Infertility Association for its work communicating patient experiences through arts programming. Horn lives with her family in Ann Arbor, MI.

Maria Novotny is an Assistant Professor of English at UW-Milwaukee. Her research considers how reproductive health patients advocate for care. Invested in community issues related to infertility, she co-edited the anthology Infertilities, A Curation (published by WSUP) which puts into practice “story as theory” by featuring visual and written narratives from over 60 contributors – each of whom self-identify as infertile. Other scholarship related to her community-engaged research and teaching has been published in the Community Literacy Journal, Reflections, Rhetoric Review, Rhetoric of Health and Medicine, TCQ and more. For the last 10 years, she has co-directed The ART of Infertility.

 Robin Silbergleid is a poet and nonfiction writer; She is the author of several books that are centrally concerned with infertility and recurrent reproductive loss, as well as single motherhood. Her current research project is a monograph tentatively titled Queer Mother Memoirs: Experiments in Life/Narrative that offers a hybrid critical-creative analysis of contemporary memoirs by and about queer mothers.  Born and raised in Illinois, she holds both a PhD in English and an MFA in Creative Writing from Indiana University. She is currently a professor of English and associate chair for undergraduate studies at Michigan State University. She lives in East Lansing, Michigan.

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Emily Westerfield is a surrogacy expert, passionate surrogacy advocate, and a five-time gestational carrier. As one of the Co-Founders and Gestational Carrier Program Director, Emily has helped hundreds of intended parents and surrogates throughout their journeys.

Emily is well-versed in the core processes and complexities along with the array of emotions associated with surrogacy. Her experiences have allowed her to share personal knowledge and expertise in consultations and the facilitation of journeys for both intended parents and surrogates, consistently setting them up for success.

During her illustrious career, Emily has partnered with specialists including obstetricians, gynecologists, urologists, and reproductive endocrinologists along with community hospitals around the northeast to grow awareness of surrogacy. Her strategic collaboration with Nir Keren birthed the launch of Carrying Dreams Surrogacy – an agency committed to providing comprehensive and unique experiences for intended parents and gestational carriers alike.

Emily is an ardent contributor to women’s health and development, bringing light and education around women’s fertility and surrogacy. Her work can be found featured in Women magazines and online news outlets including Women's Health, Today.com, Bustle, Thrive Global and Authority, among others.

She’s married to her supportive husband Max, the happy mother of three beautiful children and also an active gestational carrier having had the pleasure of bringing both singletons and multiples to couples and families across the country.

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Lisa has been a surrogate twice herself and understands exactly what it is like to give that gift to a couple that has been dreaming of a child for so long they thought it might never happen.

Lisa was honored when invited to Uganda to assist the government in creating ethical surrogacy legislation. Speaking from her perspective as the “Host Mother” it was clear that her motives were to protect the Host Mothers and create a structure that works for both the Intended Parents and Host Mothers.  

Lisa believes that families are the greatest gift and finances should not be the limiting factor to attaining your dream. By creating an ethical structure for surrogacy in Uganda, Lisa has helped create a safe, ethical, and affordable option. Host Moms Uganda is a surrogacy program that goes beyond simple compensation for services.

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Angela Rastegar is the founder and CEO of Sunfish Technologies founded in 2022, a financial platform focused on making parenthood affordable for all types of families. Sunfish’s mission is to bring financial inclusion to the ART (assisted reproductive technologies) community via a full service financial planning toolkit including loans, guarantees, grants, and guidance. Sunfish works directly with numerous IVF clinics, surrogacy agencies, and egg banks. The leadership team has expertise in health tech, fintech, consumer lending, and assisted reproduction. Angela has spoken at several recent events on the state of the economy and how it impacts consumer affordability in fertility, and the landscape of innovation on financial tools for assisted reproduction. Angela was most recently a Director at Circle Surrogacy and Egg Donation, and she holds a BA in Human Biology from Stanford University and an MBA from Stanford Graduate School of Business.

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Zach French is a bar certified attorney in the State of New York and currently serves as Vice President of SeedTrust. He provides oversight and support to the legal, sales and marketing departments.

Zach’s diverse background encompasses entrepreneurship, enterprise software sales, legal expertise, and most recently consulting in business development for emerging technologies including blockchain and AI. His wealth of experience is united by a core philosophy of building better connections within thriving ecosystems through education, sales, and strategy. With a high-level perspective, he identifies shared goals, develops effective communication strategies, and leverages technology to drive progress.

Zach’s connection to the ART world began when he and his wife, Alexandra, embarked on their own surrogacy journey, after Alexandra’s battle with breast cancer. The tremendous mental and financial toll from their journey led them to establish the Gift of Surrogacy Foundation (GSF). Within just one year, GSF has raised $100,000 and has given away a grant for the full cost of surrogacy. Zach and Alexandra firmly believe in expanding the surrogacy ecosystem, and continue to grow GSF through education, emotional support, and financial assistance.

At SeedTrust, we help families grow without the financial stress of the escrow process. We provide secure, transparent, affordable and reliable escrow services to intended parents, surrogates and egg donors throughout their collaborative reproductive arrangements allowing everyone involved the ability to focus on what matters most — building families.

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Amy Beckley has a PhD in pharmacology and has been a hormone scientist for 15+ years. Amy suffered 7 miscarriages. After 3 years of infertility, she successfully conceived. She took her experience and created a new type of fertility diagnostic to help couples navigate their fertility at home to increase their chances of pregnancy.

Amy digs into the science of getting pregnant to help individuals and couples have better conversations with their medical team and potentially get pregnant faster.

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David and James were united by love after meeting online in 2008. What began as a friendship slowly became a strong committed relationship that continues to grow. For the past six years they have been building a solid foundation for their future. As the years go by, they have created an amazing relationship that is unique and priceless by working together, sharing experiences with one another, mutual trust, understanding and love. While on their journey to parenthood, they experienced significant ups and downs, before finally bringing their beautiful Nia home.

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Mohsin Zaidi is an award-winning author and a criminal barrister. His coming-of-age memoir, “A Dutiful Boy,” explored growing up queer in a strict Muslim household in Britain. The memoir was named Book of the Year in The Guardian, GQ and New Statesman. Mohsin also won both the prestigious Lambda Literary Award and the Polari Prize in 2021. Mohsin is an advocate for LGBTQIA+ rights, BAME representation and social mobility. He sits on the board of Stonewall and is listed by The Financial Times as a top future LGBTQIA+ leader. Mohsin cannot wait to be a parent and for the chance to pretend he will do things entirely differently from his parents, before realizing they were right about more than he knew.

Dalia Iskander is a Medical Anthropology Lecturer at UCL. Her specialist research areas include the body and emotion; childhood and gender; and health related decision making. She and her husband recently had a child, and this experience has made her think differently about pregnancy and parenthood. Dalia comes from a British-Egyptian-Christian background and lives in London with her family.

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Kristin was born in Marlton, New Jersey and moved 9 times, including a stop in Denver where she discovered her love for performing at 11 years old. Creating shows in her driveway at a young age, she always knew she wanted to bring her creations to audiences everywhere. She was full of dreams and life and did everything in her power to make them come true.

Kristin and her husband started a non-profit organization in honor of their daughter, London Quinn, who was stillborn at 39 weeks in July 2021 through surrogacy.

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Jeremy Hodges has worked for the San Diego Zoo for 19 years. Much of this time was spent as an aviculturist in Hawaii where he managed a captive population of some of the most endangered birds on the planet. He currently works as the lead zookeeper for the veterinary hospital of the zoo. He throws exceptionally fancy and delicious dinner parties. He has introduced the family to raising chickens, bees, rabbits, and finches.

Alan was raised in Colorado and earned his BS degree in Microbiology from Colorado State University and his MD degree from Harvard University. He completed residency in General Psychiatry at the University of California, San Diego. He enjoys working in both graduate medical education and as a psychiatrist specializing in treatment resistant depression and addiction medicine. He serves as the family handyman, plays guitar and piano, and collects antique stereoscopic viewing cards.

Ian Jenkins earned his MD from the University of VA and completed residency in internal medicine at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center of Harvard University. Since 2004 he's served as a hospital doctor and faculty at UC San Diego Health, where he leads patient safety initiatives and teaches a medical school course and clinical practice to students and resident physicians. He's been active in healthcare quality on a national scale with his professional society and has given over 100 invited talks around the country. He writes as a hobby and published a memoir on his unique family, "Three Dads and a Baby," which made the news, podcasts, and morning shows on five continents. He's currently working on a hospital medicine memoir, "How to Die," and a young-adult romance, "Romeo and Julian." His home- made pizza is excellent.

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Kayla Weidner, a six-time egg donor, currently works as the Egg Donor Coordinator at The Genesis Group. Since joining the Genesis team, she has had the opportunity to connect with many other young women, share personal experiences, and guide them through the process of being a donor. Kayla has a passion for helping the LGBTQ+ community and has exclusively donated to gay men. Her experience as an egg donor and her three years in the industry have changed her life. Kayla looks forward to continuing to help others grow their families.

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Born and raised on the big island of Hawaii, Ashley Mareko knows the value of “ohana” (family), whether by blood or friendship. This strong tradition has been a guiding principle to Ashley as a 4-time(!) surrogate and through a career providing support to the surrogate community and intended parents. She feels blessed to be doing what she loves making a difference in people’s lives.

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Ralph Tsong has primarily practiced assisted reproductive technology law since 2016 when he started Tsong Law Group. Ralph is licensed in California, Illinois, Washington and Arizona. Prior to practicing ART law, Ralph was a labor and employment lawyer with the California Department of Fair Employment and Housing (now the California Civil Rights Department) and California Department of Industrial Relations. Ralph also was an attorney at Legal Aid Society of Los Angeles, the Asian Law Alliance, Wilson Sonsini and Littler.

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Sunshine Hanson is a driven and pragmatic mama, 3x gestational surrogate, and co-founder of Surrogacy Is alongside her amazing husband, Kyle. (And, as you may have guessed, her story is just as unique as her ever-changing hair!) She was a high school English teacher when she embarked on her first surrogacy journey, and she soon discovered that what the experience was lacking was both advocacy and direction. After working for two very different agencies, she realized that every agency (like every surrogate!) is unique, but some agencies are decidedly better than others! That’s where Surrogacy Is first began.

Built on the foundations of intention and community, Sunshine and Kyle brought Surrogacy Is to life and soon partnered with Casey Bojorquez to create the team and mission that’s thriving today. Sunshine currently lives in Georgia with her family. When she’s not guiding surrogates and sharing pieces of her story online, she can be found floating in the pool with her daughter or trying a new spot for brunch in Savannah!

Casey Bojorquez is a big-hearted wife, mama, two-time surrogate, and both Co-Owner and Vice President of Surrogacy Is… Which really means she’s the go-to lady for anything and everything related to surrogate connection and community. Casey joined forces with Sunshine and Kyle at the end of 2020 with the goal of providing a more comprehensive surrogate outreach and community focus to the company. Since the start of the partnership, she’s shifted the entire direction of Surrogacy Is and created a space where surrogates are truly advocated for and supported—every step of the way. When Casey’s not making waves for surrogates, she can be found spending time with her family, at the beach, or trying a new hiking trail!

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Dr. Julie Bindeman graduated from the George Washington University and is the co-owner of the practice Integrative Therapy of Greater Washington, a private psychotherapy practice located in Rockville, Maryland. As a result of her own reproductive story, she pursued post-graduate training in the field of Reproductive Psychology, where she actively writes, lectures, and presents on the topic. She has been on several committees for the Mental Health Professional Group of the American Society for Reproductive Medicine including serving as Chair of the Continuing Education Committee and a past chair for the Social Media committee, and a member of the Antiracism Task Force.

Dr. Bindeman is a member of a variety of organizations that are focused on Maternal Mental Health. She was appointed by the Governor of Maryland to serve on the Maternal Mental Health Task Force representing psychologists in the state. In 2014, Dr. Bindeman was honored to receive both the Woman Who Dared Award conferred to her by the National Council of Jewish Women and the Volunteer of the Year Award from the Maryland Psychological Association. In 2021, she was honored to receive Division 31 of the American Psychological Association’s Karl Heiser Award for advocacy. She authored a chapter in the book, “Psychological and Medical Perspectives on Fertility Care and Sexual Health” (Elsevier, 2021) as well as the book, “Prenatal and Preimplantation Diagnosis: The Burden of Choice” (Springer, 2015). Dr. Bindeman is the editor of a forthcoming book that will be published by Springer about Abortion.

Dr. Bindeman is a Certified Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing (EMDR) Therapist and received her training in 2017 from EMDR of Greater Washington. She retrained with the Institute for Creative Mindfulness and is an approved consultant who did her training under Dr. Mara Tesler-Stein. Dr. Bindeman became an approved consultant under Dr. Tesler-Stein as well. She knows EMDR to be a powerful modality that creates real and lasting change within people.

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Dr. Sunday Crider started her infertility profession after finishing a PhD in Cell Biology and Biochemistry from Texas Tech University. She worked as an Embryologist at Presbyterian Hospital of Dallas, as well as New England Medical Center in Boston, before coming back home to Texas to build two IVF programs as Laboratory Director. She has also served as off- site Director for New Directions Fertility Center in Phoenix and Cryobank America in Dallas.

Leaving the clinical environment in 2013, Dr. Crider began consulting in the surrogacy field as Chief Scientific Liaison, Case Manager, and co-owner of a surrogacy firm. Recognizing the need to offer a more personalized approach, she launched The Surrogacy Consultant in 2019. Between her IVF and Surrogacy years, she's been a part of building thousands of families.

Ethics in the surrogacy community are one of Dr. Sunday's top priorities. She is a member of the Society for Ethics in Egg Donation and Surrogacy (SEEDS), where she has acted as Vice President since 2021. During that time, she has served on the Standards Committee, drafting, and implementing guidelines and standards for surrogacy and egg donation.

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Anne Judge, DNP, WHNP-BC, ARNP is a Nurse Practitioner at Seattle Reproductive Medicine (SRM). Anne has worked at SRM since 2007 and has both a personal and professional connection to the field of reproductive medicine. She has a Bachelor’s degree in Human Biology from Stanford University, and a Bachelor’s degree in Nursing from the University of Washington, where she completed an honors research project on paternal infant attachment. Passionate about women’s health, Anne initially worked as a labor and delivery nurse, until her personal experiences with infertility inspired her to make a career change into reproductive medicine. Anne obtained her graduate degrees from Frontier Nursing University. She obtained a Master's and then Doctor of Nursing Practice degrees as a Women’s Health Nurse Practitioner in 2016/2017, with a doctoral project on fertility care for patients with obesity. Her other professional interests include the psychological components of infertility and male factor infertility. Anne also supports outreach efforts to increase community awareness of fertility assessment and fertility preservation. She is one of the creators and co-hosts of The Whole Pineapple Podcast, which focuses on wellness and fertility.

Ruby Booras is a board-certified Family Nurse Practitioner at Seattle Reproductive Medicine. She received her BSN from Montana State University and her DNP from the University of Washington. Ruby is a board-certified American College of Lifestyle Medicine Diplomat and is the creator/co-host of The Whole Pineapple podcast, which focuses on fertility and whole-person wellness.

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